Race Report: Xterra West Championships, Temecula USA

Xterra West Championships

1.5km swim, 30km mtb, 10km trail run.

Time: 2:25:20

2nd - 2min18 behind winner Conrad Stoltz (blog)

(Conrad and I - 3km into the 30km mountain bike leg - photo by Rich Cruse)

What was forecast to be the cooler day of the weekend turned into the scorcher breaking through the 100 (sounds better in Fahrenheit) degree level and thinking back, that’s the prominent memory to todays race ingredient to report on. Other than getting second for the best result of my short career…

Every Tom, Dick and Harry seemed up for the season opener in the bottom corner of California this morning. My pick of the stars was the pink and blue bike alongside mine belonging to Michelle Jones, who I tried telling Ruth about - One of the iconic triathlets of all time. Either way, it all made me a little twitchy before the start of the pro wave, but then we were asked to place the right hand on the chest and listen to a singing of the Star Spangled Banner. That set me at ease. As it would.

I had a cracking start to Lake Vail’s non-wetsuit swim, and lead the left hand side of the field, but missed Craig Evans’ feet when moving across to him on the right, and soon found myself relaxing into the comfortable drag of the front pack of five, including fellow countrymen and 6 time Temecula Champion - The Caveman Conrad Stoltz. It was a big one-lap affair at a steady tempo.

Evans and a girl (eish) had maybe 30seconds on us running up into transition – which was a make or break for getting on Stotlz’ wheel before the first five kilometers of flat open road. I canned my big blade for all I’m worth to get within kissing distance of his rear wheel before looking up, before putting the sunnies on, before taking the gloves off the bar ends, and before daring to tighten them Velcro straps.

We’d flown by all but one at this stage, and soon passed him to, with Stoltz gruntedly asking Evans who was leading, to which he replied “You”. Stoltz grunted back in a surprised “oh” which would have blown the strongest of minds and Evans was off the South African express train without ever really being on.

It seemed different to Xterra Grabouw (race report) four weeks ago. Stoltz was out to race this time, and seemed to have far more at stake here. I felt I could sit wheel and not work, play my hand, as he was the one determined here, a reverse of Grabouw. After 5km we swung up the 1.5km climb. I felt comfortable, and kept his rear Roval with a Specialized Fast Trak 2.0 LK company (I was running Specialized Fast Trak 1.9 SLK’s). Comfortable yet knowing cresting with Stoltz is not really the hard ask.

Back tracking to yesterday, on my final bit of pre-riding to my pre-ride from hell. I crashed in a corner that I’d decided to stick in the motorbike more banked birm, but it was a more loose sandy line, and although it felt fine on Friday, yesterday my front wheel was angered and uncontrollable. I went down hard, my first at speed for a while. Although the grazing on my arm and hip was minor, my confidence had been grazed to half… My seat had pivoted, handlebars shifted, bar end bent, and front rotor buckled. I’d just started riding again, before puncturing my rear tire on a near vertical 20m wall you need to spin out at before and then drop to granny for the top few meters. I tried to hop over a rock ledge and somehow pinched through the tire. It wouldn’t seal.

I nursed it to Conrad’s pimped out RV in the trailor park, begged some air and a new rotor, and thought the tire would hold. But when cleaning the bike at 5pm, the plug popped and I raced with Brian to a bike store in Temecula closing at 6pm (unthinkable in RSA) and put the spare tire on.

Back to the start of the descending though, with my shaky confidence I soon lost the draft and found myself fighting in every corner to not loose more meterage. Stoltz was prolific. Such skill and edgy riding. Pure class. Before starting lap two of the lollipop course, I’d given a minute. I climbed really well and felt the altitude training under Gary’s programme and guidance had come to fruition. I must have got to with 30seconds of Stoltz by the top, but then the descent started again… I’d glanced round once on the climb and could not see third trailing…

Brian Smith, the guy who biked and ran past 150 athletes at Xterra Worlds in Maui last October to finish third on the podium, was coming though, I could count on it. And until I would cross the line I’d keep that in mind…

Roughly 1min15 behind into transition 2. The American style of commentating makes everyone a hero and I was pumped running out. Heat was getting severe, stagnant and oppressive. I could see Stoltz ahead, and he chose to walk the steepest part of the first big hill. I ran through it, passed Ruth who was filming and going nuts for me.  I got a split of 50seconds going over the top, but starting buckling under the heat after a maxed out bike.

Stoltz recovered well to put another minute into me on the latter parts of the run. I was fortunate to have a proper buffer and could never see third coming. It was none other than Brian Smith though, and he ran like a demon to post a 34min 10k on rugged trail in scorching sun, some 3min30 faster then my split…

It was the best way to start my racing in the US. I felt elated, relieved, grateful, and above all cooked beyond medium rare. I took some water and hung in the mist tent till my core cooled.

Brian and Lauren had a good day out too, and survived four hours plus in the heat.  Proud to see their effort. Emma, our lift down for the weekend, raced to 7^th in the pro woman’s field.

Apologies for the longish report. We missed our turn, and at the moment we’re on the road in Death Valley… A long way from where we need to be.

Photo’s and video tomorrow… 

This entry was posted on Monday, May 19th, 2008 at 2:19 pm and is filed under Conrad Stoltz, News, Race Reports, Xterra, Xterra Temecula, Xterra USA Series. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.