Whatever Happens After the Race Happens…

Eric Grossman (Emory, VA) is no stranger to hilly races.  He’s known for his strong climbing ability and also an amazing ability to run downhill on extremely technical footing.  But Eric knows that although descending a mountain trail is much easier than climbing it, it beats your legs up badly and leaves you sore for a number of days afterward.  So, when Eric took off from the start of the first annual Swannanoa Splashdown 15K in Black Mountain, NC, on January 17, he knew what he was in for.  With 2000 feet of climb in 4.5 miles and temperatures in the low teens, the little bit of air that Eric could get burned his mouth, sinuses, numbed his chin, and covered his beard in frost.  It didn’t cool his competitiveness though.  As the early pace was set by another competitor, Eric stuck right behind him until the pace and climb proved too much for the early leader and Eric went by.  He then used his long legs and extraordinary downhill running ability to nearly sprint the 2000 feet back down the frozen trail to the win in a time of 1:04:00.  While the pride of winning a hard fought race in tough conditions lasts, so did the pain in Eric’s quads from the long downhill.  Eric said that four days after the race, his pant legs still hurt when they brushed his quads.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009 at 4:06 pm and is filed under Results. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.