vol staters have been wishing for a break from the blast furnace heat
apparently someone found a bottle with a genie in it,
because they got that break…
.
but it did not end up being an improvement.
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afternoon thunderstorms had been on the forecast
but as the steamy morning wore on
clouds piled up in a dark and ominous fashion.
.
then dozens of small but intense and fast moving storms sprang up.
they would hammer the runners on a small segment of the course
and then move on,
so the sun could convert the water on the pavement to clouds of steam.
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it was the lucky vol staters that got to scramble to shelter.
most of them simply got drenched and then steamed where they were.
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but this is a durable field of vol staters.
after 3 and a half days,
they entered the 4th night with 103 of the original 129.
.
4 have either quit or been taken out by oprah,
but are still somewhere out on the road.
even meatwagons have to have breaks!
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up at the front,
addison climbed up onto the eastern rim by early afternoon,
and took advantage of his big lead to hole up in an angel station
and sleep through several passing storms.
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he emerged to run on to manchester before nightfall.
it is unknown if he was caught by the especially heavy rains that hit there late afternoon.
christine took advantage of addison’s break to cut his lead to 13 miles and was just coming to the rim climb as night fell.
matt was 10 miles behind her on his way to war trace.
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the tail end of the field crossed the tennessee river shortly after check in.
all of them have to be in linden by morning.
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it will be a long night for those crossing the tennessee river valley.