We were woefully missing our Adam yesterday, who had finally taken enough hard knocks to be convinced to rest up this weekend. I seem to recall he often gives an overall recap of the FLRC/High Noon XC experience. In lieu of that, perhaps a few of us can give our own race stories here?
Mine follows:
It’s always been tough to field teams for the shortest race that pairs with the longest drive for our local XC aficionados, but when the gun went off yesterday, we had two mens teams: a men’s open, and a men’s masters team. The existence of the master’s team came into being literally minutes/seconds before the start, with all-star Jesse Koennecke doing last minute sign-up manipulations on his phone after Seth Hallem showed up on the line as we were doing our pre-race stride-outs. The weather was pretty ideal-for-XC conditions with soft but not muddy turf from recent gentle rains, a mild breeze with temps in the low-mid 60’s and the sun occasionally peeking out of mostly cloudy skies from time to time.
Once the gun did go off, we made our way towards a quick funneling into a chute just a few runners wide. I found my way immediately after the start to race director Mike Nier, who often starts at a pace I find sets a good tone for my early miles. As we were discussing in the car on the way there, I feel like the best starting pace is a pace that should feel way way way too easy given the adrenaline coursing through your veins. Then you look at your watch and you say…hey…that’s actually pretty darn reasonable, and then get to work. Dave Kania was just ahead, in the same pack. It’s always good to have an eye on where your friends are, and try to work together.
Mile 1 rolled by in a comfortable and relaxed feeling 6:11, with the garmin ding of mile 2 being a reminder to begin to grind out a less comfortable, but hopefully not too much slower mile. The course rolls up and down grassy bits, with a couple short punctuations of dirt trail. “Push the hills, relax the downs,” made for a good mantra to start to move up through the field. The mile was slightly slower, at 6:16, but I probably moved up 8 places or so. In the middle of the final mile, you make your way out of a short dirt ravine with a steep sandy climb-out. Coming out of there is the herald of the last gasps of the race, maybe 800m to go. Things hurt at that point, but they hurt for everyone…the goal is just to hurt faster than the guy or gal next to ya. I caught a chargers guy, he responded, we were both moving up on most. A couple STC guys came up on me just after a sharp 180 starting a long kick. My strategy was to tag onto them, and then unleash my 800m runner kick. I started that maybe 40m before a tree after which there’s a sharp right turn to the finish, making my way past those guys to get to the tree first. After coming around that, I saw 2 or 3 more guys maybe 10m ahead that looked master-ish in age, so I completely emptied the anaerobic tank in the last 100m to try to eke out a few more points. Every place counts!!
I got to the line ahead of that pack at 19:11 in rather considerable respiratory distress, and making a similarly considerable amount of noise, having run almost exactly the same time that I ran last year. After bringing physical systems a bit back closer to normal with a combination of relaxation techniques and a few of my choicest profanities, I meandered over to cheer the rest of the team to the finish.
As an aside: looking back at the results, the guys I passed were 51, 34, 36, 39, and 39…ah well! No guts, no glory, or, sometimes, lots of guts, and the same absence of glory.
Of special note watching our finishes was an awesome kick by new-to-XC (I believe) Paula Kilts, to hold off/pass her nearby competitors.
The ride home was great, especially getting to know another new-to-xc guy, Harry Pruyne, who is joining the 50-59 AG for HNAC. A stop at Okay Brewing was a perfect way to break up the long drive and refuel, esp. with the ice cream place next-door for dessert!
FLRC women took home some goodies, and we got to clap for them many times during the awards, but it would be great to hear details from their end on how it all played out. Cheers!
