Despite staying healthy, getting in some great training in the past five weeks, and enjoying the taper countdown to the Xterra finale in Maui, somehow it all went wrong after the gun went off on Sunday morning for the World Championship race…

After a distracting and painful jellyfish sting to one of my fingers in the warm-up swim, I managed to stay focused, calm and determined as we neared go time. The surf was rolling in pretty big on and off but when the Pros started, we lucked out with a few calmer sets and getting in and off wasn’t too bad. I managed to draft for a while and then found myself to the right of everybody but hooked up with a few blue and pink caps as we arrived at the first buoy right on target. I also lined up for the beach well for the first run out in the “M” shaped swim and was happy that I was at least swimming relatively straight through the side wave swells and stronger current further out. Going out to the second buoy became a bit more chaotic and some green caps who had overshot the first run out were swimming straight at us! Finally I was rounding the last buoy and heading for shore. That’s when I got my second jellyfish sting on the chin. As I neared shore and was looking forward to getting on my feet again I got pummeled by a massive wave. My body went into a full on scorpion which my inflexible back did not like at all! Both of my calves massively cramped right up into balls – oweee! When I finally figured out which way was up and down again I clamoured out of the waves and tried to get running as fast as I could to my bike up the long uphill grass climb to transition.

swim start

As I peeled off my swim skin in transition heaps of sand dropped to the ground, ugh! Even though we had wave starts this year, (two minute gaps between Pros, amateur men, then amateur women), I still had plenty of traffic to contend with for the first 4  miles of the bike. The narrower trail extended longer this year, and although it was relatively wide, the deeper sand on the sides made passing really difficult, I think Xterra has burst the seams by trying to manage 700 peeps on course at once! It was hard to find my rhythm and I was just feeling flat and on the verge of cramping most of the way. Since I wasn’t feeling my usual power on the uphills, I focused on enjoying the downhills and ripping as fast as I was comfortable. On one of the first longer open downhills I was sad to see my Luna teammate Suzie walking with her bike, front wheel tacoed and tube completely off.

Attempting to get the climbing legs going!

I came off the bike in a tight pack with Brandi, Mel, and Magali. I started the run with Magali and thought all I need to do is stay with her to salvage a decent result. I started with her and but once we hit the steeper grass I was fading. The run felt like a bad dream where I wanted to pick it up but just couldn’t. I tried to respond to every pass that went by me but never lasted long, and finally limped across the line in 12th. A physio friend has since explained to me that my scorpion back compression in the swim likely caused a “neurological injury” to my legs explaining the lack of power and cramping feelings I had – especially by the time I was running uphill on the run – ugh! Three days out it is still super painful to walk around due to sore calves.

But enough of my lamenting. Even though we had to evacuate our condo for a few hours the night before due to the tsunami warning, luckily the wave didn’t amount to anything. Race day was a beautiful day, and not too hot. The 70.3’ers and ITU’ers came out and rocked it on the least technical course in Xterra for the men and women. Lesley Paterson crushed the field and handily won her second World Xterra Title. Barbara Riveros of Chile was second, Mari Rabie of South Africa in 3rd, Heather Jackson 4th, and Jacqui Slack, of Great Britain finished up 5th for the last podium spot.

Shonny and I happy to be finished!

I had an amazing support crew, with Chris and Waldek from team Luna, out to support myself and teammates, Suzie and Shonny. I’m so lucky to be part of such as amazing team! My parents, husband, kids, and brother were also out to enjoy some more summer, to hang out and cheer us on. Even though my last and most important race of the year was a serious disappointment, I’m happy with my overall season, and already looking forward to a luckier 2013!

The support Posse on race morning!

