Reston and the yr in review. (sorry-long)

   Cold, sunny December day. Got up early to drive the 2 hrs to Reston, VA, for my last race of the yr. It's a tradition and I like the course, although I've never done particularly well, there. As I drive down I see varying amounts of snow on the ground. I LOVE racing in the snow. Reston had about 4-6 inches. I reg, get a decent warm up, and do a few sections of the course. It's mud beneath a lot of the snow. Ugghh. Bob Perna warns "be careful out there". Will do. I get a good start position, IN FRONT OF THOR, mainly because I reg'ed early. Gun goes off and up the road to the snow/grass/mud. My legs are feeling OK at this time. (I raced the day before), we head down a snowy section into a muddy left hand turn, and then up a steep little pitch. Good news is I avoid the guys who stop or go down (not so the case with a lot of my races this yr). Bad news is my legs let me know I'm in for a long race. Feel dead. Through some twisties which are even more interesting in snow, and then up to the steep pitch before we cross the lake. I run. It seems like the fastest way to go through. Across in pretty much single file since there is only a thin line where it isn't icy. Up the steep, long, run up. Legs are screaming. I hear Dream Plus from RBR letting me know he's chasing a competitor (55+) so I let him around.  Up the climb where I actually don't feel bad, and down the gnarly singletrackish section across the off camber left and on to the decent, into a thick muddy right turn. All of the lower section is muddy and slow except for a few stretches. Up the next steep pitch, which most of us were running, and through some tight turns that you had to put  foot down, out and back on icy asphalt/ grass, and start lap 2. We did 4 laps, I believe. I was close to one of my cross nemesis for a while and kept swapping places with a guy until he pulled away with about a lap to go. wasn't sure how I placed but didn't hang around long since i had to be back i the 'burg to go to Chelsea's winter concert. I find out 2 days later they placed me as "DNF"??? WTF?? They said they had my number when I crossed the line. Oh well. AFAIK, I would have been about 54th out of 69 or 70. About par for the course this yr.

  As for this yr I have to say I was disappounted at my results. I came in feeling good; didn't feel burned out at any point (unlike last yr), and had fun. Did more races than any yr before. I started getting better results in the last month, so that was a good sign. I got to races ( with the exception of Wissahickon) early. Did most things "right". I had a bunch of "being at the wrong place at the wrong time" incidents that likely kept my results down. 1 real DNF at DCCX, and lots of muddy races, not my forte, so there's another reason why the poorer results. Probably the bigest reason is my weight. While
"thin" by every day American standards, I am about 4-5 lbs over what I weighed last yr. Ice cream is the culprit. But that's on me. I think that for next yr I'll prep much the same and just try to be more aggressive. Maybe a Red Bull before the start won't hurt :-)