The Archer Report - Milwaukee Mud

It Started With One Little Drop

We should have known it was coming, lurking around every corner, much like Kahuna Dave at the Budweiser brewery. Yep, the much dreaded Xterra mud race. Finally it hit us, full on, and with both barrels at the Xterra Midwest Championships in Milwaukee.

The Xterra Championship Series has had tremendously good luck with weather ever since the series began. With only one slightly slimy race in Detroit back in 2001 when we had rain early, which cleared out as the race progressed leaving the trails swampy in areas but over all not too bad. Milwaukee would be nowhere near as kind.

The occasional raindrop could be felt as athletes rolled into transition on race morning. I think anyone who raced in Milwaukee's heat in 2005 would agree a slight shower would be greatly appreciated by all. But then the thunder started, and rumors of a cancelled swim. Within half an hour the swim was cancelled, a torrential rain had began to fall, and while most huddled under the Xterra village tents, the pros that could were changing everything from tires to rear shocks (Actually, what was with that anyway Conrad, do you honestly carry an extra shock in your transition bag?)

Once the race actually did get underway it was obvious that this was going to be a wet one, even if the electrical storm had cancelled the swim. The rain was steady and didn't look to be letting up. There was nothing we could do, these were the conditions, and we would all have to face them; so, quit your whining and toe the line, eh? After all, this is Xterra, you against nature and all that. Nature had just chosen to save all the precipitation of the last ten years for this one race.

The swim had been cancelled and replaced with a 2 mile run out and back on Milwaukee's lake front bike path, with just enough beach thrown in at half way to make things interesting. Other than that the course would be the same except for one detour on the second run to avoid some shoe stealing deep mud and a canyon ascent (but more on that later). The cancellation of the swim always makes the pro field edgy. The strong swimmers stress that they have lost their ace in the hole while the strong runners revel in the fact that they have suddenly gained a huge advantage. And, we all wonder what the tighter group will mean for the bike. Since we don't have to worry about drafting rules in Xterra we knew this was gonna get interesting.

From the gun the pace was brisk but not too sharp; I think everyone knew there would be a lot of effort needed for the bike. Andrew Nobel set the early pace on the run while most all of the regular contenders came into transition together; it looked like this day was going to turn into a mountain bike race. Onto the saturated trails the group dropped a few stragglers but retained a main pack of Stoltz, McMahon, Nobel, Dom Gillan, Brian Smith, Francisco Serrano, and Ryan Ignatz.

The women's race was quite different as the first run served to split the ladies into several groups of two or three, with patented top two Mel McQuaid and Jaime Whitmore heading onto the trails side by side and banging bars with some of the trailing pro men. Melanie loves to start the bike fast and she threw down in her usual manner blasting though the first quarter of the ride while Jaime seemed to take a more conservative approach. As it was conservativism would prove to be the order of the day on both the men's and women's side.

Riding in mud, particularly the slimy, soupy mud that we had in Milwaukee is tough. Not only is it tough to ride fast and stay on two wheels, it's tough to see, your bike tends to quit working (or break), and you get frustrated, really frustrated. This was the case in the men's group. You want to stay with the pack but if you stay right on the wheel in front of you, you can't see for all the mud coming off the wheel. If you stay too close you can't see turns and obstacles coming and you risk running into the leader or worse, getting collected when he messes up and goes down. But if you let the gap open it tends to keep opening wider and wider until you're simply by yourself. It's a no win situation; so, you try to stick the wheel and hope you have the reflexes of a cat to avoid any problem areas.

Patience, smoothness, and just hanging on worked very well for Brian Smith who laid down an attack at just past the halfway point of the bike and came into transition with a solid lead. Nobel, Gillan, and Ignatz would also benefit from strong consistent riding. However, the trail would take it's scalps on this day including Conrad Stoltz (heavy crash injuring his ankle), Brent McMahon (a crash and puncture wound to his knee), Brian Astell, and Mike Vine (Both with mechanicals). The rest of us would simply do the best we could and keep gutting it out.

The ladies race saw a similar result as Jaime's patience and consistency brought her by Melanie 2/3 through the bike. Evidently you don't want to go too hard too soon in these conditions as Mel would nearly get caught by a charging Candy Angle as well. After that the women would stay spread out and chasing those they hoped were still up there somewhere.

Brian Smith had not proven himself on and Xterra run as of Milwaukee but would show, that unlike most pro cyclist that have come to Xterra, he can run when he has to producing the third fastest split on the day and holding on for his first ever Xterra Championship win. Not a bad plan with all the Trek big wigs in town to see what this Xterra stuff is all about. P.S. Trek is Brian's main sponsor.

As for the rest of the group the detour around the muddy canyon would prove pivotal as Francisco Serrano and Brent McMahon would take the proper course and make significant time on Dom Gillan and Ryan Ignatz causing a major upheaval in the top 6. Once again the need to not only know the course but pay attention to the course in Xterra racing is a huge factor. Also, it should be said that Stoltz and McMahon showed real guts in suffering through the 10k run only to head strait to the hospital for stitches and a shiny new pair of crutches. Something that could prove to have an interesting effect on the points series, particularly when added to the fact that Series #2 Seth Wealing missed Milwaukee with a major puncture wound to the leg suffered while training in Colorado (the truth be known he was trying to keep up with me an a gnarly descent, which seems to be about the only thing I can do well anymore…).

The women's race finished with Melanie putting in a valiant effort to catch Jaime on the run but ran out of time and real estate before she could close more than 30 seconds. Again, Candy Angle was third but continues to get closer each race. Melissa Thomas and Jennifer Smith had solid races to represent the mountain bikers but still need to do some work to rival Jennifer's husband Brian's victory, better get on those runs ladies.

In the end Milwaukee proved to be one of the most exciting and dynamic Xterras we have ever had. The racing was good and you know everyone had a war story after the finish. Maybe we should hope for rain at every race.

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