I wish to thank Susan Dandridge, Paul Rollinger, Deb Natelson, Mohsen
Banan, Martine Kin, Marty Myers, R. McDonald, Jackie T-R, the
Sammamish Rowing Association, Park Ranger Heath Yates, Traci Cole, Dan
Henderson and everyone else that I am sure to have forgotten who
helped make last weekend's Lake Sammamish race a success.

Each one of you was marvelous in your support of the event and in
putting up with me as the race director. I could not have asked for
better help.

The whole thing felt just short of a Chinese fire drill, if I might
use that old vaudeville reference. If not for the help of the
volunteers it could have been much less "smooth". :-)

If I continue with directing the event next year there are several
things I would change to improve the organization:

#1 - Make sure each racer knows that they are on an open course. This
is already spelled out in the Sound Rowers sign up sheet, but who
reads that? This must be emphasized in the pre-race meetings.

#2 - Check off a list of the issued numbers to make it easier to see
who was still out on the course.

#3 - Change the web page to mention that there are parking vouchers
available. This was a last minute finding and devoted a volunteer full
time distributing vouchers and flagging down incoming racers to tell
them about it. (This has already been done.)

#4 - Use the air horn for the starting signals. The bell is fine for
the finishes, but perhaps not loud enough to reach the furthest
racers. I guess the bell would be OK if it were used from the end of
one of the middle docks. You tell me!

#5 - Order fewer pizzas, muffins and M&M's; no bagels, pretzels, fish
crackers, Skittles, G.S. cookies.

#6 - Give the club camera to someone (not piloting) in a chase boat
for some on the water shots.

#7 - Depending on the water level (this year was really low) try to
scrounge up some low floating platforms for the rowers. Either that,
or maybe switch to the beach area, though that would be a problem to
coordinate with the chase boats and the swim area ropes would have to
be removed (an hour long task, according to the rangers). We'll have
to see if the replacement floating docks to be installed this summer
will work better.

The timing worked out pretty well. I had the short race start
*exactly* one hour after the long, so the math was easy. Having the
boat numbers start from either end of the spectrum made it easy to
determine which course they were on. We only needed 3 people to do it:
a spotter, a timer and a recorder. I was there to transcribe it to the
poster boards so everyone could see the results later - and to give to
Jeff to put on the web.


So, if anyone has any other comments to make about the race or
suggestions as how to improve it, I'm all ears.

Thanks again!

Michael Lampi