I first found out about Lake Placid XTERRA from Ben Dragon, a cyclonaut that was a former expert class sponsored Mtn. Biker, about a week ago when I told him I would be up in Placid for a vacation some part of that week and he knew about the race being there and he had done XTERRA events before. I told him not me, its mountain biking, I’m not a mountain biker. I didn’t even know for sure which part of the week we would be up there at that point. My mother-in-law rents a cabin every year on Hoel Pond in Lake Clear, about 30 mins North of Placid. Sometimes I’m lucky and it falls on Ironman Weekend to go there to watch and cheer on the Nauts. This year it had already been booked for IM weekend. So I was then thinking I would volunteer at the TTT and head up there after that. I didn’t want to race the TTT because being on coumadin for my atrial flutter(heart beat locks in at 150 -170 bpm until I’m shocked out of it at Bay States Fifth Floor Electrophysiology Lab) reoccurrences (4 times this year already). Coumbadin thins your blood to prevent clotting to prevent a stroke, and if I had bloody crash I wouldn’t know when the bleeding would stop. So then volunteering at the TTT was an option since I really wanted to help out Brenda and the cause, since I also have had the incurable CLL since 2007. I’m still at cancer stage zero, asymptomatic, watch and wait, but the cancerous White Blood Cells of leukemia keep growing every visit and my red blood cells, the oxygen carriers, keep going down, not good for endurance events that I have always loved to do. We then found out the day for Noah’s sports physical, the day before his HS soccer season starts, is on Wednesday, so that would have made a very short trip and had to take the Saturday thru Tuesday time to be in Placid for a mini vacation. So it was back to looking into this XTERRA event online. First at the course maps, I knew the area around the LP high school oval and knew the run would be hilly. I wasn’t familiar with the golf course area for the bike though. Then posted on the Forum and got some done it and mastery knowledge about the course from Karen Stone, which made me think more and more about doing it. How hard could it be? It was only a .5 mile swim, 10 mile bike, and 3.1 mile run and I finished IM in Lake Placid in 2005, no problem. But the thought of the mountain biking on advanced trails made me hymn and haw whether I should attempt it. I had done the mountain biking trails at Mount VanHovenberg in Placid before, no big challenges there, of course they are cross country skiing trails and have them carved out wide for the novice mountain bikers to handle. So then back to finding out more about the event. I emailed Ken Robins, the northeast ambassador for XTERRA, to confirm he was still having a clinic there on Saturday, “It’s still on, come on down” and to let me know who to contact for the swim clinic that Total Immersion was also giving Saturday, “I’ll be teaching the swim clinic too”. So more and more positive thoughts about doing the race were building up in me. We arrived in Placid around 11am Saturday on a nice partly cloudy dry day, the city seemed empty, not your typical IM weekend crowd. No traffic, no parking spot issues, no expo tents, just two pop up tents to sign up for the event at the oval. Noah and I arrived at the oval just as the Trail Running Awards for the morning 5K and 10K races were being given out, man I could have podiumed in my age group just by finishing, not very many attempted it.
