Training Log Archive: Relentless

Day 3 of Ultimate XC. Exhausted (did not sleep well all weekend), sore, tight, and weary about the giant hills that lurked ahead, but excited about being in the final day of one of the toughest races I've ever done, and being in a good position to contend for the podium on the final day. Now the question was whether my gamble to push really hard on the run would pay off. I didn't feel great, but then I didn't figure anybody else (except maybe Getawaystix) felt that great either. I think we all knew it would be a punishing day, but also an incredible race course with some unbelievable climbs and crazy technical descents.

The course started on freshly cut tall grass on the huge property of one of the racers (PL). PL and family have build some amazing single track trails on their property and graciously allowed us to ride them. Great stuff! As with the run, I opted to start out quickly in order to avoid traffic going into the single track. While this worked well at avoiding traffic, I remember looking at my watch for the first time at 24 minutes into the race... Uh oh, this is going to be a VERY long day!!! All I could think is that I was working way too hard way too early in the day... But I remembered that the course basically had 2 very technical and steeper sections, one at the beginning and one at the end - and in the middle was a bunch of road sections linking into some trail sections wherever they could be found. So I figured I'd have a little bit of a chance to "rest" once I hit the roads. So I tried to stay with the pack I was in. They eventually dropped me, but that got me close enough to the road section. I ended up riding most of the day with an American from Mass. I believe, and the also with Logie (BL) and the Ameircan's team mate. BL had passed me at one point and was riding very well, so I didn't figure I'd see him again, but we all eventually merged into a group of 4 and rode together for a while. Was good to just put the head down for a bit and follow along.

As we approached the big 5km climb basically from the bottom of the mountain right to the top (on a gravel access road), BL informed me that the guy who was in 3rd place overall was right in front of us (we could see him climbing up ahead). So at that point I decided to try and catch him. My legs felt pretty good to climb at that point so I figured I'd see what I could do. I managed to pass the 3rd place guy about 1/4 of the way up to the summit. I made up some pretty good ground on him on the climb. At the top I met up with Dee and Harps' wife AL, as well as DM who I ran with the day before who was now cheering me on. Dee and AL were awesome at shoving food and drinks down my throat and replacing my empty bottles with fresh ones. They informed me that I was only 5 min behind the 2nd place 3 day rider (BL), which gave me a good burst of energy. I left the summit feeling somewhat refreshed mentally and physically and ready to hammer the next downhill. Only about 2 hours from the finish I was told.

The downhills were awesome. A bunch of stuff that probably would have scared the crap out of me on any other ride, but I was too tired and too much in race mode to be scared at that point. So I just crashed a bunch of times instead! I think I counted 5 endos in total and a few other wipeouts. No major damage though, except some bruised hands and new scratches on the bike...

As I went bombing down one particularly technical section, I finally looked up and noticed the lack of trail markings (the course was extremely well marked, so the lack of flagging tape really stood out). I stopped and looked ahead and behind and could not see any flagging tape. There was a couple walking up the trail in front of me, so I asked them if they had seen any bikers on the trail. They said no, but there was an intersection just ahead and they may have gone another way. So I decided to start walking back up the trail to find the last marker. As I started my ascent, another racer came flying towards me and stopped when he saw me climbing back up. We talked and decided to bike down further to see if the intersection ahead was marked. It wasn't - and clearly we had missed a turn. So we walked back up the trail about 300m and found the trail and hopped back on...

OK - here's where the story gets really interesting... So I bike about 10 more minutes along the trail, wondering how much time I lost from the mistake and whether the 3rd place guy had passed me now. And as I'm doing this, I catch up to a rider that I recognize - it's Getawaystix. Something's not right here... he's supposed to be about 10 minutes ahead of me, and I just lost 5 minutes or more of time... So I figure he must have had a major mechanical issue or something like that. He takes off before I have the chance to talk to him. I continue my race. But I'm not feeling so good about the situation. Something is not making sense to me. Then I see another guy a few minutes later on a single speed who I know was supposed to also be about 10 min ahead of me... and that's when I knew something was very wrong. From what I can figure, when I walked back up the trail where I had gone off course, two things must have happened (this is one of those one-in-a-million scenarios)... 1) there was a trail junction that led back up the hill to two different places, and 2) the course must have doubled back to almost right next to where I went off course. So when I walked back up the hill and saw the trail, I actually was seeing a different spot where the trail doubled back (about 10 minutes ahead of where I went off course). But when I got back on the trail, I had no reason to suspect that I might be in the wrong spot. It wasn't until about 10 minutes later when I started spotting riders who I knew should be ahead of me, that I started to figure out what happened... Very frustrating!!! I was pretty deflated after being sure about the mistake, and my speed from that point on dropped quite a bit. I was pretty sure I would be disqualified. I still kept moving forward, but I certainly was no longer racing as hard as I had been up to that point.

