Flashes of Panic

I think I could set the tone of the weekend by explaining how I remembered all my various cables, battery chargers, etc. but neglected to actually put my laptop in my bag. Fortunately, I didn’t actually need it. (The absent-mindedness continued to the point where I actually went for a run this morning wearing a heart-rate monitor chest strap, but didn’t realize until I was a mile in to the run that not only was I not wearing the receiver, but it was in Amherst.)

My job, for the second year, was to sit in the back of the ESPN production trailer and be the conduit for information from the bicycle spotters on the course (the guys in orange vests, if you were watching on TV) to the production crew. This entailed meeting with the spotters and production crew on Saturday (between weddings) then the production people Sunday (to verify that all the hardware was working, I knew how to work the intercom in the production space, etc. etc.)

I turned down an offer to reprise my old role writing Runner’s World’s race updates at the last minute, though my successor there did buy me lunch. (And I still got in at the private party they throw annually, though there has been a lot of turnover in the old office and the folks at the door didn’t know me. Nice party, if loud; I get distracted talking to old friends by counting the various Olympic and World medals in the room.)

Today I turned out just after 7 to “see off” my spotters. They loaded up with the wheelchair athletes for the ride out to Hopkinton; I checked in and confirmed that I was ready to listen (unlike last year, when I’d spent the night dealing with food poisoning and turned up to deliver the message that if they couldn’t hear me, it was because I was out throwing up on Exeter Street.) I delivered two economy-sized bags of Jolly Ranchers and Life Saver Gummies for them. They’re going to be on bikes for three hours; if I want them to keep talking to me, I need to keep their blood sugar up. Went for a run, checked out of the hotel, and headed to the truck.

We had a 10:30 check in with the riders, and it was a train wreck. First, we can’t hear them at all. (We’re on a cell call with the lead rider, who was also the only spotter for the women’s marathon in St. Louis.) Then, we can hear them, but they can’t hear us. Finally, it develops that this technology is at the CB level where, if someone has their talk key down, nobody else can talk. So if someone puts their radio in their carry pocket in such a way that the talk key is down… well, the rest of us aren’t talking until they get off the air.

In this way we limp through the race. I stare wide-eyed at the four moving cameras (one pickup truck and one motorcycle with each race, men and women) watching for mile markers and tapping the guy updating the “bug” which shows what mile they’re on. Nicole, beside me, is plugging times into a spreadsheet and producing mile splits, projected finishes, and stuff like that. And talking with the lead spotter, who is phoning in splits from the women’s race with the most reliable communication device we have, his cell phone. Not too bad; I know for fact that we got three or four good bits to put on the air.

And then there was the time when the entire TV compound lost power for two or three minutes. So, our communication issues were really pretty minor.

Maybe more on this later. It feels a bit disjointed. If I’ve left out bits which are important for understanding the whole, comment and I’ll try to get to it later, because the nice thing about live TV is that when it’s over, I don’t have a story to write!