Xterra 2011

Finally I get round to posting this, it feels like months have gone by since the race but it's not quite a week yet! I had intended to post this much earlier but I haven't had the time till now to get this done. So here it is, a bit about my Xterra 2011 experience :)

Rob and I were out on a cruisey run on sunday a week out from Xterra when we started talking about Xterra and about who we thought might be doing it and somehow over the course of the run (which was no longer then an hour) I changed my mind from being convince I was NOT going to do it, to 'oh well I might as well do it, what have I got to loose? Worst case I come last but I will most likely have a good time out there.'

So that gave me not quite a week to get ready which pretty much meant all I could do was getting my head around doing the event as doing training during the 5 days before the event wasn't going to make me any faster but rather slow me down more.

Unfortunately I am really not a swimmer and to be able to do well at Xterra you want to at least have an average swim time, not super slow like me, so there aren't quite as many people ahead going into the bike leg, which means there are less people you have to pass to keep up a good riding pace.

Another small thing was that I hadn't done much running and had only been on the bike once since the final race of the N-Duro Bike Vegas Summer Cup on 13 March, instead I did a couple of weeks of skiing in Canada (I could call it cross training to make it sound better? ;) Cross training or not it was great fun and it made me feel more at home on skies but less on my bike, hopefully just for the moment. I am also pretty sure I am going faster on my skies then on my bike. (or maybe this has something to do with the skiing being downhill? ;) )

And the last little hiccup was that I didn't feel too rested after having worked with 90 teenagers over the last two weeks, most of them where great kids though!

So long story short, I was ill prepared for the event but was looking forward to a fun day out there.

I was a bit nervous before the race, even though I told myself I was just doing it to have some fun. Luckily for me the event starts with the swim so the 'worst' part is over and done with early on, the down side to that is that if you swim (or whatever you want to call what I do) as slow as me you end up at the very back of the crowd when you start the ride and there are masses of people to pass.

I came out of the water pretty much last in my field and probably in the field overall. It was crazy the amount of people I saw in front of me when I finally got on the bike, I was trying to pass as many of them as I could and made up quite a bit of places. By the time I changed into my running shoes and started my first lap of two around Lake Tikitapu (Blue Lake) I was in third position, I was a little surprised to hear that and was hoping I could hold my place. I knew that I wasn't going to do a fast run as my overall fitness wasn't great so it was about making sure to hold an ok pace and keeping that lead to 4^th place which I managed to do.

There were heaps of spectators all around the lake cheering us on and having a good time which made it fun and entertaining, and the weather was just perfect, sunny and not too hot!

I am super stoked with getting 3^rd in the women Pro field behind Karen Hanlen (who won) and Susie Wood at this years Xterra and I might seriously consider going for a swim before the next one ;)