Xterra Australian Championships

So it was finally the day of my first pro race. I was lucky enough to have the support of my flatmate Shane, and my Dad at the race, which boosted me greatly, as I was very nervous on the drive out to the race. Shane reminded me that I had done lots of quality training, and had some good results behind me, which helped ease the butterflys.

The course was a disappointing one for the Xterra Champs - I spoke to people who had ridden the course, and said it was totally non-technical, and very much a hard slog as you had to push your bike over soft grass. I discovered this for myself as I warmed up on the bike. Despite the course, a few names turned up for the race, including Jason Chalker, the current Aussie Champ, Jan Rehula, the Olympic Bronze Medallist, and his Czech mate...

There was also Stu Adams, a great swimmer and mountain biker from Newcastle, and Guy Andrews, former Ironman Champ. Realistically, and if everything turned out well for them, I didn't expect to beat any of these guys. But I was confident I could get close to them, and this is Xterra, and anything can happen.

My major concern was the swim, my weakest leg. I planned to go out hard enough to find some people to sit on, but not too hard that I blew up. I also hoped to take it hard on the bike, and then see if I could strike anyone on the run.

The swim was an out and back 1500m - far enough to lose a large amount of time. After a brief warm-up, I found myself amongst the other pros waiting for the gun to sound.

After a few hundred metres of the swim, I was surprised to find myself trailing two others, who themselves were at the tail end of the lead pack for a little while. Pleased that I had found a good draft, I made sure I remained on one of these guys' feet for the rest of the swim. I exited the water in 18th place, about three minutes down on the leaders (which is a great swim for me). Even though I wasn't wearing a watch, I knew I had a good swim, as I came out of the water with someone who normally beats me on the swim, and I caught a few people who are better than me on the swim quite quickly.

The ride, was, er, non-technical, but quite hard. It was pretty much flat, and on grass, which required a continuous effort. There were no long downhills to coast, nor any technical sections which required finesse. It was pretty much head down, bum up, and keep pedalling. You could barely even coast for a second, as you would loose your speed pretty quickly.

I did manage to stack once, off a very unexpected dropoff. I worked out later, that the course actually went around the dropoff, but not until I had ridden off it on all three laps. The stack actually broke up the group of 3 I was riding with, which was a pity, as I wanted to work with them. In the end, I rode away from everyone I caught up to, and finished the 3 laps 5 minutes behind the lead pack of 5, and about 2 minutes ahead of the next competitor.

As I started the run, I was confident I would be able to hold off any charge from behind, and I also thought 5 minutes was a long way to catch up. I told myself to keep putting in a big effort, as I may just be able to catch the slowest of the lead pack.

The run was one lap of the bike course, with an extra 1km loop. Although comfortable to run on, the grass was quite slow compared to bitchumen, and I found it hard to keep up any speed, as I was running alone. I did sight someone from the lead group about 1.5km ahead, and I saw some other guys about 1km behind me at one stage.

And then I was overtaken by some people still on the bike course. Great, I thought. I'll try keep pace with them. Unfortunately, they slowed down on a slightly tricky section, and I overtook them, and never saw them again...

I finished just under a minute behind Guy Andrews. I ran past a silent Nick Munting, who was meant to be announcing the race, high fived Shane and my Dad in the finish chute, before lazily walking across the line in 6th place (out of 8 pros)

Phew, I didn't embarrass myself, and had performed as expected. I had no major mechanical problems, and got to within a minute of someone from the lead pack.

By entering the pro category, I had given up the chance to be an Australian age-group champion, but gained a whole new set of much higher goals. I gave other age-groupers a chance to win age-group prizes, whilst giving myself more incentive to improve. As it turned out, all 8 pros finished in the top 8, and the first age-grouper was a friend of mine whom I travelled to Hawaii with, and thoroughly deserved the prizes he received, with all the hard work he has put in (and overcome the bad luck of cancelled races and injuries). Well done Simon.

Saturday, 22nd March, 2003
Xterra Australia Champs (1.5km, 30km, 11km)
Swim: 23:11
Ride: 1:14:11
Run 41:15
Overall 2:18:37
Overall Place: 6th