I’ve got really sore legs from all the running and climbing!
Jacqueline Windh / 16.08.2007
About the route:
I’m just back from a two-week tour through three states. We’ve been to Colorado, Wyoming, and Montana, and we’ve got three great race routes designed. We did not make it to Idaho but are keeping in close contact with our course designer and the state personnel. We’ll announce which state and region we’ve chosen in mid-September. We want to have a back-up route ready anyway, in case any of the permitting falls through, or in case there are problems with forest fires or anything.
Colorado is great, with all of those 14,000’ peaks, and Danelle Ballengee has designed us a great course there. We’ve got great cooperation from the state government authorities, and are still working on some of the permitting issues there. We have two other designers who’ve created the Idaho and Montana routes, and everything is going really smoothly in those states too, as far as permitting and government cooperation, and we’ve also got a lot of cooperation from the local resorts in those states too.
It’s been a fun trip. We did five or six climbs, including Long’s Peak, a 14,000 footer. I’ve got really sore legs from all the running and climbing!
About funding:
It’s been a challenge funding the race for this year. Denise Watkins, who is one of the most generous and giving people I know, has been supporting this race privately to the tune of millions of dollars per year. It costs about $4 million to put the race on, and she’s paid $3 million of that each year. She told me that she just cannot keep doing it, and she offered for me to take it over. So I had to find a way of putting on a $4 million race with a budget of $1 million...
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