Sorry Grant, just noticed this blog.
So here are my thoughts on the race in Ecuador (Our team raced in 2010).
1. You can't beat this race for value. The race organizers are top notch and really help to make it easy for international teams to come and do the race. Every team last year had at least 2 support people provided by the race who knew the area and were a great help to the teams to get them to the race site and to support them during the race. The support teams get just as pumped as the racers do for the race. Also you'll feel like a rock star down there. I've never seen so many reporters and camera's, etc before a race. I'm not sure what the price of the race is now, but last year was $1000 USD and that got you a 3 day race, full support crew and vehicle, 3 days stay in a hostile and transport from and to the airport.
2. The experience is amazing. This was our first international race and the whole experience for us was just second to none. At one point we hiked into a small town that had something like 20 huts, no electricity and not a single car, but the view in every direction was something I'd never seen. I loved Ecuador so much that in fact I'm going to go back in October for a vacation so I can show it to my wife. If you can get past the fact that the mountains and elevation are beating your down then the location just leaves you soo inspired.
3. You need to find a solution to overcome the elevation if you want to be competitive. We went down a few days in advance (flew in on a Tuesday with the race starting on a Friday) and it wasn't enough time. When we hit the first hill it was like we were standing still and everyone else was going much faster (and I mean everyone). By the third day of the race we finally felt comfortable on the course, but the elevation really took a lot out of us. I'd highly suggest you go down 4 days in advance, but also you look into if you can do altitude training before you go. Either by going to a sports center, or I found something like this after the trip that I thought might help (
http://www.altipower.com). On our team we were affected differently, but at least 2 of us were pretty dizzy and tired when we got up around 13000 ft.
That said we all said we'd go back and do this race again, we just needed to figure out how to adjust to the face better next time.
As for gear we brought everything down with us except the phone. We just brought down a phone that had been cracked and bought a new sim card for it, cost us something like $20.
We also bought most of our real food down there and brought with us sports food (gels, bars) etc as those were a lot harder to find. Our support crew supplied the tents and camping gear (I think most support crews were able to do this) so the gear we brought was mainly just race gear, cloths and bikes.
I hope this helps answer any questions. Let me know if you have more.
Cheers