XTERRA Germany Championship

RESULTS

by Dave "Kahuna" Nicholas, XTERRA managing director

We have a new star brewing in Europe.  A 48 kilo (100lb) rocketship called Carina Wasle.  Perhaps you read about her in the Austria story where she had her first XTERRA and finished second to Renata Bucher.  Today Carina took the lead on the bike and never looked back.  Not even super biker Katrin Helmcke, the ‘04 German Champ could catch Carina who posted the fastest bike split.

But we must start the story with a record entry for the Black Forest event, now in its fourth year.  Nearly 300 athletes stood in the waist-deep water of Titisee (Hey, this is the name of the town and the lake, so don’t get crazy on me) watched by literally thousands of spectators lining the docks and the shoreline.  This is a typical XTERRA swim where the athletes do one lap, come on shore for a short run, and go back into the water for a second lap.  The crowd at the fences separating the competitors from the crowd on the run was four deep.  This was a major viewing event.

Young German star Andreas Bocherer (I predict he will win an XTERRA soon) followed German road-tri star Daniel Unger out of the swim, but two-time XTERRA world champ Eneko Llanos was just seconds behind. It looked like this was to be the Spaniard’s race.  Nico Lebrun had a great swim and was just a couple minutes back on a course he likes.  For the women swim stars Sybille Matter and Ingrid Van Lubek led the women with former German champ Ute Schafer third.

A heavy rain the day before left the course tacky and fast with some very muddy spots.  People got really dirty.  Reports from the hill soon had Nico in first place with mountain bike specialist Marc Ruhe second.  Coming on strong was young Czech pro Jan Kubicek who has been very fast all year.  Kubicek is young and very quiet so we don’t give him his due, but this guy is quick.  At the end of the first bike lap the reports were true, Nico in first, Ruhe second Team Wagner/Fischer/Post in third and Kubicek up to fourth.  Where was Eneko?   Where was Bocherer?  Both suffered flats.  Eneko was able to fix his, but Andreas suffered through 4 flats.  For the women, Carina simply left the others on the first climb.  Katrin was coming through the pack but had too much time to make up. Renata and Melissa Thomas were also coming up after slower swims and both were in the top 5 after the first round.

Nico was flawless.  He was totally in control and put in the second-fastest bike of the day. When Nico is in the lead he is not an easy man to catch on the run.  Ruhe almost caught Nico on the bike, but had not trained for running as he was focusing on the small country Olympics where he won the gold medal in mountain biking for his native Liechtenstein.  Eneko was just a few feet ahead of Kubicek in third, and two very fast young German guys; Sebastian Kienle and Felix Schumann were fifth and sixth.   Eneko does things effortlessly.  We always think of the hot Spanish temper, but Eneko, like his countryman Fernando Alonzo, who will likely be the new World Formula 1 Champion, are cool and calculating and always in control.  Watch Eneko sometime in person or on TV – he often is even smiling while going faster than anybody.  The Czech Jubicek came out of T2 ahead of Eneko, but simply put, Llanos slammed the run hammer down and caught everybody but Nico.  Nico saw Eneko on the start of his second lap and wasted no time with a blistering 33:40 run time.  Ruhe faded to fourth and Kubicek passed his way into third.  Kienle and Schumann were followed by 2002 German champ Ronnie Dietz in seventh and poor Andi Bocherer holding the screw that messed up his bike crossing the line in eighth.

Carina Wasle shadowed the Lebrun performance by making a solid run and winning by nearly three minutes. In second was Katrin Helmke, who had that rabbit of a runner, 2005 European Champion Renata Bucher, coming up quickly only 50 seconds behind in third with Melissa fourth, Sybille fifth and Ingrid sixth.

If you think XTERRA is not international consider this… at our final race the podium consisted of: MEN-France, Spain, Czech, Liechtenstein, Germany; WOMEN-Austria, Germany, Swiss, USA and Swiss.

And so season five is in the books for our European tour.  As of today it appears that we will have a minimum of eight National Championship races in Europe next year with new events in Belgium, Denmark and France to go along with Czech, Italy, Spain, Germany and Austria.

When the schedule is set – book your tickets.  These events make a Euro vacation a must do.

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