On Saturday Todd and I formed team Cosmopolitan Warrior to compete in the ClownDown 2008. For those who don’t know ClownDown is a citywide adventure race in Chicago similar to the Amazing Race. This years race included 42 teams and 13 destinations throughout the city. Cosmopolitan Warrior fared pretty well considering it was our first year. We ended up finishing 11th (just missing our top 10 goal) and in under 3.5 hours. We ended up making 2 tactical mistakes that probably put us out of a top 5 finish:
- Missing a stop on the Red Line and ending up at the Clybourn stop.
- Heading for the Harold Washington Library instead of the Original Library (ie Cutural Center).
The highlight for me during ClownDown was after running about 3 blocks we stopped to wait for a bus in Greektown. While waiting a couple teams ran by us before the bus finally came. About 3 blocks later we see the teams running up ahead to the next bus stop and Todd told our bus driver not to stop for the other team. His response was simple: “If they’re not at stop I’m not stopping”. Good to his word, our bus just kept rolling as the other team tried to flag down the bus. It was glorious.
* A special thanks to our Camera Crew: Josh & Eric.
** I plan on posting a video in the next couple of days from all of our footage; it should be interesting.
*** The rest of the photographs can be found on Flickr.