Rickenbach, Salter Place First at XTERRA Thompson Lake

By Chad Denning, XTERRA Rep

XTERRA Thompson Lake Challengeon July 20, 2008 in Poland Maine is an event that will grow and become a major staple to the XTERRA family.  The location in Maine is surreal with its history as a kid's camp from back in the 1930's.  It boasts the oldest free standing log cabin in the western hemisphere and the lake has 30 foot visibility.  If that alone does not get your juices flowing wait till you see the course!  When I first started riding the course I was initially discouraged with how often I had to dismount but that was short-lived after I got out of the mud hole, rock garden area.  It was all smiles by the time I finished the entire bike course and could not believe how amazing it turned out!  It really throws a little of everything at you and makes you feel like a mountain bike champ when finished.  Then getting out on the run course and just loved how they got off of actual trails and ran literally right through the woods.  Two thumbs up in my book!  The event went off extremely well and it really had that New England small quaint charm to it as there were just enough participants to make the action exciting yet feel like a home grown event!  Can't wait to see the turnout next year as this is one event that every athlete should have the chance to do!

Getting down to the real nitty gritty of the competition the race was a nail biter all the way to the end in both the male and female categories. 
Starting with the swim a 16 year old swimming phenom, Jake Schoberg came out the mile swim in a blistering pace (16:09) followed by seasoned XTERRA athletes Nate Chubet (18:28) and Ken Robbins (18:30).  On the ladies side Monique Salter was first to emerge (19:12) closely followed by Nicole Pisani (20:29) and Katy Sullivan (23:24).

Jumping on the bikes the competition really started to heat up as athletes started jockeying for position.  The veterans started to show their real strengths and Brett Rickenbach put in a very fast time (1:05) followed by regular New England XTERRA athletes Ken Robbins (1:06:48) and Tad Norton (1:06:59).
The ladies did not disappoint with some fierce competition, Tracey Cote (1:15:29) and Kelly Ault (1:16:38) leading the charge at the front of the pack were doing everything that they could to cut the deficit to front runner Monique Salter who finished the bike in (1:18:21).

Finishing off with the run we really had no idea what the front was going to look like as everyone was heading into the run looking still rather fresh.  Who was going to have the legs to out pace the race course?  A stellar run from Matthew Craft (22:02) who was never far from top three in all disciplines secured him a second place overall finish (1:49) followed by Brett Rickenbach who held on with a strong run (22:15) to finish with the top podium spot with an overall course time of (1:47:16).  Nate Chubet secured the third place spot with an overall time of (1:51) closing the gap on the run.

Monique Salter was showing no signs of weakness putting in a run time of (27:45) and taking the overall podium spot (2:05:18).  Tracey Cote (2:05:49) had an amazing bike time and then followed up with a last surge to put her in second place a scant 31 seconds after Monique then only to be hunted down by Kelly Ault with the fastest run split (25:38) to shore up the third place spot another 36 seconds back (2:06:26).  The top three ladies finished in just about a minute total time from each other.  Great excitement throughout the race!!

Can't wait to see the next installment of the XTERRA Thompson Lake Challenge -  hope to see you there!!

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