Nutri-Bay Ambassadors @ XTERRA MAUI 2017 – Race Reports and Photos Yannick Antoine: M40–44 World Vice-Champion

I really wanted to come back here and compete in the Xterra World Championships in my final year in the M40 category. Since the All Saints' holidays fell after the race, it was an opportunity to take another family trip. First of all, I had to qualify.
Xterra Greece was the first opportunity, but I got a flat and was forced to abandon after only 7 km of mountain biking. A missed opportunity...
Xterra Belgium. I left nothing to chance and prepared for this race by scouting the courses, while also incorporating Ironman training sessions (Klagenfurt was three weeks later). Having finished second in 2016, I was hoping for at least as good a result, if not better. I finished second again, and as I stepped down from the podium I knew I had qualified.
Ironman Klagenfurt (Austria): I went there to beat my Ironman time, not for a slot. A professional change was planned for the autumn, and it would have been difficult to combine that with training and a long stay in the Pacific for two races. But in the euphoria of a good race (9:19), in which I placed fifth in M40, Michèle told me to take the qualification for Kona. I then considered returning to Belgium between the two races to work for a week and moving up my start date in the new job to 15/09 (one month before Kona), telling myself that the final weeks before departure would be difficult to combine (family, new job, training), and that my performance in both races would probably be unpredictable. After checking with my new employer, it was doable. Let's go—I would do the double, more for the challenge it represented than to aim for anything specific in terms of placing or time.

Saturday 14/10 - Ironman Kona. I won't go back over the race; it was just waaaay too long (this post is already long enough as it is 😁). It's true that after 15/09 my training had been reduced by 40–50% compared with a normal Ironman training plan, but I felt fresher. I had nothing left to prove here, so I decided to "take a risk": take risks in an attempt to do better, while also accepting that I might do worse. We know what happened next 😜. Even though the underperformance was substantial, I didn't look for excuses, and I had a new Ironman experience, with new "sensations." I came home half disappointed, but the optimist in me was half satisfied to have finished. Maui starts here...

Sunday 15/10: recovery with the dolphins 😳🐬. Packing the bike, Awards Ceremony, and I took the plane again that very evening.

Monday–Tuesday: return trip with a small detour through Los Angeles and Universal Studios 😎

Wednesday morning I was at work 🤓. Recovery was ... adequate. Travel fatigue (I was struggling in the middle of the afternoon), but I had done a large part of the Kona race at endurance pace, and the muscle damage caused by dehydration, the marathon, and the cramps was there, but overall fatigue was ultimately lower than after an Ironman raced in "race mode." A few very short, easy sessions, followed by a good mountain-bike ride on Saturday and a trail run with Geoffray and Stéphane on Sunday reassured me. It's certainly not ideal preparation, but I was able to push on the climbs and increase the intensity...

Monday–Tuesday: work; I had recovered from the jet lag. Preparing the other bike, luggage, etc.

Wednesday, off we go again! Three planes and another 12-hour time difference later, we arrived in Maui on Wednesday evening.

Thursday: scouting the mountain-bike course after some mechanical work (the lockout cable had been damaged during the journey). Only the lower section of the course was open (the first 5 and last 7 km); the upper section was too muddy (even more so than last year). This bothered me because we were three days out and it would be impossible to ride only the upper section, let alone do the whole course again two or one day before the race—it would be too tiring. The climbs were too steep to ride them easily, and I now needed to conserve energy for the race.

Friday–Saturday: beaches, testing the waves (they are absolutely huge this year!!!), and a final tune-up. The xterraplanet website ranked me among the 5–6 favorites in my category (out of 85, with the 40–44 age group being the largest), and so did the Luxembourg press 😄. A little pressure, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't also think that the podium, and maybe even the win, was possible—at least on paper. But a race, especially an Xterra, isn't raced on paper!

Sunday 28/10: Race day. Pasta and ham for breakfast at 6 a.m. (not something I'm used to, but I—once again—messed up my Gatosport the day before... no comment 🤐🤣).

Here we are! The course has dried out, the waves are smaller, and the race will definitely be completely different from last year! Is that to my advantage? No idea... I continue to think that my 2016 placing was also due to managing the difficulty and unusual length of the event well. You had to be enduring and resilient, push hard, regularly clean the bike, and avoid technical problems and crashes—which I managed to do. This year, you had to be fast.

