June 15th, 2008
HAPPY FATHER’S DAY!!!!!!!
It’s official. I’m an Xterra Triathlete. 
The race went as well as I expected- being that I haven’t raced in over a year and that I am coming back after a lot of time off.
The race confirmed what I already knew: WHEW I AM OUT OF SHAPE! Blah! ICK! Agh! But, I am so happy with my race and man it felt good to be out there again competing.
Before the race I got an excellent surprise… Sonni had come to watch me race! He didn’t even tell me. He came over with his son, both were on their mountain bikes, just to watch me race. It was so nice, and really I don’t have words to explain how much it meant. It was a great boost and definitely made my race day.
I was happy with my swim. I came out with a second group of girls and hit the bike in good position. But, I expected to have trouble on the bike and lose a good chunk of time against the other girls… because, well, frankly I’m quite a novice at mountain biking compared to these girls. Most of them I recognize from NORBA racing from reading reports on Cycling News. Me? I’ve never even done a mountain bike race before. So, I have lots to learn.
Quite early in the bike another guy was trying to pass me, and I let one guy by, but another guy tried to squeeze past too. It was pretty tight, and I guess he hit a tree limb or something… and he fell right on top of me, jabbing his handlebar into my side. It really hurt, and it took my breath away. I had to take a few minutes to get my breath back and, well, my nerve, before I could mount my bike again to keep going.
After that crash I couldn’t breathe really deep, but I kept going. That’s part of racing. I tried not to let it get to me too much mentally, but alas… it did. I walked A TON of stuff that I normally ride, and when we were up a few weeks ago to pre-ride the course I didn’t have near as much trouble. I couldn’t deal with crashing again… so I was conservative. I dismounted, pushed, shoved, and mounted my bike again over anything that I just didn’t have the nerve to ride. Oh well. I couldn’t stay focused on the fact I wasn’t riding well, although it did bother me, I just tried to stay focused on moving forward.
I knew I was really far behind on the bike. LIKE WAY LAST IN MY FIELD. Ugh. Okay, so no one likes to be in that position, but instead of focusing on the negative, I just kept pushing as best I could, given the shape I’m in, and enjoyed being out there racing.
The run was AWESOME! I kept a steady pace and just had a blast on the course. There were a lot of crazy obstacles on the run, but there was a good bit of open fire road and pavement too where you could just run. The “Mayan Ruins” were ever bit as steep and crazy as people said they’d be, and the dry river bed where you jumped from rock to rock over and over was a lot of fun. It was cool to jump, hold your breath, then be like, “I DID IT! YEHAW!”
After the race I thought about my effort. And I’m happy with it. Very happy! Because I know I have A LOT of work to do on the mountain bike, and well… I look forward to that. And I have work to do on my over all fitness, but hey, I knew that anyways… and with time I’ll be back to where I was a year ago. It’s nice to have that feeling now, and have a good baseline race to work from.
And, yes, I had thought about just racing age group for this event… since it’s my first time doing an Xterra event because it would take a lot of pressure of me. But, I’m a registered Elite with USAT, and per their guidelines I have to race in the pro field. Across the board, if you are a pro triathlete, you have to race pro in duathlon and in Xterra. So, yeah, I knew I was going to struggle big time racing with the pros, but I’d rather race where I know I can become competitive once I gain more experience instead of asking to downgrade my license until I figure things out. I’ve always enjoyed a challenge anyways.
No where to go but up from here!
Thanks to all the people out on the course cheering and volunteering to help with the race. It was a very well run and organized event… I can’t wait to go back next year!
Thanks again to my wonderful sponsors who support me through it all:
Studio7Multisport
Swank Chiropractic
Splish
Inside Out Sports
Be Present
Nutrilite
Winskins
June 15th, 2008 at 10:14 pm
Great pictures! And congrats on the FIRST RACE BACK. Where are those mayan ruins steps? I didn’t see those when up in Richmond last Fall. Also, it’s hard to imagine the river is deep enough to swim in. The parts that we saw looked really shallow.
June 16th, 2008 at 6:23 am
Yeah, the Mayan Ruins are across the other side of the river… I can’t really explain where they are, the way we got over there was crazy. We had to climb a set of stairs up to a reservoir first and go across some bridges on the road and stuff… yeah, I can’t explain it! hahahahahaahaha The picture shows them pretty nicely though.
And yes, the river is very shallow. A lot of times you were pushing yourself up and over big rocks and sandy spots. It was a very weird swim… technical, but I liked it!
June 17th, 2008 at 12:33 am
great job alisha! mountain biking is SO HARD and technical, like swimming i wish it were one of those things i started doing as a child so that by now i’d be able to do wheelies and trials stuff and hop my bike up onto picnic tables, when in fact my best mtb skill is that sometimes every once in a while i can go down hills without freaking out!
xterra looks like so much fun, but i think it’s also that you make it sound and look like so much fun - just the way racing should be.
June 17th, 2008 at 2:11 pm
Alisha,
You are so tough and courageous to jump in to a whole new discipline after your block of time off. Way to go! I have no doubt that you will be able to hang with those pro MTBers in no time. And most of all, I am happy it was FUN:-)!!!
Brooke