XTERRA McDowell Mountain Trail Run - Run15 Mile

My plan was to ease into my effort and planned HR target of the low 160's. My legs felt pretty good and the first mile was fast over the sandy rollers of the trail. A group of about 8 were immdeiatley off the front and I was in the second pack. Things sorted themsleved out very quickly and everyone was running in a line with about 10 feet between runners. I passed two guys early within the first 2 miles just as we hit the first climb up to the ridge. The climb is rocky and you had to pay attention to footing. I could see 2 guys up the trail from me and the lead group was now out of site.

As I climbed, i could see I was putting some time into the guys ahead, but I satyed controled and let the race come to me. Once up on the Ridge heading towards the Dixie Mine turn off, I closed down the gap so i was running directly behind these guys. My HR was around 163 to I sat in for a few min. to see what they would do. Clearly the guy in front was slower so I waited for the one in front of me to make the pass first. He did and I followed about 10 seconds later. I was right on him and could hear he was breathing hard so I made the pass immediatley right before the trun off.

Once I tunred on Dixie Mine, there was a downhill section and I used that to open a gap on those two. After a short climb, I came to the long, steep, single track descent to Dixie Mine itself About half way down, I saw the leader coming up. Thre guys were still in a group followed by 3 more spread out behind them, so I knew I was top 10 but missed the actual head count. I could see an aid station down on the service road and figured that was the turn, but it was actually beyond that. I knew the area, that there was a wash followed by a extremely steep hill and sure enough, the turn was half way up that sucker. I mean it's stupid steep. There was a kid sitting in lawn marking the turn taunting me as I scrambled up!

This was about the 7 mile so I took advantage of the aid station to take my one gel with some water as I ran by. The climb out of Dixie Mine was tough especially as evryone was coming down at the same time, but there was enough spread between runners so it wasn't too bad. I made my way back to the turn for Coach Whip and no longer had to contend with oncoming traffic. Once on Coach Whip, i was completely alone and could see only one runner way up ahead on the trail. I was still managing my effort well, and felt pretty good but I knew it was going to get rough after 12 miles. Coach Whip has a long descent section and i used that to try and recover before the last bit of climbing around miles 10-12.

The guy in front of me seemed to get closer but I went through a very pad patch between 10 and 12 and he opened a big gap. I never looked back but I began to worry that I might get caught if I couldn't get it together. Fortunately, I made the tunr on Tonto Tanks and knoew it was 3 miles downhill on hard pack sand. I let my legs fly and settled myself down. Feeling a bit better, I now had closed back up on the guy ahead and at one point was within maybe 20 feet of him. Once we hit Pmberton and the last 1.5 miles, he found a whole different gear and really took off and I had no response. Within the last .5 miles, I looked back to make sure no one was coming up on me and saw nothing but empty trail. I came intot he parking lot and crossed the line pretty spent.

I waited for Jamie to finish, which she diod in 2:11, 7th in her AG, and checked the results. I was very happy with 7th OA and hats off to the guy from Tuscon in my AG who beat me by about 3 min and was 5th OA. 3rd in my AG was over 11 min behind me. The dude who won the race went 1:28! WOW.


Great race this year I will look to do the whole series.