Folske, Dubray Win XTERRA Wild Ride

By Circ Toepel, XTERRA Rep

McCall, Idaho and the XTERRA Wild Ride have been high on my list of events to do and they did not disappoint.  This place is COOL!  The swim is cool (64 degrees), the bike is way past cool and the run is as spectacular as I have seen anywhere.  Even the nights are cool - if you consider around 32 degrees cool.

Payette Lake is deep, which keeps the temp down so most competitors wore wetsuits on the .75 mile swim.  Always fast in the water, Volker Riedlinger came into T2 first with David Gettle right on his fins, I mean tail.  Not to be outdone, Lisa Riedlinger led the women into T2 followed by Mary Fordham.

The 20 mile bike leg is where Wild Ride is aptly named.  It starts with a killer climb up a 2 track road, heads out onto some very cool technical, rocky, single track. There is a challenging stream/river crossing thrown in as riders pass by Blackwell Lake some fun downhill then another climb with some very steep sections.  And then….the real wild ride!  Sit down, shut up and hold on.  The steep winding descent follows a quad trail all the way down to the road just above transition.  There hadn't been much rain lately so the trail was covered in several inches of dust, making this the perfect tune-up for the sand surfing on the bike descent at Tahoe. Adam Wirth had the second fastest bike split in 1:34:46 and Grant Folske powered the bike in 1:37:10.  None of the girls could touch Korrie Dubray on the bike as she put up a time of 1:55:46.  Lori Harvey posted the next fastest split at 2:00:24 with local resident Julie Welty two and a half minutes back in 2:02:56.  

The 6 mile run is classic XTERRA and in keeping with the theme, is insanely cool.  It goes deep into Ponderosa Park and weaves its way through forests of pine and evergreens.  There are abundant roots, rocky staircases and bridge crossings with beautiful meadows and lakes thrown in for eye candy.  The competition was fierce for the last few remaining points of the season and the run was a hard fought battle.  Lori Harvey made a valiant attempt to catch Korrie by laying down a 52:09 run, 3 minutes faster but not quite enough.  Korrie held on for the win,  finished in 3:17:10 and said she thought the technical, twisty, rocky single track was sweet.  Lori's power run put her in 2nd overall at 3:19:50.  Simone Messerscmidt, who was still suffering the effects of the flu last week dug deep and posted the 3rd fastest run time of 54:41 which brought her up to 5th overall.  The battle for 3rd went right down to the line but Lisa Riedlinger held on to the final podium spot in 3:28:26, one second faster than Julie Welty.  Grant Folske's solid performance all day gave him the men's 1st place overall in 2:39:45.  Adam Wirth took 2nd with a 2:42:37.

Post race there was an abundance of food grilled to perfection and topped off with your favorite condiments, as well as chips, fruit and cookies.  Many thanks to all the volunteers and especially to Ponderosa Park for helping us set up the swim course and allowing us to play on the trails of this wonderful venue.  Also thanks to the race director, Darren Lightfield, who personally helped build some of the bike course.  Darren was kind enough to hook me up with one of Scott Bicycles new carbon fiber, full suspension rocketships to check out the course.  The Spark is now on my list of "must have bikes".  And if the Wild Ride is not on your "must do" list, it should be! 

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