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VIDEO:Interview with women's series winner Crystal Goecker

By Bob Stephens
PikesPeakSports.us

While Alex Nichols completed his business-as-usual sweep of the Pikes Peak Road Runners Fall Series, Crystal Goecker was ecstatic to win the finale and claim the series title at Palmer Park.

The talented Nichols, who competes internationally, comfortably won all four of the Fall Series races. He completed Sunday’s race in 45:25, a comfortable 31 seconds ahead of runner-up James Burns. Peter Maksimow was third in 47:53.

“It was tough,” said Nichols, who ran for Colorado College and is now an assistant coach there. “It was a fast course – for Palmer Park, especially. At least one really big uphill was eliminated.”

That suited Nichols, who said he’s training for a 50-mile race Dec. 7 near San Francisco.
“These are my speed workouts,” he said matter-of-factly.

The course, set up by Pikes Peak Road Runners Director Larry Miller, was approximately seven miles over the rough terrain of Palmer Park.

“Alex is extremely talented,” Maksimow said, “When he’s healthy, and he is now, he’s very good.”
Nichols, 27, said it was great to complete the sweep – it had been his goal – of the four-race Fall Series.

“It came together and I stayed healthy enough to win them all,” he said. “Like James said, one wrong step and you could take a fall.”

Burns, 25, who ran collegiately for George Mason and is a professional triathlete, was competing in his second trail race and hurt his right ankle at about the halfway point.

“I tried staying with you, man,” Burns said to Nichols as they visited after the race. “I don’t know how you fly down those hills.”

“Lots of practice,” Nichols said with a smile.

Nichols finished all four races with a total time of 2:07:42. Maksimow was second at 2:13:04, followed by Carlos Ruibal at 2:15:54.

Practice – and study time – is exactly what Goecker put in during recent weeks, and she was proud to be the first female finisher. She won the series with an overall time of 2:45:09, followed by Elizabeth Schultz in 2:46:51 and Connilee Walter, 2:47:27.

“I’ve been reading and researching how to run trails,” she said. “I just started running trails. My goal was to win today, so it was great to achieve that.”

Goecker clocked 59:31, with Walter 36 seconds behind her. Schultz was the third female finisher in 1:00:15, just ahead of April Luu in 1:00:32.

Goecker, who grew up in Colorado Springs and ran for St. Mary’s in high school, ran all four races in the Fall Series and said she received quite an education.

“It’s the first time I’ve done the whole series,” said the 34-year-old mother of two. “I’ve always been a track runner but learned you need to conserve energy for the uphills in trail racing. This was a really hard race, but overall, I did a lot better. I wasn’t as strained on the hills today.”

Goecker resumed her running career at age 27 and sounded like she’d also compete in the upcoming Winter Series. Luu was encouraging her to do so, and was perhaps her biggest fan before Sunday’s race began. Goecker had her eye on Schultz, who won the second race in the series just a couple of months after moving to Colorado Springs, and Walter, who is one of the area’s top female runners.

“I told her it was her day," Luu said. "She killed it; she positioned herself well during the race and picked them off one by one.”