Largest crowd ever said to fill campsite for D-100

Tuesday's meeting of the Odessa Chamber of Commerce was headed by a very tired trio of officers. President Zach Schafer and vice president Jeff Huiras were still helping to clean up the race campsite and haul tables and benches back to town on Monday and Tuesday. Schafer is also the proprietor of Rocky Coulee Brewing Company and the Desert 100 weekend represents one of the busiest times of the year for that business. Huiras was the lead Chamber representative at the beer tent this year and also put in hours and hours of time answering questions, troubleshooting and instructing servers. At the meeting, he and Schafer both expressed gratitude to Bill and Vickie Pichon for volunteering to help out in the tent, also for many hours each. The third Chamber officer at the meeting to have been burning a candle at both ends for several weeks now is treasurer Larissa Zeiler, who is a CPA with Leffel, Otis & Warwick and faces the looming April 15 deadline for income tax return preparation.

As busy as these people are with their own businesses and places of employment, they still make time to help out the Chamber by volunteering to provide a much appreciated service to the thousands of visitors who attend Odessa-related events. Huiras said he was told that the entrance gate crew to the campsite distributed 8,400 wrist bands to folks wanting to camp this past weekend. During the prior weekend, he was also told, the number of participants was also higher than ever before.

Estimates from the raw numbers available this soon after the event indicate that the races this year likely made more money for the Chamber than did Deutschesfest 2018.

More information on the race weekend will be provided as information becomes available.

Those interested in seeing additional pictures of the races may visit the http://www.smugmug.com website page of the official photographer, Square D Photography. There are some very spectacular photos.