First of all, I can't call Whistler, Ironman Canada. That's like calling the new wife of a buddy who was married to someone for 30 years with the ex wife's name. Whistler is its own event. It does not need to steal its name from Penticton. That does both Penticton and Whistler a disservice. Whistler has a lot to offer. It is in the category of "world resort" and can benefit more from that branding.

OK....enough of that.

I got to check out parts of all three courses. Truth be told I had run on most of the run course and most of the bike course as early as 1992 after I came here to vacation after doing IMC Penticton. It was awesome then and it is even better now.

Swim: The swim venue is stunning. It is one of the nicest swim venues I have been to in this sport outside of Nice France and St. Croix (Kona is cool because it is Kona, but I can think of many other beach venues with a better beach than the Kona swim venue). Yeah, the water is cold, and I hate cold water, but the peaks on all sides and clear water make up for that. Most of you would not find the water that cold. I get cold in the water in Hawaii so take my input with a grain of salt. You can ride over from the main village in 15 minutes or take the shuttles on race day. It would be nicer if the village was beside the lake like LP or Tremblant, but it works just fine.

Bike Course: I had ridden down to Pemberton and back several times in the past so I did not ride it on race week. I like the ride out of T1 from Alta lake. Just enough uphill to hopefully warm things up. Going down to the Callaghan turn off, is lots of downhill but you are mainly pedaling in the 50x12 and 50x11 (compact crank). There are also several short uphills from 5-8% grade on this "downhill section". I added up around 100m+ of vertical gain on the downhill section risers. The climb to Callaghan was stunnning. I did not complete the entire thing on account of "tapering". There was lot of 7-10% grades there. Very beautiful terrain. In my perfect world, IM Whistler would be a 2x90K loop down towards Squamish Callaghan climbs on each loop. Unfortunately triathlon cannot keep the Sea to Sky Highway closed all day so we go towards Pemberton. The ride back up to Whistler added up quickly. By the time I was back to Whistler, there was >2000 ft of climbing in the first part of the course! After race day, I will update on the Pemberton section, but a lot has been said by many. I did ride down once past Green Lake part way down when I arrived here. The wind coming back to Whistler is a wind tunnel as the land heats up faster than the sea beyond Squamish...ouch. That will hurt tomorrow.

Run: love the twisting and turning through town the lost lake loop. I was supposed to be tapering, but I decided that it was more important to show my son the run loop around that lake than worry about my perfect race result. He's hooked and has been running through those trails daily. You're never really on a flat on this course. This will be the opposite of the IM Texas run course where you literally never hit a hill.

Venue: Whistler village is as good as it gets for families. Between the lodging options, hiking, lifts up the mountains, options to glacier ski, dining from low end to the most high end, you have everything. I've vacationed here in the past so no surprise, but to mate that experience with an Ironman is near perfect. I'd rate this on par with taking a family to Nice France (probably better for most North Americans, I am just biased to France and the Cote d'Azur). Plus you don't need a car once you get here. There are shuttles right from Vancouver airport that beam you and your bike case here. Turn your brain off and just show up.

I am biased to IM Tremblant which is near home for many of the same reasons I think Whistler is fantastic. But take Tremblant, and inject it with Steroids and HGH, and then juice it up with the entire US Postal EPO/blood bag routine and you're barely at the magnitude of Whistler. An Ironman surround by 6-8 foot peaks but unlike Tahoe you are not at high altitude and can actually breath. That makes this venue near perfect. The main danger here is you could easily blow your taper doing all the family stuff on the mountain. Nothing worse than being on vacation and sitting in the hotel room missing out. Looking out the window, I feel like I should run/hike to the summit or rent a cross country bike and ride to the summit, but gotta save that for a visit that does not involve racing an IM.

I had to wait a few days to take pictures as it was raining mid week when we arrived. I will update with pictures from around town later this evening.