So ... this is really late in coming so I want to appologize up-front :)
My friend Yvonne talked me into doing an Xterra (yes, my first) the night before the race. It was, in a word, FUN! Yup, i think i'm addicted ... here are the fun details.
My strategy for the race was simple: Survive the swim, kill the bike, and fight to maintain my position on the run.
The race started off with a swim ... Yvonne hooked me up with a wetsuit so i didn't freeze to death in the water :) Don't laugh but it's been a while since i've really swam and i couldn't really remember the whole breathing deal for the front crawl ... so I did the side crawl and the breast stroke the entire way .. yup, the whole 1000m :) It was slow but I did survive. And to my absolute surprise i wasn't the last one out of the water ... i was the 3rd or 4th last ;)
Brian, Yvonne's husband was there cheering and as I left the water he ran beside me and told me .. you're not the last one! LOL. Awesome. :) My transition seemed to be going smoothly until i got the wetsuit to my ankles at which point i could not seem to get it off ... heh. Seems that this transition thing should be practiced ;)
Once on the bike i started feeling more in my element. I was picking people off throughout the technical course and having a blast ... it was great. The course was fun, I finally felt like i could move faster ... ahh... i was really racing.
The bike-to-run transition was smooth (except i forgot to untie one of my shoes so i had to untie and retie one of my shoes! Noobie mistake! No big deal. I went off to the run thinking i had to move fast enough to ensure that all of the girls i'd just passed did not pass me back. I got into the zone. I was having fun running on the trails ... and i started to pass people! Wow - wasn't expecting that. While i've been doing some running for cross training I am pretty far from running shape so i was pretty surprised by this ... Awesome! I was really surprised when i found myself halfway on the running course and picked up the pace.
I finished in a solid pace and was pleasently surprised to find myself 4th!!! Yeah, 33rd out of the water ... and 4th overall ... nice. Apparently I need to work on my swim if I want to take this Xterra thing seriously ;) All of the girls around me finished in 15 minutes ... a solid 15 minutes ahead of me!
Yvonne rocked the course and ended up 2nd ... Rockstar!