Awards finished around 11:45, including the swag prizes for the best hoola hoopers (they were bad), bare foot sprint race inside the oval (they were fast), and push up competition (they were strong, winner did 48 push ups in 30 secs). Then to check in for the clinic, about 30 people did the clinic, there were a couple of mtn bike tri first timers like me. Ken Robins and Pro Racer Matt Boobar(long course overall winner) did the clinic inside the oval, started out with the basic stuff, nutrition the day before(he recommends sushi and rice as the best pre dinner meal) and the day of the race(lots of fluids throughout, taping the gel packs to your handlebar stem so they rip off below the tape line, sticking this one type of gel tablet to your top tube, bike rack set up for a quick transition, mountain biking position for descending on the single tracks(butt off and over the seat, keep your feet at 3 and 9 o’clock, novices spend to much time in the saddle), run forward(lean and keep from falling down, you waste too much energy by favoring a heel strike). We then walked over to Mirror Lake for some swim tips on the floating dock by the start(one new one for me was to grab the water like your grabbing a bowl of rice, I’ve always kept my fingers together, not good, you want to grab as much water to push against to propel yourself forward, leg fluttering has little to no value, draft so that your fingertips just brush the swimmers toes ahead of you, first person back saves 20% energy, second person back saves 30% energy, when making a 90 degree turn at a buoy do 1 or 2 back strokes to make the turn, much quicker than turning and swimming freestyle. There will be a red carpet from the beach to the oval transition for the race just like at Ironman, everyone was happy to hear that. Only disappointment was we didn’t go to the run course or the bike course to get a sneak peak of what’s in store for tomorrow. So, getting the adrenaline rush from the clinic, I immediately signed up to race and Noah signed up to volunteer (volunteers get a free entry into next year’s race). Then Noah and I had time to bike the course, everything was marked with blue signs and arrows for tomorrows race. To begin with I do not have a bike for this course, mine is a Cannondale non suspension mtn bike, made for commuting with 2” metro street slicks. Noah’s is a little better suited for it, a hard tail Specialized Hard Rock purchased from Comp Edge’s last fall sale. We started out from the oval with an easy peasy ride straight out to the Mobil station up Mirror Lake Drive maybe .25 mile past the beach to turn into the trails heading to the golf course, a nice ride and paved so far, then the trail changes from paved to pebbly to rocky to grassy. A wide grass path at this point, then you make a turn into the single track and don’t come out for another 9 miles. So 90% of the race is on these advanced trails, and I riding my Cannodale hit a couple of high roots and bounced off course, so time to let out some air from the tires on both our bikes from mine of 85 and Noah’s of 65psi down to a hand squishy tire pressure. That was a big improvement; at least we could ride over the roots and rocks and not get bounced off track. Many of the tree openings were handlebar width only wide, no sharp daggers hanging out though, they did a good job trimming close to the trunk. Many of the trails switched backed being spaced only about 10 yds apart so you would always see riders throughout. Some of the two bike wide trails you had to share with others coming at you from the other direction.
We started out riding it at 3pm planning to get back to the oval by 4pm so we would have time to catch the 5pm mass in Saranac Lake. I had never done single tracking and thought this would be doable, not hardly, we took it slow and careful, no falls, but we walked over the large logs not knowing the technique for riding over these. At about 4:45pm we were still in the woods and didn’t know how much longer we would be there until we would get out of the woods back to the golf cart path. So at this point, I can see car traffic about 50 yds from our trail, so we hop off to walk and lift our bikes over the fallen trees to get to the highway. This is the point were I got scratched up pretty bad, but my INR blood score of 2, wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be, the blood cuts to my legs clotted, much quicker than when I get a blood INR check and need to apply pressure for about 2 minutes to get it to clot. So made it to onto the Highway Rte 86 the Ironman road back to Placid, knew the area now, we came out at mamma bear, then climbed baby bear, then poppa bear and then downhill back to the oval. Made it back around 5:15, rushed to Saranac Lake to catch the end of mass and prayed a couple extra Hail Mary’s for an injury free race tomorrow. After back to the cabin, decided to adjust Noah’s Specialized Hard Rock to fit me, since at least it had knobby tires and a front suspension. Raised the seat about 4 inches and pumped the tires to 35psi, now I should be race ready. The day was still cloudy but dry, but around 10pm at the cabin it started to pour, like the bouncing off pavement rain in Kevin’s LP picture on the home page. It was going to be a “It could rain in Placid” kind of day for tomorrow’s race. It’s just like a rain cloud settled over placid and wasn’t moving, until Monday morning around 11am when it finally stopped. So the bike course we practiced would be much different come race morning. We leave the cabin at 6:15am to head into Placid, no traffic all the way in, once at the oval we start to see a much bigger crowd than at the awards ceremony from Saturday, not IM crowd though more like a FIRM race crowd, about 350 bikes in the transition area total. Put on the wetsuit as I leave the car still light rain outside, might as well stay dry until after the swim, then head down to the oval for body marking and pre race meeting at 7:45. Then we walk over to the Lake, no red carpet in the road though, don’t know what happened to that, but I had my Nike aqua socks on and could put them on after the swim and run on the road with those on after the swim just as well. First wave of the long course males goes off, one guy really blasting away from everyone, exits the water for his first loop at least 200 yds from the field. Then the female and relay wave goes off. My wave starts around 8:15 after most of the long course males finish their first loop out of the water and around the floating dock, just like IM, only big difference is the furthest buoy is just about half the distance out, being a half mile loop. My wave goes off, only about 75 in my wave, no problem finding my line and trying out the rice bowl grab swim stroke, it works quite well, but was having a problem getting a good breathing pattern going, with my nose being plugged up from an end of week long cold, so it wasn’t until I got to the first turn that I had my breathing rhythm down and started passing swimmers on the way back to the arch. Once out of the water, you are on your own, no wet suit strippers, maybe only 40 spectators to cheer you on at the beach.
