Xterra Southeast Championship

It’s always satisfying to put together a solid race after months of training. With an age group win, 2nd place overall amateur finish, and a hand-full of pro’s in the wake, yesterday was no exception. Although I placed well, I was most thrilled about my huge improvement over last years’ performance. Even with a slightly longer course and hellish water and air temperature conditions, I managed to knock 8 minutes off of my time from last year. Unfortunately, my overall improvement was not reflected in the swim. Although the 81 degree water temperature didn’t help matters, I still ended up over a minute slower than last year. I have three theories about this: · I have no way of verifying, but the first swim buoy looked a whole lot further out than last year. · After averaging less than 10,000 yards a week for the majority of the year, including a few weeks completely out of the water, my total time devoted to swimming was less than adequate. · Increased muscle mass from additional cycling and running is turning my legs into anchors in the water Since most of the elites were slower than last year, I’m leaning towards my first theory. Regardless, more time in the pool to increase core and upper body strength should help to offset any added leg mass, and restore that torpedo like body position from my college swimming days. I felt very strong on the bike this time around. Although having home course advantage definitely helped, I had a much stronger engine this year. I was able to maintain a much quicker and smoother pedal cadence. This was a result of more than doubling my saddle time since getting on a road bike last year. I also have to give credit to having one of the fastest mountain bikes for the course. While the majority of my improvement came from a much stronger bike leg, I also had a better overall run. After leaving transition, I got an immediate side cramp. This slowed my pace considerably for the first 3 miles. After mile 3, it finally went away in time to tackle the infamously technical and steep yellow trail. Additional attention to hill repeats in training this year gave me the capacity to actually run the entire course without stopping or walking. Although cramping while on the run continues to be an issue, I feel like I have gotten much more control over it. Through better conditioning, a more dialed in prerace diet, and better race nutrition, I am finally getting a handle on it. Next up: Buster Britton… Check out the race photos at http://www.xterraplanet.com/news/press_article.cfm?id=2215 (I’m in #19)