After celebrating my daughter Zoe’s 5th birthday last Wednesday, the following day J-F and I left the kiddies at home with my wonderful parents and flew down to Salt Lake City. We then drove 45 minutes north to Odgen, Utah for a 4-day “race-cation” for the Xterra USA Championship and the final race in the Pro points series. I felt lucky to have escaped catching the nasty cold both my kids had the week before as I would need all the oxygen I could get with this Saturday morning race being at altitude. The swim starts at 4900 feet (1494 meters), and the bike course peaks out at 7300 feet (2225 meters) with 3400 feet of total climbing!

View from top of the bike course looking back at Pineview Resevoir

With a lot on the line, Suzie, Shonny and I were excited to have our Luna team mechanic, Chris Mathis come for the race and get our Orbea Alma 29ers in perfect working order, a definite boost to the pre-race confidence!! This was very true when I picked up a thorn in my tire in the parking area before the race, I might have freaked out just a little but with Chris on hand to seal it asap and reassure me it was fine, I was good to go!

Luna team mechanic, Chris Mathis, working hard on our bikes!

With the Pineview Reservoir lower than ever this year, the swim started a long ways down the usual boat ramp start. It was a wetsuit swim but the perfect temperature. The Pros had a 30 second head start for the 2-lap swim without the usual beach run in between. We headed straight into the morning sun which made sighting the first buoy challenging. I’d had a good warmup but still felt weird and a little weak, the usual beginning of swim panicky feeling, especially as the green capped age groupers starting to engulf me! Just keep swimming, this will pass…and it did. I found myself around Renata the whole swim, and tried to catch on to a few amateurs throughout the swim as they surged by. I was feeling better on the second lap, but dang it was a long swim. Everyone’s times were at least 4 minutes give or take slower than usual, so I finally exited the water after more than 28 minutes!

Renata and I left transition together and I kept her in sight on the road stretch leading to the first section of dirt, and up through Wheeler Canyon as we made our way up to the top of Snowbasin. It was rocky double track climbing that narrowed down to single track as we neared the halfway point right before the first of two long sustained descents. The climbing was never too steep, with some rolling downhills and flats to break it up. At the halfway point I was about 3 minutes down from the leaders. Lesley, Melanie, Suzie, Christine, and Jacqui Slack were all still ahead. By the very top of the course, I had passed Jacqui and Christine, with Renata still just ahead of me. After a fun, slalom like long descent and a few more short climbs we entered T2. I went out onto the run in 5th. When J-F told me I was about 2:30+ back of Mel and Suzie, I knew some catching was definitely possible!

The run starts with about 5 minutes of straight steep uphill running under the chairlift. It is brutal but it is just about putting one foot in front of the other as fast as possible. Then it is fast, mainly rolling downhill single track with lot’s of baby head rocks to look out for for a few miles. By the halfway point of the run I’d over taken Renata and had Melanie in sight back out on some double track. At about the 4 mile mark I puffed past Melanie and knew I only had a limited amount of climbing to my advantage to close on Suzie before the last mile of more of trail which was all downhill to the finish! With the altitude nothing feels fast on this course but I kept pushing hoping to see Suzie in sight. When I finally did near the end of the descending I put on the gas with gravity to help as best I could. With one small hill before the finish I went as hard as I could but it wasn’t enough and I had to settle for third by a margin of 13 seconds! Ouch. I was definitely gunning for a top two finish but if it had to be third, it might as well be to a Luna teammate, so I’m super happy for Suzie who had the race of her life to date as a Pro!

Last ditched effort to close the gap on last little climb before downhill finish shoot

It was an incredibly exciting overall series this year for the overall as well. That 13 seconds would have been the difference of finishing 2nd versus 4th overall in the Pro series as well, so it is a hard pill to swallow and not keep thinking about where I could have found 13 more seconds out there on course over 2 hours and 52 minutes of racing! That said, I am as motivated as ever to get back to work for Worlds in Maui 5 weeks from now. Congrats to Lesley Paterson who took the win on Saturday as well as the overall series title. As the reigning Xterra and ITU off-road World Champ, she is THE woman to watch out for on October 28th!

