While the XTERRA motto is “Mother Nature is your toughest competitor,” perhaps nowhere on the planet is earth and nature so much a part of the experience than in the mountains of Marunuma.
The first rule in the official competitor handbook is to ‘Love and care for nature’, and in his welcome to competitor’s race director Taro Shirato asked participants to “please feel the nature of Marunuma and the smell of earth through your entire body.”
American Will Kelsay, in the fifth week of a six-week, six-country around-the-world XTERRA adventure, took this advice to heart by literally hurling his body into the earth on numerous occasions with three big crashes on the bike to his credit. The reckless abandon served him well and nearly earned him the upset of the decade against four-time XTERRA World Champion Conrad Stoltz.
The field was also stacked with the best Japanese amateurs in the country, including former age-group XTERRA World Champions Kimiko Matsuda and Keiji Matsuba, former XTERRA Warrior award winner Tae Yoong Kim, Saipan Pro Mieko Carey who won the women’s elite race for the third straight year, and a host of others.
Carey topped the women’s group finishing the entire race in 3:00:25
“Everybody who races XTERRA has to come do this race. It is absolutely amazing, like nothing I’ve ever done,” said Kelsay. “Seriously, it is so awesome. I was crashing all the time and muddy. It was super challenging and hard, but fun the whole time. Even when I was climbing up the ropes on the run it was painful, but still fun.”