I arrived at the finish line in "2nd place" of the 3 day racers and quickly began to explain the situation to the race director, who really didn't understand what I was explaining at first. He didn't seem to think it was a big problem at that point - until the next couple racers came in and my time put me ahead of the 3rd place guy. Now he had a problem on his hands. So he explained his dilemma and then asked me if I thought that I would have beaten the 3rd place guy. I said yes, I though, based on how things were going (having passed him on the uphill) that I probably would have beaten him, but there's no way to know that for sure, and that I definitely would not accept to finish ahead of him for the bike race or the overall rankings. I told the race director that I had no problem if he wanted to DQ me for the race. It was an awesome course and an awesome weekend and I had no regrets, regardless of my race result. I also said that if he didn't want to DQ me, then he should at least assess me a penalty that would keep me in 4th place or lower in the standings, but definitely not in 3rd. He seemed very relieved that I wasn't trying to make a case for finishing in 3rd place overall. I was glad that the issue was able to be resolved without anybody feeling cheated.

So, officially, I finished in 4th place overall, about 2 minutes behind 3rd. Very happy with that result.

All in all it was an incredible weekend with tons of challenge, fun, and lessons to take away... A fantastic race, extremely well organized and one that lived up to the promise of being one of the toughest races of its kind out there...

C • Congrats! 2

Day 2 of Ultimate XC. This was my biggest day of the race. I figured this would be my strongest discipline so my plan was to hammer the run. I decided to run with a friend (DM), since we had run this race course together the previous year and both felt happy with the result. He was doing the 1 day race, so I just told him I would try and hang on to him for as long as I could but when it was time for him to take off to not worry about me.

We started off pretty quickly and moved our way toward the front half of the pack so we would not have too much traffic getting into the tighter trails. I felt like I was pushing a little harder than I would if I was on my own, but was still able to maintain the pace, so I hung in there with DM. The brook run was a great relief (although not an easy section) with the ice cold water on the legs and the rocky stream bed which forced everybody to slow the pace down. There were a few deep sections in the brook where I was up to my chest in water, but again it was a nice way to cool down and get ready for the difficult climbs ahead.

About half way through the race DM started struggling a bit. I found out later that he had been fighting a virus leading up to the race and it was coming back with a vengeance. While the pace slowed a little, we still moved quite well and were well ahead of our time from the previous year's race. The slightly slower pace also allowed me to not totally destroy myself on the climbs since I would need the energy for the end of the run and for the following day's mountain bike race.

On the final climb to the summit of Mont Tremblant we were passed by the lead female in the 1 day race and 4 other 1 day racers. As we exited the bush and began to climb the last 500m or so on a gravel road I spotted another racer about 100m behind us. DM asked me if he was a 1 day or 3 day racer and I told him I thought he looked like one of the 3 day racers. At that point DM convinced me to leave him and hammer the rest of the climb and downhill so that the guy coming up from behind would not catch me. I felt pretty good at this point, so I ran the last 400m up to the summit, skipped the final aid station (I still had 3/4 of a bottle of water left and a little bit of food) and began the 6.5km descent to the finish. I felt fantastic on the downhilll. My legs felt strong and my knees were still absorbing the terrain quite well, so I decided to try and keep a very strong pace on the entire downhill. I soon passed the 5 guys and the lead woman who had passed us on the uphill. I knew at this point that I was in 3rd place in the 3 day race, but I didn't know how far back the next racer was behind me at this point and since it's cumulative time, I wanted to keep a very strong pace right to the finish.

About half way down the mountain, I was very surprised to see the 2nd place 3 day racer in front of me. I figured the 2 top racers were probably running neck in neck to the finish line and that they were a good 10 minutes ahead of me. So I pulled up next to him (BL) and once he recognized who I was, he said "well this is going to be an interesting finish!". I don't think either of us were all that excited about the idea of duking it out to the finish line, but I figured that's exactly what was about to happen. I had noticed on the way down the hill that I was moving quite a bit faster than BL at this point, but I knew he has the speed and technical ability to go just as fast as I was going. So I decided I would try to take off and see if he would follow me. As expected, he did give chase, but I was able to pull away fairly quickly and I didn't see him again from that point on - but I always felt like he was right behind me and would show up any second, so I was pushing the pace really hard from that point onward.

