Race Report: Xtera Crystal Cove 17k Trail Run

After our last mountain bike ride (at the beginning of December), Skyler's knee began having some problems. He finally decided to see a physical therapist about it and discovered he has an injury where his patella and something else (I can't remember) are rubbing together. His PT says this is probably due to all of his Ironman training and racing. Good thing this is the off-season, right?

Just a few days before finding out about his knee problem, I had signed both of us up to do the Xterra 17k Trail Run at Crystal Cove. Since his PT told him not to run, Skyler decided not to race.

December brought a lot of gloomy and rainy weather to Southern California, but the morning of the race was absolutely beautiful! You could easily see Catalina from Crystal Cove. Skyler drove us to the race site and brought his running shoes...just in case. You know what that means. I picked up our race numbers and Skyler started debating whether to race or not. You really can't make that kind of decision on race morning because of course you're going to get caught up in the pre-race excitement. He decided to race, as long as his knee didn't hurt.

The race began with a steep uphill. It's a great way to separate everyone. This was Skyler's second trail run, but my first. He is a great runner and was near the first right away.

Hills are tough for me, so I patiently ran slow and steady up the hill. Lots of people passed me. At one point I thought I was in last place (I wasn't)!

My friend Tran (a fellow triathlete and cyclist) led the way up the hill. Good motivation for me.

After climbing for about a mile, there was a long descent.

Running downhill is my thing. I flew past so many people. It felt good to make up some ground.

The race was 17k and it was a loop, so you didn't get to go down whatever you ran up. And let me tell you, there was SO MUCH climbing. The climbs were long and the descents were quick and steep, so you didn't get to recover much. By the third mile I started having lung and chest issues again. My chest gets real tight and I have a hard time catching my breath. I haven't figured out why this keeps happening. I thought maybe my tanks were too tight, but I ruled that out. It might be due to running uphill, but I also have the problem when I'm not running uphill. I'm thinking I have runner's asthma, but that's just my guess. I am currently having tests done to figure it out. I've had an EKG (all clear), a lung/chest xray (waiting for results), a treadmill stress test (waiting for results), and I'm scheduled for an echocardiogram in a few weeks.

Anyways, back to the race. It was hard to figure out if I should be going faster or what because this was my first trail race and it's way different than regular road running. I knew it would take me longer to finish this race because of the hills, but I didn't know how much different.

Since this is a trail run series, they calculate your age as of the end of 2011. Awful! When I signed up for the race I was still 28, but I had to register as 30, since I would be 30 at the end of 2011. That sure makes me feel old!

Skyler 1:30:02 (7th out of 20)

Elise 1:42:36 (4th out of 17)

I feel pretty good about my time, but was bummed to find out that if I would have been in my actual age group (I was 29 on race day), I would have placed 1st. Oh well. That's life, right? I have really started embracing trail running. I signed up for the OC Chili Winter Trail Run Series at O'Neil Park. The series consists of 3 5-mile trail runs. I'm looking forward to it. Starts in February.