The race was on, no joke. The congestion seemed to get worse as night fell even though by now we had gotten far from the unsupported race route. It became a cutthroat competition with 2,710 miles to go! On the sweltering pitch black desert floor, teams jockeyed for position for the legal five foot pull off. The long, straight road offered few pull offs and was tightly sandwiched between deep loose sand. The battling teams ate up the possibilities and created a chaotic scene. Many teams were executing dangerous transitions as bikers and cars tangoed along the shoulder of Highway 78. Teams were now closely followed by their support vehicles and were riding up on top of each other rather than allowing the 100 meters required by race rules. It seemed like everyone except us was doing rolling exchanges although not very well. I think they meant to be legal, but needed more practice or didn't anticipate the chaos of other riders. I for one did not expect it to be this tight this far into the race. It was pretty exciting, but I'm not sure if I could have handled the intensity for seven straight days. If everyone continues to use two vehicles eliminating the need to stop to do a transition we could end up dropping more than 30 minutes every single night. We'll see how it plays out, but I'm afraid our strategy might be too conservative in this tight a race.
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