As I finally made my way to the village, I entered the "chute" that took us right through the middle of the village and on to the finish line. That is such a great feeling to run down the middle of the village and to hear the cheers of random strangers - we just don't ever get that in adventure racing! So as I entered the chute, a volunteer (I think) screamed out "400 metres to the finish line!". I was relieved, thinking that all I needed to do at this point was to run to the bottom of the village and I would be at the finish line. I had been out of water for a while and it had caught up to me, so I was in desperate need of the finish line. Now, having done the race last your, you would think that I would remember that the finish line is not, in fact at the bottom of the hill... but I was not exactly thinking straight at this point. So needless to say, when I got to the bottom of the hill and another volunteer pointed to his left and screamed "only 500 metres to the finish line!" I was absolutely defeated. I had invested everything I had to get to the bottom of the hill. 500m at that point felt like 500 miles. I think that's the slowest I have ever run 500m and there were no hills, no rocks, just nice hard-packed gravel and a beautiful rolling path to the finish with some cheering people. I could not believe how hard this last few minutes felt, considering how easy it actually was. It turns out that BL almost caught up to me in that section - finishing about 15 or 20 seconds after I did. As I turned the last corner before the finish I spotted Dee and Harps' wife and a few other familiar faces who were cheering me on. It's funny what we think about when we are hurting physically. All I could think about was how much I needed an ice cream. A big ass chocolate dipped ice cream. So as I ran by, I asked Dee (more like, I begged her) to bring me an ice cream to the finish line. One of her friends graciously agreed to get me an ice cream and showed up about 10 minutes later with the biggest, most beautiful chocolate dipped cone I've ever seen! The timing could not have been much better. Any time sooner than that I actually could not have eaten it, since when I got to the finish line I nearly passed out. I literally was standing at the food table, my entire body shaking, with a cup in my left hand that some person was continuously filling with HEED and I was continuously chugging, while grabbing as many pieces of watermelon as I could with my right hand and stuffing them in my mouth. It was like a race against time to try get some fluid and sugars in my system before falling over. I managed to barely stay standing (a chair would have been really nice at that point) and finally make my way under a tree to sit down for a few minutes before my ice cream arrived. It took me at least a half hour to feel ready to move from under the tree. I clearly had overspent myself on the last downhill. That had me a bit worried for the next day's race, so I really tried to focus on eating and drinking a lot in the evening and stretching as much as possible.

Overall a great day and I was very happy with the result - I was now in 4th place, only 2 minutes behind the 3rd place guy.

Event: Ultimate XC Challenge
 

Day 1 of Ultimate XC. Was very excited and a little nervous - not sure what to expect on the paddle section. I had wanted to come and test run the river section (and my boat!) but that did not end up happening. So I hopped in the boat and hoped for the best. It became pretty clear early on that testing the rapids and the boat would have been a good idea. First off, my boat was not kind to me. I don't know if it got wrapped in some rapids at some point or tied down cockeyed, but whatever happened to it, it only knew how to track to the right (and there was no rudder). At first I thought it was the wind on the lake, but I had the same issue for the entire paddle, and no amount of shifting body weight, leaning or any other trick to keep things straight worked. So all I could do was grip my paddle as far to the left as possible and stroke as hard as I could on the right with each stroke. It was exhausting. The portaging was a relief.

Next, I had changed my mind about what to bring with me - originally deciding to bring a bilge pump but no spray skirt and then changing my mind at the last minute to take the skirt and leave the pump (told myself that I had my water bottle in case I really needed to bail some water). So I paddled with the skirt on for the lake section, forgot to put it back on after getting in and out of the boat on the river, and then took on water in the rapids. So there I am in my boat with 5 inches of water in the cockpit, my useless sprayskirt around my waist and no bilge pump thinking "I guess I didn't quite do that right!". Dumped in rapids about 3 or 4 times - I just never felt comfortable in this boat from the start, but didn't have too many options at this point! On the first dump I was trying to get to stable ground to get back in and I fell between two big rocks and banged up the side of my shin pretty bad, which had me concerned about being able to run the next day (was hurting with each step later that night). I'm sure I looked pretty funny a few times standing in waist deep moving water trying to pick my water-filled boat up out of the water to try and drain it... Note to self - bilge pump... ALWAYS!

Finally made it to the big "portage" section where the organizers took the boat and we got to run for 3.5km. I was so happy to be out of the boat. I ran pretty hard in this section to try and make up some time and felt quite rejuvenated by the time I got back in the boat for the long paddle to the finish on Lac Tremblant. I got on the lake and spotted FB just ahead of me at the floating aid station (boat). So I figured I'd just try and chase him to the finish line. I held him for a while, but ultimately fighting the "right turn" just killed me physically and mentally and I just shifted into "looking behind" mode to make sure I didn't get passed. Finished 8th overall and considering all of the things that went wrong, I was satisfied with the result. 36min behind the leaders, which is a lot, but I knew my stronger disciplines were ahead. Spent the rest of the evening trying to hydrate, replenish, rest and stretch to get ready for the run.

C • Nice work! 1