RACE REPORT: XTERRA Smith Lake

Submitted by: Eric Seale

Yesterday I raced my first XTERRA event. It is a very different beast than any sort of road triathlon. I can honestly say I am more sore and drained today than I was after my almost half ironman at White Lake.

The quick skinny: I don’t have final (official) results, but I believe I was 57^th, and I think 85 racers were pre-registered. All in all, I was very happy with the way it turned out and I now have a baseline for the next one. Numbers (from my GPS, not official scoring which are not yet posted):

• 1000 meter swim in 17:14
• T1 6:16
• 18 mile (I measured 19.56) in 1:43:50
• T2 1:46
• 4 mile (I measured 4.08 miles) run in 47:42
• Total time of 2:57:00

I think I must be in the XTERRA age bracket of highest competition and largest number of competitors. The first, second and fifth place overall finishers were from my 40-44 bracket, and the winner finished 55 minutes faster than I at 2:02ish.

Here is the long version of the race report if you have nothing else to do this Memorial day. ;-)

The swim went fine and was a straight out and back course. All participants started together which meant 80 plus people thrashing together and the first 150 yards were pretty rough. The lake was interesting due to there being plenty of long grass that you occasionally swam through. I had some nut swimming about the same pace near me that could not go in a straight line. He must have swum into me no less than 10 times, from my left, right, behind and once almost swimming backwards into me. It was frustrating.

T1 was a pretty long run uphill from the lake from sand to gravel road. Usually it is not as long, but the area was plastered by the tornados last month and they still have not cleaned up the area they usually send you up from the lake. They suggested (and were right) that you wear shoes. So it took extra time to put shoes on after coming out of the water, run up the hill (550 yards according to my GPS) and then take off those shoes and get everything on to go on the MTB course. So, T1 took a long time and yet I still forgot to put my gels in my shirt or to buckle my Camelbak. Darn glad I have a neck to keep me from forgetting my head.

The bike was OK, but my back tightened up about mile 3 or 4 of lap 1 and I just could not push it. I guess the 9 mile pre-ride on Saturday coupled with camping on the ground and just being a geezer contributed. I passed about 7 or 8 people early on, but then as the bike progressed, I was passed by three or five others. The course was very sandy and as it had rained on Saturday, my pre-ride did not really hint at the difficulty the sand would create in the race. The showers had packed and wet down the sand so it was pretty fast and relatively easy to ride on through lap 1. As the race unfolded, the 85 passes on lap one and the 30+ riders ahead of me on lap 2 really churned up the sand in the corners and one spent a tremendous amount of time trying to control the bike and not wash out the front wheel through lap 2. There were plenty of crash victims around. The other tough part of the bike was all the roots. With the tight nature of the course and the sand, it was difficult to maintain speed that would allow you to bunny hop or roll the roots and I expended a ton of energy unclipping to foot dab to maintain control over roots and correct in the sand.

T2 was pretty much normal for a bike-run transition except it takes a little longer to take off MTB shoes and then to ditch the camelback etc.

The run, well, it was just brutally hot, humid, sandy and hot and hot and hot. I ended up walking far more than I expected, probably 20% of the 4 miles were spent walking. I could not keep my heart rate down and was just over heated. There was no breeze and even with pouring about 5 cups and 2 bottles of water over my head and drinking one water and one Gatorade at each of 4 water stops, I just could not keep cool. For the next one, I will not attempt to wear any shirt at all as it was not helping to keep me cool and it certainly weighed plenty as it was completely soaked.  

I had no illusions that I was going to be podium material with this being my first event, but I had no idea I would be so far off the pace. I think I finished the swim in the mid 20’s and the bike in the 40’s. I would guess that I was in the 50’s if not 60’s on the run – I was passed by many on the run. At least I can report that I wasn’t the only one dying on the run and I passed a couple of people who were cramping or puking and even handed over some electrolytes to one guy who then blew past me later on. I knew I was getting stomped when I saw runners over half way finished with the run course when I still had over a mile to go back to the transition area after my second bike lap. Turns out the two men and the woman I saw were out of the top ten no less. The hero of the day – was the third place finisher in I believe the 30-34 age group. He was still not finished with the race (only three in division I guess) at the awards ceremony, but was announced as third anyway. Why was he not finished? Well because he broke his chain and derailleur on lap one AND WAS CARRYING HIS BIKE FOR THE REMAINDER OF LAP ONE AND ALL OF LAP 2. The rumor was he carried it for over 4 miles of lap 1, so 13 miles of running with a 25 pound-ish bike over his shoulder. NUTS.

Eric