July 18, 2021
Eli Hemming from Kiowa, Colorado and Tabor Scholl from Louisville, CO captured the XTERRA Beaver Creek 18-kilometer trail race on a gorgeous mountain morning in Avon, CO with winning times of 1:08:55 and 1:23:33, respectively, on Sunday, July 18, 2021.
Hemming, one of America’s top professional triathletes, showed off his running speed in grand fashion this morning. He took the lead from the start and ran a 6:10 pace up four 500+ foot climbs and finished more than six minutes ahead of runner-up Ashton Grissom and Jake Link in third.
“Today was super fun. I haven’t done much trail racing and it was amazing, and really nice to get a little variety in there,” said Hemming. “Those hills are tough though!”
Hemming is a four-time triathlon World Cup medalist and eight-time Continental Cup medalist, and before his elite tri career was an all-star cross country runner who won the Colorado 4A state title in his senior season.
His fiancé, Tabor Scholl, is a speedster as well and won the women’s 18K race today with 15-minutes to spare.
“That was one of my biggest motivations out there today, not to get beat by Tabor,” joked Hemming.
Just like her future husband, Scholl led from start to finish, and placed 5th overall.
“That was hard, but I really enjoyed it,” said Scholl, who was covered in dirt and scrapes and just a little bit of blood. “Yeah, I took a really nice superman on the trail, on the singletrack on the backside. I’m fine, it’s part of trail racing.”
Scholl was a track and cross country runner at CU Boulder, where she graduated in 2019 and after that had a “full year of exploration.”
“COVID threw a lot of wrenches in my plans, and led me to trail running which I’m really enjoying,” said Scholl. “I decided I didn’t want to run around in circles anymore, I need more mental stimulus going on, so I switched to trail running in May.”
In June, Scholl finished third at the Adidas Terrex 10K as part of the GoPro Mountain Games behind only Janelle Lincks and Giselle Slotboom. It’s clear her future on the trails is bright.
Ellie Webb from Denver and Stacey Hendry from Arvada finished second and third for the women in the 18K. In the day’s other races, Patrick Ciquera and Kati Petry won the 9K races, Robert Marks and Zoe Silver won the 5K runs, and Team Peak Performance took home the 5x5K relay team title.
Today’s XTERRA Beaver Creek 18K age group division winners were awarded a complimentary entry into the 2021 XTERRA Trail Run World Championship 21K to be held December 4, 2021, in Kapalua, Maui.
Find complete results (and who got those Maui entries) in the full results here.
