Racers go red after muddy Teva trail runs
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VAIL – Red, white and brown were the unofficial colors of the Teva Mountain Games trail running races Saturday. The course for the 10-kilometer national trail running championship race was modified at the last minute, as race organizers said the top sections of trail were covered by about 8 inches of snow. Nonetheless, there was plenty of white to be found on the race course and falling throughout the race, which took competitors down Bridge Street and up onto the snow and mud-packed service roads of Vail Mountain. Brown was probably the predominant shade, but there was lots of red skin showing through skimpy running shorts, and even some blood here and there, like on Matt Carpenter’s leg.Carpenter, from Colorado Springs, won the race in a time of 46 minutes, 41 seconds, to become the national men’s trail running champion and qualifying for the U.S. Teva Mountain Running team, which will compete in the trophy event Sept. 25 in Wellington, New Zealand.The conditions didn’t seeM to faze Carpenter, who was soaked from head to toe in the unofficial colors following the race, including a vibrant red gash from sliding into a tree on one of the steep downhill sections of the course.
“When I woke up, the weather was great in Colorado Springs,” Carpenter said. “When we came over the pass here, I just thought, ‘Oh God. This is going to be muddy.”Timothy Parr from Gunnison was second in 47:31 and Clint Wells was third in 47:50. Vail’s Josiah Middaugh was fourth in 48:23 and Celedonio Rodriguez from Mexico was fifth in 48:31.”It wasn’t so much about pacing,” Carpenter said. “It was just, you couldn’t go as hard as you wanted because you slipped so much. You just had to be in control and go on the good parts. Clint was really strong on the ups and Tim was running really strong on the downs, so I thought what I had to do was run good on the flats. I think I probably won because I was a little more risky on the downs. But, I ate a tree. I would like to meet the people who didn’t fall today.”Parr was unthwarted by the conditions.
“The course was exactly what I expected,” Parr said. “I wasn’t expecting it to be this muddy. But I liked it. It added an extra element to it. It made it a little harder.”Women’s winner Anna Pichrtova (52:19) from Slovakia was less than enthused about the conditions, but managed to beat second-place World Mountain Running champion Melissa Moon (52:39) of New Zealand, and Laura Haefeli (55:01) of Del Norte, who was the first American woman to finish and thus the new national champion.”I like sunshine. I like hot weather,” Pichrtova said. “I really don’t like snow and mud, but you can’t do anything about it. You have to stay open and positive and try to do your best.”From Pichrtova’s myriad of race victories she said the conditions Friday made Vail’s race one of the most difficult she’s ever done.
“It’s one of the harder ones,” she said. “It was so muddy. You couldn’t really run sometimes, you had to slide. I wish I would have had spikes. I don’t like to be so cold.”The cold was a blessing for runners like local Lisa Isom, who was perhaps the only racer who didn’t fall a single time and took fifth in 57:34 after fourth-place Chris Lundy (56:34).”It was fun. It was awesome. It was the best course I’ve been on in a while,” Isom said. “It was so messy and fun. I would much rather run in this than heat any day. Maybe because I live around here and I’m used to the cold. We did a race in 95 degrees a couple weeks ago, so this is perfect.”
Berman goes multi-sport in true-to-form mud runThe mud factor was a definite go Saturday for the Teva Games 5K mud run, which local Mike Kloser breezed through like a hovercraft with the winning time of 27 minutes.Following not too far behind (29 minutes, 26 seconds) was 15-year-old Jonathan Stevens in second place, who, upon being asked how it was, looked at his crusted legs and said, “It’s muddy.” Daniel Carlson took third in 29:46, Vail’s Paul Gorbold was fourth in 29:49 and Matt Johnson was fifth in 30:25.Daniel Although Tao Berman, who won the Teva Games extreme creek kayak race, said the last time he did a running race was in the fifth grade, he managed to finish unofficially among the top-10 men Saturday, launching off of the starting line shirtless, in a full-fledge sprint.
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“I figured, for at least a moment, I’d have the lead,” said Berman, who decided to do the race at the last minute and who didn’t officially register. “That all lasted for about a moment. It started out pretty flat, and I was like, ‘This isn’t so tough.’ Then, the switchbacks started. It was much harder than the kayaking races I’ve won. I used my heart much more than I did in the extreme race. This was 31 minutes and 55 seconds and that was 1 minute, 53 seconds, so it wasn’t as abusive. I’m just not a runner at all. I might actually train for this a little bit next year. If I could shave 2 minutes off my time, I could get in the top five. The only thing I had getting me up that hill was all the carbs in the beer I drank until about 1:30 in the morning.”Staff Writer Shauna Farnell can be reached at 949-0555, ext. 610, or sfarnell@vaildaily.com.Vail, ColoradoVail, Colorado