So I peeled off the wet suit and I had my aqua shoes under a bench by the beach line out to the road to slip on and had a nice transition run passing people trying to run in their tight wetsuits. Get to my bike at the rack and get dressed up for the bike. Head out of the oval passing bikers on the pavement and into the golf course path, then the fun begins in the woods. The single tracks were much more difficult today being muddy, with slippery roots and rocks throughout. Made it through about 3 miles and see riders heading back at me saying we all missed a turn that was hard to see, so went with them to get back on track. Every sizeable log I had to hop off and lift the bike over it. With the many switch backs spaced close together you would hear riders saying “Where the F@ck am I”, “I’ve been stuck in this circle for three times already”, “These woods can’t end soon enough”. From what I heard, last years long course was only a single loop of 8 miles long and the riders complained it wasn’t long enough, so they lenghtend it to 2 loops of 10 miles each for the long course. At about mile 8, I started to lose focus and hit a high root wrong and threw me over the handlebars with the front of the helmet and a bottom wide open mouth digging into the soil. After I spit out the mouthful of mud and leaves, I felt for any sharp edges or missing gaps in my teeth and no bleeding, a good sign, all was still there, was worried about loosing my front top three teeth bridge work from a previous bike wreck. So back on the bike and then about 200 yds further down, caught a slippery large rock on my left side tire and threw me off the bike again this time on my left shoulder and hip, no hurt there at least though, but it told me maybe I need to refocus and get some sugar in me with downing half my water bottle of Gatorade. Only a little over a mile left in the woods, so took it careful and easy out of the woods, then easy peasy back on the wide grass, to pebbly road, to paved road, into the oval. A quick transition to run, I had biked in my running shoes on platform pedals, otherwise I’m sure I would’ve fallen a lot more if I had cleats. So out of the oval giving Noah a high five at the water station he was at in the oval for the runners, then out back of the high school up the parking lot into the trail, this trail was pretty dry for some reason, steep going up and nice and wide, same going back down the other side, then you cross the highway and the fun begins. Single track running through the woods at some points just shoulder width apart. Again like the bike trail, rooty, rocky, muddy, and slippery, then about mile 1 they have a cameraman taking videos of runners crossing the first mud bog, two runners ahead of me run in and loose both their shoes being sucked off their feet in the mud. I didn’t follow their line, and made in through with a minor mud bath. About 50 yds ahead is the second mud bog, I didn’t have any runners ahead to school off of for this one, went off to the side figuring that should be the path of least travels, NOT…I went in both feet to my kneecaps, didn’t think I would pull myself out without some help, but managed to lift my right foot out with the shoe getting sucked into the mud. So went in elbow deep to try to find it, could only feel tree roots for a time, then found the shoe. The left foot was still in up to the knee, I was able to cringe my toes to hold on tight to my shoe to pull it out, then got to stable ground and scooped the mud out of both shoes, and felt liked scooping out chocolate pudding, at least my socks stayed on the whole time though.
Then back to the single tracks, a couple rolling hills throughout, then around mile 2 you hit two brooks you need to cross about mid calf deep. Made it through the first one OK, slipped on a rock in the second one and hit the water, washed off some of the muddy legs though. Then finally a little more single track and out of the woods to an open field back to cross the highway, then a repeat up and down the opening hill to the Ice Palace and run down the steps of the High School to run across the oval infield through the finish arch. What a race, it wore the bejesus out of me, sore all over from shoulders to toes. Then onto the infield for the great post race meal of garden salad, veggie pasta, and spaghetti and meatballs. Then I helped Noah who was still at the oval water station for the runners going around for their second long course loop and finished around 3pm when the last one went by. All in all a great race if you’re a mountain biker(this course had Jay O written all over it) and trial runner, a great experience to do if you’re not(like me).
Jim Gurzenski
8/23/10