Podium (L-R): Melanie McQuaid (4th), Suzie Synder (2nd), Lesley Paterson (1st), me (3rd), Renata Bucher (5th)

After two years in Whistler, Xterra Canada moved to Canmore this year – a gorgeous rocky mountain town that J-F and I enjoyed living in for five years before moving an hour east to live in Calgary full-time four years ago. It is one of my favourite places to mountain bike in summer and cross-country ski in the winter and did not disappoint as the Xterra Canada venue yesterday!

A few blasts of rain the day before and overnight made for some slippery riding conditions, and we woke up to the first snowfall of the season on the mountain tops with the morning temperature feeling not much above freezing. After spending most of my transitions set up time shivering and chilled, ironically I finally started to feel reasonably warm for the first time after I got in Quarry lake for a warm-up swim. Thanks to a really warm summer, despite some very cold nights recently, the lake stayed reasonably warm for a September triathlon in the Canadian Rockies!

A great shot of the swim start by Jordan Bryden

The gun went off at 9:30am, and about 150 competitors made the plunge for three 500m laps, and two short beach runs in between. It was a pretty bumpy start in the small lake. My neoprene cap felt like it was choking me, I was fighting to stay calm, sight the buoy, not get kicked or punched in the face, swim hard and find some feet to draft all at the same time – oh, isn’t open water swimming fun! By the second buoy I was in a small pack and drafting. I figured it was an okay pace, as any attempts to pull out and around the two in front of me failed. The funny part, I discovered later was that the two I was swimming with were the same two I’d swam with a month earlier at the Xterra Enduro – I guess we naturally found each other again!

When I exited the water, even though I hadn’t felt too cold while swimming, my terrible circulation still left my fingers and toes numb. I struggled the entire long run up to transition to get the velcro of my wetsuit undone. Finally, just before reaching my bike I got it undone and could start to get my wetsuit off! Off on my bike, I was over 5 minutes down on swim superstar Christine Jeffrey back in action for the second half of the season, about 2min30 from Melanie and Suzie, and another 1min30 from Chantel Whidney, an ITU triathlete trying an Xterra for the first time.

The descents on this course make me smile – thanks to Trey Garman for this shot exiting the meadow to the next super fun section of the EKG trail

We had about a kilometer climb on the road to get to the Nordic Centre trails, which worked out by giving me the necessary time to get my gloves on my numb hands. I was feeling decent, and other than getting stuck behind a bit of a walking train of peeps off their bikes down the laundry chutes, I had pretty clear trail the first lap. Although the roots were slick I stuck to a good motto a mountain bike race buddy, Mike Garrigan always told me: “ride it like it’s dry!” and didn’t feel like it changed the conditions much at all, perhaps partly thanks to knowing this course and the lines so well. By the bottom of the coal chutes I had moved into 3rd place, but Renata joined me and immediately set a furious pace up heart break hill. I stayed on her wheel for that climb and from then on I kept her in contact and she dangled in and out of my sight for the rest of the ride.

My Avia Bolt’s await me in transition, the perfect lightness and traction for this course!

Melanie was out front by over 3 minutes at the start of the run, and Renata had about 45 seconds on me. The run was extended by about 2 km from the previous Xterra Alberta course, and it was tough! With rarely a flat smooth section, the run course is constantly up and down, twisting, and over roots and rocks. I knocked my knees together several times and felt like I was about to twist my ankle a few times, especially on the first lap. I didn’t feel smooth or fast and I was hurting and heaving up the killer steeps. But I managed to catch Renata halfway through the first lap.

A cool shot by Luke Way, grabbing a sip of water at the halfway point of the run

At the halfway point I heard I was still 2 minutes down on Melanie, so I just had to dig and hope for the best. Ian Crosthwaite caught me at some point and was pushing me hard from behind. By the time we hit the Biathlon range, unfortunately Mel was not “catchable” (she finished 1min08 in front of me) but I figured I would try to kick it in and finally drop Ian. When we hit the rocks I tripped and nearly face planted. On the dirt, he dropped the hammer and I tried to respond. That was when I truly hit the wall, its been awhile since I’ve hit the wall that bad running, but I guess if any place in the race, it could have been worse!

