hour 44
.
dont blink
.
i took off hour 43,
thinking a nap would be a better use of the time.
even tho this is only the second night
i was feeling the fatigue and needed to catch some sleep….
.
and the large country competition has not turned out at all like the small countries.
coming up on 40 hours we were quite concerned about our team.
several countries still had most of their runners active
and even tho we still had the numbers
several of the runners appeared to be in serious trouble.
in all honesty,
a couple of them were ready to quit
but hung on an hour at a time
convinced the team needed them to add just one more lap
to keep from getting blown away.
the numbers on the other teams were actually intimidating.
in our minds they were like machines preparing to grind up our battered little squad….
.
clearly the opposite was true
looking at it now,’i wonder if they were not getting the same impression.
that 13 by our name on the scoresheet represented a team of supermen.
they had no idea how badly we were hurting,
and they got discouraged and quit.
it would be hard not to.
i guess they will never know how close it was.
a few more hours of running like they were running
and we might have started to fold…
.
so now it is shaking out who is going to be playing the long game.
australia still has numbers
japan has not backed off
belgium remains dangerous
altho they have lost a lot of numbers.
hungary still has some tough athletes
but numbers are also an issue.
those two have to try to stay in the game and start a comeback when we finally lose some people.
.
to be honest
things look good for team USA. right now
they will never know how close they came to breaking our confidence.
