Yesterday: I spoke with one of Richard Assen's crew, who advised that they had driven (8-1/2 hours each way) to visit him in the hospital. They said he was alert and cheerful and that he would be flying home to Australia soon for recovery, rather than staying here in Bolivia.
The wind subsided.
And that's all the good news from yesterday. Mike Garcia was first with a shakedown run at about 225, followed by a record attempt about 255 on a 262 record, so that was not a qualifier. He made two more attempts, both of which came up short.
Jim Knapp was unable to find the engine part he needed, so he packed up.
Al Lamb's engine was bad, so he swapped in a new one only to discover it had a bad turbo. So, the turbo was swapped and he got a run in near the end of the day, but had other problems.
The engine in Jamie Williams' snowmobile was found to have water in the oil, so it was done. Jamie tried a shakedown run in his streamliner, but abandoned the run, as the tip-over switch kept popping. He'll try that again today. Don't know if he'll have time for the turbine bike.
Ack Attack had problems with their electrically-operated outrigger wheels, which took some time to repair. Then they towed to the far end of the course to try a shakedown run, only to discover several more problems. They still haven't got any runs in.
And the only push truck has unknown problems which left it unable to push anything up over about 25MPH!
We're all hoping to see something positive on this - our last - day!
Jeff - a long way from Boise
