Hi Spike,
P2 is the one you should use for your shoot, I use P2 for the "travel n shoot" situation, for my long form on the sticks events I use a Nnovia HDD V-Mount to the rear of the cam,
G.D.B. International - nNovia QC80A2D QuickCapture A2D - 80GB Recorder
G.D.B. International - nNovia QC Mount Kit - V-Lock
it's very reliable, it has Two weak points first is the Firewire connection to the cam, I use gaffer tape to make sure it does not drop out during use, it's happened once in three years , that was because a Commentator next to the cam got excited and pulled all the cables. other is the formats it records to, mine has only DV25 limit. I believe the latest can record to a wider range of files.
Funny though about HDD's , we shoot P2 and then dump to HDD's, and because we don't trust them we dump to a second HDD, A strange world indeed.
Cheers and good luck on your shoot