Race #2, Taji (7/9/09)

Up at 5, and off to the races. This is a much more rough, dusty, brown military-y base than Al Asad. Well, they're all military-y, but this one was a little rougher, more like MASH with older buildings, closer together, more fence and more cluttery. The Pavilion where the race festivities were held were right near hotel so we walked over, and got set up. There were already lots of people there to run, all decked out in their grey ARMY t-shirts and navy shorts. I can't tell you how many times soldiers came up to me and asked for Under Armour to make their PT gear. The stuff they had was polyester, so it wicked moisture, but they were really thick and you could tell they were hot and uncomfortable. I believe we did bid on the PT unis, but the military chose the lower bidder. When I told them that, the soldiers all said they would gladly pay DOUBLE for good performance gear. It was worth it with all they PT, especially since there's really nothing else to do!

We got all the racers registered, helped people put on their D tags and get psyched for the race. There ended up being 150 runners. Good turn out. There was less of a breeze, and we started an hour later than we did at Al Asad, so it was considerably hotter. No second lap today. It was only a 2 mile run though, so it wasn't too bad. I ran with a soldier from Georgia. She'd been in country for about 4 months and was hoping to run the Army 10 miler in October. Also ran with a soldier from MS who was hilarious! I saw him a few other times while we were at Taji. After the race we all drnak ice cold water (Which as I said is very VERY easily available. We did the awards ceremony and broke everything down. We did some organizing to make our jobs at the next race easier then ran back to housing for a quick clean up before our 10:00 visit to the base commander. They awarded us challenge coins, we awarded them NASA stuff and Olympic stuff. Sandy, Frank Bart and Robi met with the base public affairs and a journalist who was planning to write a story about the tours. Rick and I hung out and had a great chat on the couch in the lobby while Josh worked on downloading and tagging pictures. Once they were done, we all headed for lunch.

With food in our bellies, Catch Penny headed to Camp Taji North to play a 1pm concert for the detention center staff while the race staff got to go somewhere where most visitors don't go; the FARP and the helo mechanics area. This is an area a bit away from most of the action on base, and the soldiers who work here have long shifts, so they're considerably cut off from the world. They were thrilled to see us and show us what they do. The FARP is the Forward Ammunition and Refuelling Post (or something like that). It's like a pit area on a race track, but with guns and rocket fuel. Planes can land here and quickly get refueled and reloaded. The whole process takes about 5 minutes. Pilots sometimes fly all day, so they have to reload quickly, but they're also able to go into the break room and grab some snacks and drinks or a bathroom break if they need it. The word FARP still makes me giggle (I'm so mature). I had just started getting used to the word FARP, and not snickering when it was said, then she started talking about flipping the FARP. That sent me over the edge. Come on....Flipping the FARP is funny! The actual concept is pretty mundane, but the phrase is hilarious! The FARP is a huge rectangular concrete pad with about 5 refueling stations. All the hoses and ammo are stationed to service the aircraft from a particular side. When the wind changes, the aircraft have to approach from the opposite direction, putting the refueling stuff on the wrong side, so they have to take about 90 minutes to flip the FARP so all the hoses and ammo can quickly reload the aircraft from the other side. Again, not a particularly funny concept, or a fun job (sometimes they have to do it several times a day, but Flipping the FARP is something I'll be smiling about for a long time! When we got there, an Apache was in the first bay. While we were there in the break room talking to the FARP technicians (Farpers?) 2 Blackhawks arrived, so we were able to watch a refueling. Then both the Blackhawks and the Apache took off, so that was pretty cool to see as well. The Apache pilot held up an American flag in his window for us on his take off. That was pretty cool.

Then we went to the 2 big hangers where they repair and do maintenance on the aircraft. Every 60 days they have to bring the aircraft in and take it completely apart, go through a thorough checklist of maintenance and repair items to be sure everything is in good working order. Then they reassemble, take for a test flight, and send them back to "the customer" (the unit who used the aircraft in the field. I thought it was interesting, but not surprising that they called them "the customer".) This whole process takes about 14 days, and is vital for safe flight and the safety of our pilots and everyone in their aircraft. Everyone there had a different job, and they were all very happy to tell us all about everything that they did. I got a tour of the supply area where they store the extra engines and helo blades (that was pretty cool) and all the spare parts. I got a tour of the mechanics area where they disassemble the copters. I'm surprised by the number of contractors. There are a lot of jobs that are contracted out to civilians through an agency to fulfill vital roles where the military is understaffed, so this mechanics area (and a lot of other areas around these bases) are a mix of digi camo uniformed soldiers and street clothed civilian contractors.

There was also an Apache helicopter there that we were allowed to sit in. A really nice female pilot took us through all the controls and what we were looking at as we were sitting there. The infared cameras were really neat. We had the headsets on and were talking through the mics. It was pretty cool to sit there. Great opportunity. I also talked to a Major for a while who gave me the whole scoop on the aircraft, how they work, what part is housed in each part of the bird, etc. (bird=aircraft) Again, everyone was really proud of their own area of expertise and very willling to tell you everything about it. I guess since they're pretty isolated in this area, and everyone they work with knows what they do, any visitor is a new opportunity to share their story, and enlighten! It's so much fun how easy it is to talk to everyone over here.

After that, we headed back to housing to rest, hit the internet, shower, and pack. Quick 6pm dinner, then at 7pm we loaded our luggage into the Bongo truck (fun little tiny pickup type truck that looked more like a go-cart truck.) we headed over to the pavillion where the concert was being held. (same as where the race was.) Nicole, Sandy and I worked hard to separate all the shirts into size specific boxes. They were all mixed up, and in huge black bins that we couldn't take with us. We did our organizing to the sounds of Catch Penny playing in the background which was pretty fun. We got all the boxes taped up and organized. This was going to make the next bunch of races much easier from an organizational standpoint. Once we had that all finished, we went out to the front to watching Catch Penny. This crowd was pretty into the show, which was fun. They were standing up by the stage dancing. The guys in the band do a great job getting people involved. If there are any troops who play the guitar, they'll invite them on stage for a song with them. They always get someone up at some point to play the cow bell with them (insert "more cowbell" joke here...believe me, we did!) and for the final song, they do Pink Houses ("Ain't that America, you and me, Ain't that America, something to see" That one.) and invite everyone up on stage to sing with them. It's really really fun and the audience has a great time. This was a relief because for the show they played this afternoon at the north area of the base, they had 1.....count it 1 person in the audience who only stayed for 1 song. After the show, the band packed up their gear (which they can do with lightning speed!) and we headed to the airfield to wait for our Chinook to take us to the next base. We got there around 10 with a scheduled departure of 10:50. We finally loaded on the Chinooks around midnight. We had fun chatting in the bus while we waited. At this point, there was no race scheduled for the next morning, which was a relief.