SIDS race, Prospect Mt, 2/22/2009
20 inches of snow hammered Prospect on Wednesday and Thursday preceding the SIDS race, which is a fund raiser for research into Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. With all the new snow, I'd been concerned about bogging down in a soft track. But when Roy and I went out to warm up, my worries were unfounded: the track was quite firm all the way around. The new grooming machine is a huge improvement; without it, the place probably would have been extremely soft. Being one of the first to go out on fresh corduroy didn't hurt either. I made sure to thank Bud Fisher, the Williams College coach, when I saw him.
The race course was 2 laps of an approximately 6 kilometer loop. The first two-thirds of the course were fairly easy, going to the coat rack, then out Whistlepig and Loose Moose. The pain would come at the end of the lap, climbing Workout and 2290 before going down Steffen; then a hairpin turn and an uphill finish. While warming up, I learned that the organizers opted for a wave start due to the large turnout. With a 20 minutes delay until the 10k start, I ended up skiing 2 laps of the course before the race even started. Not too smart.
After a middling start, I picked off a few people as we passed the coat rack. I had excellent skis and put up a gap going down Loose Moose. Going up Workout, John Tomlinson and I worked together, and we were passed by Harry Rock and a couple of high school kids going pretty hard. No worries: I figured I was being careful and saving some gas for the second lap.
On the beginning of the second lap, I reeled in the high school boys again; I figured I had a shot a beating them if I was in front while descending Steffen. At one point, John was sandwiched between the 2 of them; for how long I don't know. Once again, going up Workout, these 2 kids put up huge moves to pass John and me and pull away. Maybe my ignominious DNF at this year's Lake Placid Loppet was playing in my mind: I was afraid of blowing up, worried that I didn't have quite enough gas to close the gap. I ended up getting one of them back as we approached the Steffen descent.
At the bottom of Steffen, John went by, gapping me going down to the hairpin. I made up some of the gap - perhaps I went around the hairpin a little more smoothly, and I reeled him back in as we approached the finish. With everything I had left, I V2'ed uphill to the finish line and thrust out one foot. It was close: one of us beat the other by the length of a binding and a big toe, but I'm not sure who! A great day all in all. Don't miss this race that's not only fun, but also raises money for a good cause.