We ran two races 21km skating on Saturday and 42km classic on Sunday. In general, I liked it! On Friday night, while registering for the race I wanted to get a place in the elite pack. I told an official: "I want to start from elite line." For the classic race - without any problem, but for skating he said: "I can't". I told him: "I have to!" At the end, after a while, he sticks to my number a golden emblem with the sign of the first line. Satisfied, I went home. Sean (my friend) was also given the elite line for both races.
In the evening, we arranged a ski preparation room in the basement of the rented apartment (The old lady was perfect, next year I will stay at her place again). I scraped my skis with a scraper from Kuzmin, put wax (Swix Ch -2-8, didn't have another one:)), on top - put Toko Molybdenum (just for fun:)), a small night run, stretching and sleep.
Early in the morning we moved to the start. After last year's being late for Transjurasienne for 10 minutes, I prefer to do everything in advance, thus we are at the start 1:40 before the race. We asked Toko guys, what they think about their riller, they advised a large linear structure and on top a large broken structure, and they even offered us to do that. Of course we agreed. Some more moving around before the race.
From the start I went third. Initially, the pace was pretty high, though not extreme, it was quite easy for me, though some people couldn't keep up. After the hill, on flat, we slowed down a lot. I skied as during a normal workout. Two 42km guys went forward. We were six in a pack, three for 42 and three for 21. One of the 21km was my friend Andrea, a very strong skier (he was 3 minutes faster than me in the Swiss Championship 20km duathlon race). I didn't try to catch the two 42 guys, although I felt that their pace was not very high. We were three for the 21km in the pack, thus I was automatically in prizes and I was a bit afraid of being tired if I tried to go with first two people. As it turned out later, Andrea also thought to catch up with a couple, but said that he could not. After we splitted, we were left three of us, I was confident in the strength of Andrea and was waiting when he would start to run away from german guy. But he never did ... We passed a sign 1km before the finish, I was confused. GPS shows 18.5km, must be some mistake (I did not know at that time that the race was 21km instead of 23). As a result, we came to the finish together. Andrea went in front 400 meters before the finish line, I did not managed to do that. At the finish sprint I was able to beat german guy on the outer radius.
Even an the end had enough time to get my arms up. Happy and almost not tired I went to prepare for the 42km.
It was the first International Marathon classic race for me. The lap was easy, an idea to run without kick wax was spinning in my head. Some friends said that it is necessary to put a bit of kick wax, so that one could push with his foot. My friend Valentin Rychkov advised me to take the risk without the wax, and then we decided to prepare both classic and skating skies and see what glides better. So I did, prepared both pairs with the above mentioned recipe. Though didn't scrape classic with Kuzmin scraper, because it is without scraping glides well enough. In the morning I went to test the skis. Classic skis glided better than the skating ones. I decided to try to apply TOKO riller to my skating pair and see what happens. It is ironic but true: this is the second time in wet weather, when Toko riller makes skis slower! I decided to go on classic skis. Then my head started to think again about grip wax (bad head!). I remembered the race two weeks ago, when I ran 30km classic. I did apply a bit of a wax and went double poling with one leg push a lot. Thus I decided to put a bit of a klister. Front of 10cm shorter than normal kick area, back at the middle of the shoe. A silly mistake! Only double poling for the entire race. I guess gliding suffered a bit. Never mind, now I became more experienced! The start was ok. The crowd fairly large, up the hill the group was a little stretched, almost everybody was double poling, no kick wax! Then on the downhill some people catched up with the leading group again. We skied in a crowd for a long time. Somewhere after approximately 10 kilometers after the start I was skiing next to a guy. I remember that I had already seen him and that he was Russian. So I asked. It turned out that it is Sergei Ivanov from Balashikha, I have heard a lot about him! The entire first lap I was in the crowd. And then, when we entered the second lap, in a gentle uphill the group began to be torn up. The first group went together, and we were a bit behind. I rushed to catch up, but turned out that I do not get closer. Up the hill I was able to run away from the nearest neighbors, trying to catch up with the guy who fell down and got separated from the main group. By the end of the hill I was caught back by two people, and then we went three of us. On the flat, I began to raise the tempo in order to escape from the guys behind us. We ran away, I looked back and saw no one behind. Then three of us caught up with a guy from the main pack. He couldn't go with us. Then we caught another one (as it turned out, he was the winner of this marathon some year). And then we went together, four of us. I periodically looked back, could not see anyone (maybe, because I'm blind, skied with no glasses and with no lenses). 5 kilometers before the finish we increased the pace, 4th in the group couldn't keep up. After that I did not look back anymore. Between me and two people in front there was a gap of 1-2 seconds and I couldn't get it back. We continued this way until the finish. At the finish line I was surprised to find out that there was a norwegian skier behind and at the sprint I couldn't do anything so he won. Moreover, it turned out that Sergei Ivanov is just 4 seconds behind me and a few more people are not too far. In any case, I was pleased with my 17th place and 4.5 minutes behind the winner. It is done. Now Transjurasienne! 76km! Skating!
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