Heading for a second place finish, as Ian leaves me behind, another shot by Luke Way

Overall, I’m happy with second, and a solid race with the second best bike split by seconds to Renata (who finished 3rd), and fastest run split of the day. It was so amazing to have so much support out there and the amount of cheers I heard all day long from spectators, volunteers and even fellow-racers kept me pushing. Congrats to everyone who completed this epic and very tough Xterra course, and to everyone who secured a spot to the Xterra Worlds race in Maui. It will be awesome to have another amazing strong contingent of Canadians there again. And of course, very cool to have three moms (myself, Brandi and Chantell) on the Pro Podium!!

The podium L-R: Brandi Heisterman in 5th, Renata Bucher (3rd), Melanie McQuaid (1st), me (2nd), and Chantell Widney (5th). Zoe may be shy at times but she loves getting up on podiums any chance she gets! 🙂

They are rare, but a few times per race season I get to enjoy some lower key, casual races, and that is precisely what this beautiful August long weekend was all about. A time to have as much fun as possible with family and friends, while throwing in some “fun” racing. A great chance to get the kind of quality intensity training in that would be impossible to do on my own while also avoiding going too deep into the pain cave that is needed for the more important “A” type races!

Saturday and Sunday in Canmore was the second annual Xterra Enduro. Here is how it unfolded…

Event 1: 3000m swim at Quarry Lake (47:50, 10th overall). With a 10:00am start time, it was tough getting my family organized in time to leave Calgary but we arrived with about 20 minutes to spare until the start time. Quarry lake was the perfect temperature to swim with a wetsuit. It is so clear and gorgeous you feel like you could just drink it up while swimming. We did 6 x 500m laps, with a short beach run each lap. I missed a small pack ahead of me, and the first lap probably felt the toughest as I didn’t get time for a warm-up, but settled in and one of the guys I was swimming with said we picked it up each lap so that was cool! Check out the incredible conditions that made for a very enjoyable swim!

Event 2: 40km mountain bike at the Canmore Nordic Centre (2:43:46, 4th overall). After some time for a lakeside picnic it was time to head up to the Nordic Centre for a 2pm start for the 40km mountain bike race and it was hot!! I went through 3 bottles and three gels and was definitely feeling thirsty most of the race, but actually felt a bit stronger and more technically on by the 3rd and 4th final lap. On pretty much the identical course to last year I was 6 minutes faster so that was encouraging. This demanding course involves pretty much all the climbing at the Nordic Centre but of course it is mixed with fun descents like laundry chutes, the Albertan and the coal chutes.

Start line for the 40km mountain bike race

Heading off and up and up and up to start!

After the bike race, it was off to Kyle, Carrie, Fin and Will’s house for an awesome BBQ. Zoe and Nico had a blast chilling in the backyard and you can see why!

Event 3: 20km trail run at the Canmore Nordic Centre (1:50:30, 5th overall? still waiting for run results). Sunday morning, it was back to the Nordic centre with beat up arms and legs to line up and run 20km on the trails on the same course we rode the day before meaning major climbing and lots of rooty descending. After a wee bit of “yogging” around the stadium to warm up we were off. Like a delayed brick, the legs were feeling pretty heavy the first bit. I actually started to feel better on the second lap and got my downhill root running coordination working a little better! After one lap, the second woman was about 10 seconds behind me, so I decided to pick up the pace up the climbing to the laundry chutes. I didn’t see her again but had some good back and forth running with some of the guys out there. And I managed to take a good seven minutes off my time from last year, so another good sign of hopefully improved fitness, or maybe just a willingess to go a little harder in this challenging race, ha!

