On Saturday, Amanda and I ran in the 4/5 in the 5Peaks series held near Wakefield QC. If you remember, I had been here once before racing at the National Snowshoe Championships. In fact it was the same (or very similar) course.
Both of us knew we had lost fitness from the summer. How much, well we were about to find out!
The race was 10.4K in length and the terrain was hilly to put it mildly (1600 ft of climbing/descending). There were 96 participants that took part.
Since I had a good idea of the course, I positioned myself right at the front. It payed off as I led out the race for the first 200ms into some very narrow sections. After this I let others take over the pacing and settled in for 5th place.
Whats funny is I was running against the same people who I had competed against in the snowshoe championships in the spring. The only difference was I wasn’t wearing shoes that were twice as big! Game on!
At about 3K I was in 5th spot, biding my time. There were 2 guys who were about 50ms ahead which I kept an eye on. I decided to move up into 3rd, just to be safe, and also to see how strong these guy were.
Then, the guy who was in 1st took a wrong turn, putting me into second. Shortly after the gent in front fell over (tripped on a tree). That left me to lead this race. And that was it. From then on it was just me. I looked back a couple of times to see if anyone was around but I couldn’t even hear foot steps. Great, cruise control on!
As I crossed the finish line I was met with some puzzled faces as people were expecting somebody else to win. Sorry (not really) to spoil the party.
Amanda had a great showing to, finishing a solid 4th overall in the womans race. She’s done very well in her first year of XC running.
Thanks for reading!
Happy (Back to using rabbit ears to watch TV) Trainin!
Cliff
I would like to make a correction…it was 11.4km….not 10.4 km…BIG difference when your legs are so shaky you feel like you might fall off the side of the mountain! Great race and can’t wait for the next one in 2 weeks!
* note: previous comment was made by me, not Cliff!! He of course would never have shaky legs haha!*
Awesome race y’all! You’re both making me want to ‘get off road’. Soon I hope. Soon!
Nothing like a trail run. Then there’s a trail race, where the dynamics of tripping, staying on course, animals, mud, water, no support — can add a whole other dimension. And sometimes, an advantage. Kudos on your first place – sounded like a lung-leg burner of a race. Fun.
Checkout the new video! 2 weeks and that will be me on the top of the mountain! Base jumping is actually against the rules. Damn.