Swim start: for once, I positioned myself on the inside, taking the shortest route! I figured there would be a fight, but it was worth trying, and it
seemed to me that most of the 40–49-year-old field (my starting wave) was farther outside. I started well and fast, under the big waves, and then the sensations were good. I was in a pack, not struggling as sometimes happens. Australian exit, second lap, and then I came out in about 25 minutes, four minutes faster than last year, and David told me I was 16th in my category. Because of the wave starts, that put me 209th overall, but in reality 350–400 competitors had already come out of the water (including those who started three minutes earlier) and would be ahead of me on the course ☹️.

Off we go on the mountain bike. Same strategy as in 2016: push hard to get over most of the elevation gain in the first 12 km while moving up through the field as much as possible. Last year, it was sometimes "enough" to ride sections where others were walking, but this year everyone was riding and so... there were bottlenecks. You constantly had to manage when to overtake and the extra effort required, because you had to get past quickly before the next narrowing or technical section. At times I stayed behind a small group waiting, unable to pass, and it was frustrating. My legs were responding, but I was less "sharp" than last year—I could clearly feel it. Once I reached the upper section of the course, which I had not scouted, I made a few small mistakes: braking too hard, choosing the wrong line. I remembered the course, but that didn't tell me in advance where to place my wheel. I lost a little time. A back-and-forth developed with a few riders in my category, but I managed to get the upper hand and open a gap each time. Over the final 5 km, bike handling became crucial again. Things went well, apart from the beginnings of cramps in my adductors and hamstrings. I had to let two riders from my category catch me and pass me on the final switchbacks before entering the transition area. The mountain-bike leg went by quickly and I really enjoyed it, but I knew my placing was worse than last year (I was already third after the mountain-bike leg in 2016).

Indeed, Michèle and then David confirmed that I was sixth right from the start of the trail, although there were 3–4 riders about two minutes ahead. At that point, I no longer really believed in it; I told myself I could try to hold onto a top-10 finish, and perhaps go for a top five if the riders ahead faltered. I was overtaken by 2–3 riders. My legs felt like wood, cramps were starting, and I had to tackle 350 m of elevation gain (equivalent to the Tintigny trail 😉) over the first 4.5 km... I took a handheld bottle to run with because I knew it would be hot and the aid stations would come slowly. It allowed me to hydrate frequently. I took advantage of the rare, short flat or downhill sections to regain a decent stride. After 2 km, I overtook some guys again; my legs were coming back a little. Nobody in my category... I continued pushing to the limit of what my muscles would tolerate. Kilometer 3, kilometer 4, still nobody... finally, near the summit, I caught a Mexican who had passed me near the end of the bike leg. I was in the top five, and the course became favorable again, with more runnable sections where I could accelerate with my legs having recovered somewhat. Over the next 2 km, I would move into fourth, third, and then second (according to my calculations). I was managing the cramps now, but in my favorite section: long technical descents, turns, accelerations, trees to jump over, streams, etc. Behind me was a 25–30-year-old who wouldn't let go and was "pushing" me. I didn't know where the leader in my category was—probably far ahead—but I kept pushing and passing riders from other categories to prevent any possible comeback. In the end, I never caught the leader and nobody caught me, but I finished the race having given everything! On the final meters along the beach and then through the grass, David, Florence, Michèle, Maëlle and Julian were there to cheer me on. They didn't believe it either when they saw me set off on the trail, but fortunately for me I kept trying all the way to the end without giving up, and it paid off.
The leader put 9 minutes into me on the mountain bike. He is the Brazilian Cross-Country and Mountain Bike Marathon champion and was out of reach, even though I made up 3 minutes on him on the trail.
That wraps up the triathlon season on a positive note. As a side note, I finished 10th (out of 30) in the Kona–Maui double standings and first (out of ... 2 😄) in my category. I posted a faster time in Maui than the top two in the double, who were around 9:40 in Kona.

Thanks to everyone for the encouragement beforehand, following along during the race, and the congratulations afterward. Special thanks to my family, who were there in person; I like to think that also played a part in the success of this second half.
See you very soon at a race, to share a training session, a training camp or ... a Rulles. Mahalo!