Leg 3 of the Death Race

Leg three is supposedly easy. But if you are a soloist, it is one of the tougher legs. Because you are running through the valley of the Smoky River, it focuses all the afternoon heat. And you are tired.
But this year it was much cooler. It didn’t rain for the rest of the race, so my lack of jacket wasn’t a problem.
I did need to go to the bathroom the entire time, but I didn’t want to risk missing the cutoff.
There is one part that I call the whirlpool. It isn’t actually a whirlpool, but the river does a bend there that is slowly cutting away the ground. This year, they stopped having us dance along the edge, and instead we had to climb up a steep slope to get away from it. It was pretty brutal to do at this stage.
I caught up with a friend, Rod, who was good at keeping me going. He kept telling me to keep running when I wanted to stop. He is a master of ultramarathons, so it is hard to argue. I made the cutoff with fifteen minutes to spare.
My fast female friend caught up with us part way, but then she fell behind later. She did make the cutoff with five minutes to spare.
I then spent twenty minutes trying to regain my humanity. My friend Mike, arrived at the transition at 7:00:30. Which was past the point of cutoff, if you forgot that the race started late. They were very petty and didn’t allow him to continue. If they had, I have no doubt in my mind he would have finished the whole thing. I didn’t see it, but a lot of people sided with Mike.