Hey all,
Two MORF'ers headed out to Sacramento for a great early season race - Xterra REAL. Why is called Xterra Real? Because back in the day, 7 years ago, it was the only REAL mountain bike triathlon around the area (or so the story goes). By "real", they mean, real trails. The single track is great, a nice narrow ribbon of brown dirt surround by green foliage (inlcuding Poison Oak, Tecnu is a great thing to lather in after the race). I had my camera mounted on my handlebars hoping to get some great video, alas, it is harder to work than I anticipated with my heart rate at 180 bpm trying to catch up after the swim. I did manage to take a photo, which is very representative of the whole course:
Race Recap: I've done this race three years straight, and everyone is always worried in the weeks leading up to it..."Will there be water in the lake?????". Oh there was water in the lake. Clean, crisp, cold water. So much it managed to rise high enough to cut off a 1.5 mile portion of the bike loop. The swim went off without a hitch, right at 9 am. (Side note: TBF Racing in Sacramento puts on first class events. This may not be a major "Cup Race", but it's the best organized race I've been to. If you are in Sacramento for business or pleasure, go to tbfracing.com and see if they are having a swim, trail run, or triathlon while you're in town and go to it). During the swim, the two MORFs in the crowd ended swimming side by side, and came out of the water together, despite someone unzipping my wetsuit COMPLETELY while basically dry humping me during the first 50 yards of the swim. Graphic I know, but you get the idea, because it's happened to you. We exchanged phone numbers at the first buoy and went on our way. I finished the swim with the velcro around my neck holding my wetsiut on, 55F water sloshing into the open zipper. The beach run was about a minute and a half run to T1. Early season triathlon = crappy transition. I managed to leave T1 with no water, my camelback lying under my discarded wetsiut. Crap.
The bike leg is sweet right off the bat. T1 is set up directly next to the single track you'll ride for the next 13 miles, and includes a nice little 5 foot steep drop to get your speed going for you right off the bat. You're off like a shot, and unless the swim went well for you, you have a bit of work to do to pass on a series of curvy short climbs. The bike is an all out balls to the wall fast course. The very short climbs are generally followed by drawn out long portions of windy trail, where a pre-riding the course and knowing the turns will benefit you in carrying massive amounts of speed through the turns. It's a two lap course, so I picked up my water as I rode by T1 to head out on my second bike lap, thank goodness. As you roll into T2, you wonder what it will be like to head out on the run not yet having incorporated brick workouts into your training. Brick workout number one for the season, here I come.
The run is flat for the first mile and a half, then descends to the beach along Folsom Lake. Wow, I can't believe this area is so close to Sacramento, that section of the beach is beautiful with granite rock formations providing good obstacles to run over the top of on the run course. The meat and potatoes of the course is in the middle mile and half, where a series of STEEP climbs push your legs into full blown hurt. Descending down the other side of the steep climbs, you get to let it ride to the finish. The two MORFers in the crowd had a great start to the season, claiming age group second places, with the men's and women's overall champions taking the first place spots in their division. More importantly, we're stoked and motivated for the season to come, and were reminded just how fun XTERRA is!