Post-run podium time with the kids

After some food, socializing, and awards, we ended our super fun Canmore weekend with an icy dip for the legs in the glacial Bow River while the kids did some rock throwing. J-F was icing his ankle which he sprained almost two weeks ago, it has been hard for him to be so laid up, but he finally got out for a ride again today! Thanks to him and the kids for their weekend race support – they had some fun trail walks while I was racing. Congrats to all everyone I know who did the race – it was tough! Coach Cal proves again why he is a great coach AND training partner for me – he is faster in all three disciplines – as he won the overall this year! And a big thanks to Tony Smith who always puts on fantastic events. Come on out to his next event, a road triathlon in Canmore on August 19th, for more info go to: www.smithevents.ca

Post-race pic with CSR training group

UnBEETable! That was the joking chant I shared with the Rakita family and Craig Evans after crossing the finish line for my first Xterra series win at the Xterra Mountain Championships in Beaver Creek, Colorado.  I had scarfed down as many beets as I could handle the night before the race, with the laugh that the extra nitrates would help the oxygen uptake while racing at altitude.

Placebo or not, my race went as well as it could have after spending the previous two weeks at sea level! The swim was conveniently located in a small lake just a stone’s throw away from our condo, so after waking up and driving our run gear up to T2, it was a pretty relaxing morning getting ready for the 9:00am start time. It was a wetsuit swim with the water temp about 66 degrees Fahrenheit – just right! With four wave starts at two minute intervals, the Pros went off first. I was in a group, actually drafting and feeling okay until we rounded the first buoy. While breathing towards the buoy side I accidentally inhaled a bunch of water instead of air. Gulping and choking (it is hard enough to breathe at altitude) I momentarily panicked and did a bit of breast stroke until I could breathe properly again. Unfortunately after that I was all on my own and just had to find my own rhythm and swim as straight as possible between the buoys.

I came out of the water in 4^th place. After about a mile on flat pavement we were up and climbing under the first ski lift. Roughly the first 40 minutes was all twisting single track climbing with a few reprieves of flat flowy sections through the Aspen trees (fitting as my Maxxis “Aspen” tires turned out to be the perfect choice tire for this course).  From the start of the climb I could see Sara Tarkington about 30-40 seconds ahead. My last race at Beaver Creek was in 2009 and it took me until the end of the run to catch Sara that year, so I knew she would be one of the strongest contenders of the day! About 2/3 of the way up the first climb I was closing up to Sara when Jenny Smith let me know I was 1 min and 20 seconds back from first place-Melanie McQuaid. By how good my legs were feeling I knew a win was a good possibility at that point. On the next pavement climb Sara and I pushed the pace together, and went by my Luna teammate Suzie. Back on the dirt Melanie was in sight and I was reeling her in. (Thanks to Trey Garman for the photos below!)

On the gravel road descent that lead into the first single track descending Mel flatted, not the satisfying pass I was looking forward to but I said, ‘I’ll take it!” The top of the course began with super fun descending down fast switch backs. Then was a fun mix of shorter climbs, single track descents, and flat fast big ring sections to traverse to the other side of the mountain climbing before a final longer descent into T2. Sara and I went back and forth at least four times. We were moving fast, and it was a good battle. In the last descent I got a bit of a gap and went out on to the run with about a 30 second lead. Wow, it was the first time I didn’t have anyone to run down!

Heading into transition

I didn’t let up, and felt pretty darn slow going up all the steep climbing in the run but despite the suffering, and with no one in sight behind I managed to begin to enjoy the scenic run before letting gravity take my legs as fast as possible down the final long hill to the finish line. It was a fun day under perfect race weather conditions! A win definitely helps make me feel much better about the few extra days of gorgeous weather and family vacation time I had to miss on Hornby Island for this race!

L-R: Renata Bucher (4th), Sara Tarkington (2nd), myself, Suzie Synder (3rd), Melanie McQuaid (5th)

Thanks to everyone for the kind words and support! Now I’m looking forward to not getting on a plane for a while and enjoying several races around home through the end of the summer. Next up is the Calgary 70.3 on July 29^th.