Relay floods Pahrump with racers; gives town economic boost

The 32nd Baker to Vegas Challenge Cup Relay came through Pahrump on Saturday evening. The annual event starts in Baker, California and ends in Las Vegas with Pahrump being the halfway point for the 120-mile, 20-stage event.

It’s the largest law enforcement event of its kind in the world, with teams participating from Calgary Canada, Royal Canadian Mounted Police, both men and women; Berlin, Germany; Queensland, Australia and law enforcement teams from throughout the United States.

This year the event had 274 teams participating, which was the largest in its history.

The teams are entirely made up of law enforcement personnel and each team consists of 20 members. The distance for each team member varies. Some are selected to run three-to-four-mile legs while others will run 10-mile legs.

The LAPD team got the best time, finishing the race in 12 hours, 52 minutes and 38 seconds, and our own Nye County Sheriff’s Office finished the race in 22:27:27.

Economic boost

The race gave the community a nice shot in the arm economically as an estimated 7,000 law enforcement personnel and support teams migrated through the town.

“We look forward to this race every year and it’s the busiest time of year for the gas stations on the route,” operations manager for Horizon Markets Teri Champala said. “I love to see the unity that the runners have. We make sure each gas station has extra staffing and order extra water and Gatorade for that day.”

As for the hotel occupancy, all four hotels in Pahrump were booked solid by Baker to Vegas people.

The race had a momentary scare as Las Vegas Metropolitan Police dealt with a shooter on a bus on the Las Vegas Strip on Saturday.

According to Chuck Foote, race coordinator, the shutting down of the Las Vegas Strip didn’t stop the race.

“I was kept informed by our ham radio people what was going on in Las Vegas and I was sorry for the people that got hurt,” Foote said. “The race goes through the back way and really wasn’t affected by the event. We just had a few teams late to their stations.”

When you look at the event, coordinator really doesn’t describe adequately what Foote does. General is a more accurate title, for he commands a small volunteer army that is made up of 1,000 or more people.

He said there are all sorts of volunteers in this race.

“We have all the teams put up one volunteer,” Foote said. “That person can be just directing traffic at the exchange points.”

A closer look

Pahrump’s queen of volunteers for this event is certainly Alice Eychaner, who has been doing this event for 19 years for the Pahrump Moose Lodge. She has been doing this so long that Foote mentions her on the Baker to Vegas website.

“We hand out cookies and water to all the runners,” she said. “We used to bake the cookies, all the Moose ladies, 174 dozen, but they were not all the same size and so we started buying them at Smiths, 200 dozen cookies. We also donate three cases of water. It takes three months to prepare for this event and we have at least 50 Moose Lodge people out there.”

There are also the ham radio volunteers.

“I had one radio operator that came in from Atlanta, Georgia just for this race,” Foote said.

Joy Matlack is a volunteer and coordinates all the ham radio operators at the different stages.

She said she got into this because she was teaching disaster training communications and this is her 28th race. Matlock said there are volunteer radio operators that come back every year.

“I was asked to help out with this and it seemed like a fun thing to do at the time,” she said. “Now, the year isn’t complete unless I do Baker to Vegas. I am retired and drive all the way from New Mexico. Every year we come to Pahrump and eat at Mom’s Diner and hit Red Sky Barbecue.”

She added, “The more teams you have out for the race, the more radio operators you have. I recruit all year for this. This year we had 448 radio operators out here at the stages.”

As far as the number of incidents the operators had to help with, it was low this year. Matlack said they helped with a motorcycle accident that didn’t involve any runners.

“We had about 12 incidents involving runners and that is low,” she said. “When it is hotter, we have had more incidents.”

Matlack said working this race teaches people about their limitations because of the long hours that the radio operators can work and these volunteers bring all their own equipment.

John Minger is one of the many radio volunteers who has worked the race for the past eight years. He said ham radio operators are necessary because of the poor cell coverage out along the highway from Baker to Shoshone. The radios are used in case of emergencies. Matlack said it was because of guys like Minger that her job is not as hard because he has experience doing this race.

“I am retired,” Minger said. “I come out because of the people. I was stationed just 35 miles from Baker.”

Of course it’s not all work. The volunteers manage to schedule in a good time.

“I enjoy this event and the desert,” he said. “We come out and do something fun every year and this year I went and saw the China Date Farm out in Tecopa for the first time.”

He said he comes out here and monitors his frequency and it is practice for him.

“In case of emergencies, that’s what we practice for and you can plan, but if you don’t use the gear and practice using it, things get lost or you lose things. There is always something you forget to bring too.”

Besides the ham radio operators, Foote said there are lots of medical personnel as well.

“I had 140 medical volunteers that came from Arrowhead Regional Medical Center in San Bernardino,” he said. “They brought out medical students, nurses and doctors.”

In addition, there were various search and rescue teams that volunteered for the event. Nye County had its own search and rescue team there.

Efforts continue

Foote said there’s so much coordinating involved with this event, that even on Monday he was still working the race.

“I am still debriefing the race,” he said. “Also, the lost and found is big. One racer from Texas lost his wallet and I know he will need his driver’s license to get on the plane. I guess you can say I even start coordinating next year’s race now. When I started doing this race, it took four months to coordinate the race, then six (months), and now a year.”

Preplanning starts now.

“The construction on Highway 160 is something that affected us,” he said. “You have to have alternatives. There has to be preplanning for that construction project will still be going on next year.”

He even talked about the Highway 372 construction.

“I was grateful for what the construction guys did to get the part of Highway 372 from Blagg Road to Pahrump Valley Boulevard ready for the race,” he said. “They went out of their way to make it so the runners had a better time going through that part. The Nye County Sheriff also closed the road for us and that made it safer for us to run through. She was a great help (Sheriff Sharon Wehrly).”

Race teams still had problems navigating the Highway 372 construction. They could be seen talking to the traffic cops as they tried to make it to the Blagg Road exchange point.

Foote said he was thankful for the Pahrump community and he has watched the community grow over the years.

“Back in 1984 I didn’t know that this town existed,” Foote said. “I have watched it grow from 5,000 people to what it is now,” he said.

He thought that the race has even contributed to the population growth out here.

He said he knew some people that have retired from law enforcement and moved here because they discovered Pahrump through the race.

Contact sports editor Vern Hee at vhee@pvtimes.com