Race Recap - Masters and Austrian (and German?) Champs
It's humbling to finish a race only to have a 61 year old Austrian tell you he crushed you by about 12 minutes. Only uphill from here.
Welcome to the first race recaps of the season. After um-ing and ah-ing across most of November and December I landed on the World Masters Vertical Championship and the Austrian/German Sprint Championship. A little strategic with the race choices, especially considering the Sprint format is a selected Olympic event, but I may have been a little unprepared with how much longer the Masters Vertical was. Either way both weekends were highlighted by amazing racing and fantastic people.
Masters Vertical Championship - Werfenweng
Werfenweng…what an exceptional Austrian town name.
Say it. Say it a couple of times. It’ll make you happy.
Masters Championship weekend consisted of both a Vertical and Individual event and was folded into national cup race called Die Erztrophy. It’s genuinely shocking how much being in the mountains is just a part of everyone's life because between young and old, elite and punter everyone was here racing.
Having spent about a week in the van, in shocking weather, it was lovely to get to Werfenweng and catch up with Dan.
Having met Dan a while back at a Skimo Camp in Australia it’s genuinely mind-blowing to see a sport go from it's early stages on a snow lacking slope in Falls Creek to both of us being here in Austria racing at the Masters Championship. Now, I'll let Dan talk through his own race but he absolutely crushed both the Vertical and Individual…the sport is in great hands within Australia with people like Dan flying the Skimo flag.
Now…I only raced the Vertical with the focus both in the training through the last year being shorter events but it's still nice to get amongst a longer race. Not racing the Individuals though. Don't get me wrong I definitely feel confident and strong enough but with ole mate who came second absolutely obliterating his face falling on the final downhill I legitimately don't have the capacity/resources to hurt myself.
Ah well…maybe for the 2030 Olympics (Winkyface.gif).
So here's the Vertical course…stunning in it’s harshness. 870 vertical metres in only 3kms is an astounding amount of ascent to push as hard as you can on.
And here's some stats from my Suunto and the results…
Cooked.
The race went about as expected. There's a sharp uphill to start the race followed by a longer traverse up the mountain along a service track which deceptively also continues to gently climb uphill.
The final section up until the finish is an aggressively steep uphill where I unfortunately had a skin issue and needed to swap out to a spare I had in my suit (you can see it on the graph at about the 40 minute mark).
Unfortunately, I couldn't get the sub 50 minute target that I set for myself but genuinely Vertical races are immensely painful, hard and sometimes can surprise you. I consider myself pretty strong running uphill and will put my capacity up against anyone in Australia but skinning uphill is a different game and it's always great to get a race in and get in a couple of learning outcomes.
Now…for Sprint Champs.
Austrian/German Sprint Championship - Kellerjochbahn
Another weekend and another race punctuated by great people. Bene joined me for the race which was beyond helpful and encouraging. It’s a little crazy to think I met Bene through Instagram which lead to us sharing about 6kms at UTA22 up until the Giant Stairway and he’s here on a random slope in Austria supporting.
You have to love great people. To the race.
From what I've been told Kellerjochbahn is a more out of the way ski resort just 15 minutes up the valley from Innsbruck. After getting here I was told the race start was a cheeky 300m skin up the mountain from where you park.
Was I prepared for this…no.
It did throw me for a little loop. A warm up which I had been drilling the last three weeks didn't quite take into account me forgetting something and having to ski back down to the van, and skin back up again but we soldier on.
Outside of the absolute mayhem of figuring out where the race actually started the rest of the day went well. Below I’ll drop in a quick video of what the day entailed which I think will give you a clear view as to what the race/morning actually looked like.
How did the race actually go though?
Below are a couple of positives and a couple of negatives that I've taken away from the race.
Positives
Transitions through both the Qualifying Round and the Heats felt really good. Outside of a small moment where I thought I was skiing instead of booting they felt clean, smooth and hopefully were somewhat fast.
Skinning technique through the diamonds was majestic…at least in my eyes. Through this sections I was able to push at the points I wanted to and glide it out when I wanted to which is something I've tried to work on over the years.
I had what felt like a good amount of power to start each section…which also leads me to some negatives.
Negatives
Although I had some power to start each section those last 4-6 metres felt like I was breathing through my eyes.
The boot pack went forever. Unsure if it was just a longer bootpack or if I hadn't prepared appropriately but there were moments where I looked up and almost fell over anticipating how much vertical was left.
All in all the day went well. I wasn't last, which is always a goal, and I was able to beat a couple of Germans and Austrians. I was also able to improve on my time during the Heat Round from my Qualifying Round which wasn't a goal going in but definitely something I'm happy about.
We move to Arinsal and Bou Taull now where I've got two World Cup stops…let's hope that the positive trend, as small as it is, continues through.
…A couple of loosies below.
Good work mate! Could not spend that much time in Zone 5!
Well done, Brian! It sounds as hard work. I hope you also enjoy it! 😉