Xterra US Championships

XTERRA USA Championship/Race Report(12^th AG)

Snowbasin, Utah – September 21, 2013

Swim - 38:15/Bike - 1:47:26/Run - 55:54/OA - 3:24:17 12th of 39 Qualifiers in AG

QUICK STATS…

Swim course distance: 1,500-meters(0.93 miles)* ACTUAL Distance: 2,400-Meters(1.5 miles)!
Elevation at swim start: 4,900-feet
Water temperature: Officially 60 Degrees, but Felt Much Warmer!

Air Temperature:  Start 40 Degrees/Finish 85 Degrees
Mountain bike course distance: 18 miles(point to point)
Total climbing on bike: 3,400-feet
Elevation at highest point: 7,300-feet

Elevation at T2/Snowbasin Resort Lodge: 6,400-feet
Trail Run course distance:  6.45 miles
Total climbing on run: 700-feet
Total climbing on course: 4,100-feet

This was my 3^rd year qualifying & racing at Xterra Nationals.  It is my favorite race to do because of the stunning scenery & challenging terrain of Northern Utah’s Wasatch Mountains.  It has also been my “A” race for the last 2 seasons & this year it would be a great benchmark of where my fitness is at heading into Xterra Worlds next month in Maui.   In 2011, I raced this course in 3:31 & in 2012, I dropped my time down to 3:17.  Based on where my fitness has progressed to this year, I had a goal of sub 3:10 “IF ALL THINGS ARE EXACTLY EQUAL” to last year.   However, starting with the Swim, they certainly were not!

Swim – Being at elevation, I did not go out too aggressive or aggressively pursue feet to draft off of. But rather built into my race pace & raced my own race.  I felt really good throughout this full contact swim, though it seemed like it took forever!  Spotting was nearly impossible because the buoy was toppled over, directly in the sun, & drifting out to sea(really!)!  I really knew something was up when my 30 minute alert went off on my Garmin & I still had another buoy to round!  Based on my OW training swims, I had expected to be out of T1 & on my bike by that time!  My GPS registered 1.5 miles on the swim!  Also, with the buoy toppled & sighting difficult, I am sure that I did some bonus yardage in addition to the extra long course. Physically, I had a decent swim, but probably not a good technical one. Almost no drafting & poor sighting.  However, much of the field had these same issues.  Split was way slower than last year, though if the course had been the same, I am sure that I would have picked up time here over last year.  My GPS showed that I swam at a 24:28 minute mile pace this year, while swimming at a 28:28 minute mile last year.  I also felt much better in the swim this year.  I tried to ignore the fact that extra long swim course was going to throw my goal time out the window & did not look at my watch again for the entire race! 

Bike – This is a point to point course with 3400’ of climbing!  It starts at the lake & ends at the Snowbasin Ski Resort.  Since it’s point to point, you only get 1500’ of that climb back in 2 short downhills.  So about 14 miles of climbing w/about 4 miles of downhill! 

I built into the bike over the first 20 minutes climbing up Wheeler Canyon, then really picked up pace.  Legs felt strong & I had a good rhythm on the bike while passing several folks.  By the time that I got up to Sardine Peak trail & the meat of the 3100 feet of climbing, I was riding with a fast group of riders & I pushed even harder(too hard?) to stay with them knowing that there was a nice recovery coming up w/the 2.5 mile downhill going into T2.  I felt like my bike was much stronger than last year & I certainly pushed it harder. Results did show a 2.5 minute improvement on my bike split over last year.  

Run – Off the bike and running up that 1^st monster hill is always the hardest part of this race for me.  You basically run out of T2 & start with a ½ mile climb directly up a Black Diamond Ski Slope!  My quads were tight & threatened to cramp, but once up the main climb, I got a little rhythm back, but my legs just felt like lead. I didn’t feel that winded, but my legs were just heavy & not turning over fast. I struggled on the run much more than last year & my split showed that with a drop off of almost 2 minutes.  My run fitness is certainly better than last year, but it just wasn’t there off the bike in this race.  I am learning that balancing a race & being at peak for race day is not an exact science!

I certainly left everything out on the course & was more physically drained after this race than any other that I have done to date. It certainly felt that I used every ounce of fitness that I had in me.  Initially after the race, I was a bit bummed about my performance.  I knew the swim was much longer, my bike showed only a slight improvement, & my run was off.  However, my Super Coach, “The Professor” Bruce Erskine who never sugarcoats anything made me feel much better about it after carefully analyzing the results.  First, he pointed out that my swim pace was a full 4 minutes faster than last year!  My  bike was 2.5min faster (so far 6.5min faster), and my run was 1:48 slower …so basically I shaved OVER 4.5min off from last year’s race!   Still not the sub 3:10 that I wanted, but considering that most everyone’s run was also slower & that the majority of the Pros were 6 -15 minutes slower than last year, my time of 3:24 compared to 3:17 last year was not so bad.  Still, I would have liked to have been able to finish my run strong to call this a great race!  Not sure why I couldn’t, but the much longer swim, hotter temperatures, windy conditions, & hitting the bike more aggressive all probably played some roll in that?

Next up, XTERRA WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS!  Maui, Hawaii| Sunday, October 27, 2013