Cross des Iles (Moulins)

Once again it was freezing cold for a cross country race here in France with the temperature hovering just above freezing. I borrowed spikes from one of the cadettes because the course was really muddy, especially some steep hills on the back part of the loop.

I have to confess up front that there weren't very many women in my race. I expected a lot more than 17, but I'll just pretend that those who stayed home would have finished behind me anyway (except for Cecile). So when the gun went off I was initially surprised to be in the front pack, until I remembered that there were actually fewer people behind than in front of me.

After the first 100m or so I settled into seventh place. I could see Stephanie chasing the lead woman and another woman from Montlucon Athletisme (whom I had never before met) running in fourth. Even before we turned to go out to the back part of the loop, the field was already spread out, but I could tell I was gaining on sixth place. I slipped backward on the hills and spun out on the turns in the muddiest part, but I moved into sixth place just before turning to repeat the loop. Unfortunately, a different woman passed me a couple minutes into the second tour.

I stayed on my feet and held my position through the second loop before finishing the 4.75k course in about 20:18. It's nowhere near the equivalent of a PR performance, but with the conditions, I'll take it.

After getting my clothes back on and doing a short cooldown, Anne and I watched the senior men's race. The guy who won was the French junior cross country champion and no one challenged him for the win.

Now here comes the really French part of the story. Christian, Guy, and Yannick had apparently decided that I had to try vin chaud -- hot wine. I was a little apprehensive -- I don't even like normal temperature red wine very much -- but I agreed to give it a taste. Turns out this stuff is delicious! It contains sugar, cinnamon, and a bit of orange or lemon and hardly tastes like wine, more like apple cider. I may have to learn to make it myself.

Just before we left to go back to Montlucon, the awards ceremony began. Turns out, although I had finished 7th in my race, I had finished 5th among the senior women (excluding the veterans and juniors in the race) so they called me up to the podium! I received a bag of goodies including a decorative thermometer, oven mitts, and a salt grinding mill. It was really cool to be up on the podium, although I ignored the fact that after they honored those who won the veteran and junior categories nearly half of the women in my race had made the podium.

Now it's time to finish packing, run over to the train station to buy a ticket to Paris, and clean the apartment. I have to catch my train at 5am to meet Mark, and then we are off on a two week tour of Europe!

Enjoy your vacations! Merry Christmas!