Survival of the Fittest start area.
Chasing Kris and Mike early in the race. (Lesley Loree Photo)
Sunday I raced the final event in the Coast Mountain Trail Series called Survival of the Fittest. I was hesitant to enter the 18km race starting and finishing at Quest Univ. in Squamish but decided to go for it. The race features a huge climb off the start with several big ones to follow. The climbs were matched only by the technical descents on trails normally left for the crazy downhill mountain bikers.
I started the race still feeling my sore achilles tendons from the previous few weeks training. This was definitely a factor on the big climbs. While typically I find the steeper sections ideal for me, I can just grind away, this race featured lots of runnable ascent sections on rolling terrain. Forced to run fast, I found myself struggling. I tried to keep up with eventual winner Kristopher Swanson and found myself redlining pretty quickly. Mike Murphy caught me soon after and though I tried to hang on, he ran ahead on a rolling section. By myself for the rest of the race, I found it hard to push on the descents and spent considerable time thinking about how much worse I will feel running these same trails during the Squamish 50k in August.
Finishing up the first big descent. (Rob Shaer Photo)
Too tired to talk to Gary after the race. (Rob Shaer Photo)
I finished in 3rd feeling pretty wiped. Kris and Mike are both exceptionally strong guys so I am not too worried. Hoping my running legs are feeling a bit stronger as the summer wears on and the training kicks in. It was a hard race! When the sun came out strong it was tough. I definitely will be using some sort of water carrier for the Squamish 50.
Thanks a lot to Gary for putting on a cool race and all the volunteers for helping out. Overall it is a very cool race venue, a beautiful start area at Quest, a good course and it was very well organized. Cool prizes too. Im definitely excited to do a few more of the Coast Mountain Trail Series events next year. Also thanks to Sarah for biking up to cheer me on into the finish.
Results are here.
A bunch of photos are posted up here and here.
Gear:
- Dynafit Feline Superlight Shoes, React Dry Shorts
- Patagonia Capilene 1 T-Shirt
- Suunto Ambit 2 HRM/GPS
My Dynafit Feline shoes are working awesome. I am looking forward to racing in the Ghost model as soon as my legs are feeling a little less sore. The Ambit 2 worked well for most of the race but seems to have give out at the bottom of the course and cut out the last 5 or 10 min. Movescount file here.
Stats:
- Time – 1:37:26.6
- Distance ~ 18km
- Ascent ~ 1050m