I am not super familiar with Riverside, but my pick between the two would be Tucson. It will have a bit more altitude as well as good choices for long rides/runs. May be a little hotter than Boulder, but if you train early you should be okay.

drn92

Riverside!
Cheap, flat, dangerous and dirty.

Seriously, not even a contest.

Tucson is beautiful, not sure abt the rest.

Riverside has allot of options. For continuous climbs I like Redlands up Hwy 36 to Onyx Summit to Big Bear Lake and Back. Hemet Lake, Idyllwild. You also have access to some great ride in the San Gabriel’s and along the Coast... Options galore and If it gets real hot you have options to get out of it. Good Luck

  
I am training for IM Boulder in Houston so when I do altitude work I go to Austin.


But for a week before Boulder we will be in Ruidoso New Mexico at about 7700ft so I am hoping that will help me out.

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Once, I was fast. But I got over it.

A well designed & executed training plan will work equally in either city. It's up to you to make it happen. Brownlees train in wet & cold yet the work they put in works fine in heat--it's the work & rest they perform consistently not the city.

I live in Boulder and I would not call the run course hilly at all. The majority of it simply parallels the Boulder creek so there is a slight down grade going East (away from the mountains) and a slight up grade on the return. There is nothing I would call a hill or even any overpass for the roads, the entire run course is below the levels of the streets above. (last year I think there was an overpass that racers had to cross several times...but the RD has engineered around that this year.

The bike course is rolling - I rode the entire course yesterday and there are 2-3 climbs but nothing grueling. The longest is a 4 mile stretch that climbs about 500 feet, but that elevation pays off for the next 20 miles, with long stretches where it is easy to average 30+ MPH. I rode 1 loop of the 2 loop course + the ~12-15 mile extra segment at the end and averaged 19.9MPH at a purposely easy pace ( I raced this morning). I averaged about 155W for 3 hours, I would call it a very fast bike course.

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" I take my gear out of my car and put my bike together. Tourists and locals are watching from sidewalk cafes. Non-racers. The emptiness of of their lives shocks me. "
(opening lines from Tim Krabbe's The Rider , 1978