Despite wanting to do this event for several years now, this was my first year racing in the Dirty Duo. I wanted to try it out with my partner Andrew as he has mad skill on the mountain bike and I love to run.
Waking up in the morning to cold pouring rain, I felt horrible to have asked Andrew to race with me as the weather was quite crap. But thankfully for the both of us this proved to add further excitement to our races. I started us off with the 25km trail run. I have been feeling a little off my game the last few weeks and wasn't sure how I would feel on this tough trail run. I didn't particularly train for this race but saying this I rarely ever "train" for a race... I mostly enjoy playing outside on the trails everyday for fun. I might have to rethink this concept as some amazing athletes are now out on the trail kicking some butt... Anyways, before I digress too much, I took off at a fair pace wanting to feel good from start to finish (well, when I mean good, I mean I would like to finish wanting to race again...). It took me until old buck to get aspects of my old racing self back... I ran up old buck in its entirety and it felt good, passing some folk made me feel better and I got my mental game back... I absolutely loved running in the freezing cold slush, mud and snow... It reminded me why i love adventure racing so much and got quick flashbacks from Patagonia Expedition Race where we traveled without trail for many days in the pouring rain, freezing cold... this was not quite to that extreme but it got me going.... pushed through until the end and managed to run in in a decent time. I then passed it over to Andrew. Andrew rocked it and got us a second place finish. It was good fun to race with him and it was a wonderful race! thanks race directors and volunteers!
the team! Pictures from race website
live, love, laugh,...DREAM!
lina
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