{"id":222904,"date":"2016-03-11T06:00:12","date_gmt":"2016-03-10T20:00:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=222904"},"modified":"2016-03-11T06:00:12","modified_gmt":"2016-03-10T20:00:12","slug":"pros-brace-treacherous-course","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/pros-brace-treacherous-course\/","title":{"rendered":"Pros brace for treacherous course"},"content":{"rendered":"
The pros pose for a group photo after the press conference for the 2016 XTERRA Saipan Championship yesterday at the Kanoa Resort.
(Roselyn B. Monroyo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Professional triathletes are up for an unforgiving course in the 2016 XTERRA Saipan Championship.<\/p>\n

No thanks to Typhoon Soudelor, which altered some parts of the bike and run trails, making the already challenging course even more dangerous.<\/p>\n

\u201cI checked the run course with some Saipan friends and it was very slippery. One wrong move and you could get injured and you are done with your race,\u201d said Mieko Carey in an interview with Saipan Tribune after yesterday\u2019s press conference at Kanoa Resort.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been racing XTERRA for more than 10 years and this year probably will be the most challenging after Typhoon Soudelor hit Saipan in August. I really have to be very careful, especially when going to the run trail,\u201d said Carey, who will be battling the women\u2019s division crown of tomorrow\u2019s off-road triathlon against Australia\u2019s Belinda Hadden, Switzerland\u2019s Renata Bucher, and Austria\u2019s Carina Wasle.<\/p>\n

Hadden and Bucher also visited the bike and run courses in preparation for this Saturday\u2019s race and both agreed their hands and feet will be very busy as they negotiate the up and downhill trails.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have to be very careful and use our hands and feet to make sure of our movements along the trails,\u201d said Hadden, who will be racing in XTERRA Saipan for the second time after a sixth place finish in her debut last year.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a crazy course and is made even more challenging by the typhoon that hit Saipan. When you\u2019re done with this race and survive the course, you know you are ready for the entire triathlon season and you\u2019re hard as a rock,\u201d said Bucher, who will be gunning for her eighth title in XTERRA\u2019s Crown Jewel.<\/p>\n

Bucher, Carey, and Hadden are coming into this weekend\u2019s XTERRA Saipan with little recovery time after completing the Half Ironman course in last Saturday\u2019s Tagaman Triatlon, while Wasle had about three weeks of rest, heading into tomorrow\u2019s race. Wasle, who targets her second title after ruling the event in 2014, is hoping the breather will work to her advantage as she tackles the risky course.<\/p>\n

\u201cI hope I save enough energy to last this challenging course, especially the run part,\u201d said Wasle, who was the fastest female in the 12K run course and the only one to time in under one hour last year after submitting 58:31.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs for the bike course, I hope and pray for a crash free race, but you\u2019ll never know, so I really have to be very careful,\u201d added the Austrian, who has a history of bad crashes in the bike course in the past XTERRA Saipan race.<\/p>\n

Both the bike and run courses will pose threats to pros and amateur triathletes\u2019 bid to complete the race, as remnants of the damage caused by Typhoon Soudelor can still be seen along the trails at the northern parts of the island (Tapochao, Navy Hill, and Chinatown). However, majority of the trails have been cleared, thanks to Bobbi Grizzard and other volunteers. Markers are also everywhere with blue arrows for the 30K bike course and red for the run part. The 1.5-kilometer swim leg will not be a problem, as it will take place at the calm waters off Micro Beach.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, in the men\u2019s division, only three pros will battle for the crown. Filipino pro Joe Miller leads the short list and will be joined by Japan\u2019s Takahiro Ogasawara and South Korea\u2019s Kaon Cho.<\/p>\n

Miller placed sixth among eight pros in last year\u2019s XTERRA Saipan and though this year there are lesser competitors, the task of completing and winning the event will neither be easier nor harder.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can\u2019t tell if this year\u2019s race will be easier or harder for us. The results are unpredictable and it will depend on the race condition that day. We all have equal chances to win the race,\u201d Miller said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Professional triathletes are up for an unforgiving course in the 2016 XTERRA Saipan Championship. No…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":29,"featured_media":222908,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[448,133,6333,2879],"class_list":["post-222904","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-kanoa-resort","tag-run","tag-typhoon-soudelor","tag-xterra"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222904","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/29"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=222904"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222904\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/222908"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=222904"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=222904"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=222904"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}