Randonee Race

Yesterday, I went to the ski resort and participated in a randonee race. Randonee skiing is the type of skiing that I do. This means that you skin uphill under your own power, without the use of ski lifts, and then take off your skins and ski down. A randonee race takes skinning uphill to an all new, completely absurd level. There were three categories to the race; race division, heavy metal division, and recreational division. The race division is for people who travel throughout the west during the ski season and regularly participate in the races held at different ski resorts. These racers are very serious about what they are doing and have very light, specialized skis for going uphill, as well as having skin-tight race suits. They also have the longest race course. The heavy metal category is for those who want to complete the same race course as the racers, but don't have the ultra-light gear and don't where race suits. The recreational category is for those that have not raced before and want a shorter course just to see how they compete against other randonee skiers. I chose to race in the recreational category because I have never competed in a race before and did not know what to expect. I also didn't have ultra-light gear and am not sure if I could sufficiently fill-out the super tight race suit.
For the rec. division, we had two uphills and two downhills to complete the race. This totalled 3,200 ft. of elevation gain and loss. While going up the last uphill of the race, I thought that I was in lead for the rec. division, but was told by a race official that I was in second place. This confused me because I only saw tight race suits in front of me, which lead me to believe that I was in first place. Finally near the end of the last uphil, I saw a tight race suit coming down the rec. course. I figured that must be the guy in first place. At about that same time, I slipped going uphill on some hard snow/ice and my ski came off. I quickly put the ski back on, but realized that my heal was locked down (while going up, only the toe gets locked down), so I had to take the ski off and back on to release my heal. By this time, the guy who was behind me was starting to gain on me. I hurried up and arrived at the transition area (where you take of your skins and get ready to ski down) just before the other guy. However, at this point I was extremely tired and frothing at the mouth from the intense uphill climb. The guy behind me was able to transition faster that me and took off down the hill before I did. I knew there was no way to catch him on the downhill, but I tried my best. On the downhill, I was skiing as fast a comfortably possible. Actually, it wasn't comfortable at all, and I was terrified I was going to wipeout in stellar form. At the speed I was going, this would have been a really bad idea. Luckily, no one was close behind me and I was able to slow down a bit. When I got down to the finish line, I was exhausted and my thighs were burning. I was so tired and beat, I thought I was going to lose my breakfast.
I ended up coming in third place, which I was pretty happy with. Not bad in the town of Jackson, that is filled with super-athletes. The second place guy finished less that a minute in front of me and the first place guy was a whole five minutes faster that us. The second place guy and I both agreed that if you are going wear a tight race suit and ultra-light gear, you should probably be racing in the race division.