So are they keeping the bike the same, or are there changes in the works?
i thought the RD referenced 2015 race changes, but not necessarily bike course changes. hopefully someone in the know could reply…
Saw on the IM Boulder Facebook page that the race director was quoted at Ironman Arizona as saying that “you will love the new bike course”.
Hopefully it’ll be posted soon.
I’ve heard it will be run Grandprix style with 112 loops inside the Whole foods parking lot.
I’m doing boulder as my first tri/ironman what’d you all think of the course? Any advice?
I heard that the new bike course will go up to Carter Lake - that is one heck of a good climb - and of course a super fast descent
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It was a pretty fast bike course last year, I went 5:36:31 on 155 watts NP and weighed 73ish kg’s. The wind was down. If they put the Carter Lake climb in it will slow the bike split by 10 minutes or so. Its not that the climb slows you down so much, its the descent on the north side of the lake. The elevation loss is too rapid to make up for the climb. All but the super light and/or best bike handlers will have to use the brakes on that descent, especially if the wind is out of the south. If you are from sea level, don’t worry about the drop in power cycling at altitude, you more than make up for it with less resistance in thin air.
The run course is well shaded for a lot of the run, I hope that doesn’t change as August at altitude can be brutal if the sun hits you directly.
I am pretty sure i saw on the Boulder 2015 FB that the race Dir said it was change to lesser elevation gain with newly proposed 2-loop or 2-lollipop loop bike course.
Of course.Let’s make an ironman in colorado easier…
No it’s not. WARD or Super Flag is a good climb. Carter Lake really is nothing. Get into a rhythm in a low gear & stamp it out. Really doesn’t take that long, it’s all about pacing & picking the right gear. Even in an Ironman it isn’t that big a deal, CDA has much worse climbs than Carter Lake.
YES…do NOT drink any water from the Rez. Doctors from the race I talked to said there were hundreds of similar cases from the race with intestinal issues. Likely from whatever festered in the water after heavy rains AFTER they did the water testing to determine safety levels. I started vomiting around 30 miles into the bike–so something took hold of me in about an hour of exiting the water & continued all day (lots of walking!) It rained about 2.5 days. Also, get good at dodging people on an overly narrow bike path with locals, kids, dogs, tubers…bikes all over during the run. I ran through a nice cloud of “pot smoke” from a group of teens near a turn around near Eben G. Fine park race day too. Not sure if they eventually were “shooed away” by cops or not.
Agree here, this should be a difficult course set up.
Let’s toss Super Flagstaff in there! Agreed, take advantage of the mountains. How about Lee Hill or Old Stage or both? UP Lee Hill & down Left Hand Canyon then out to Carter Lake. No sea level folks would want that course though & we’d all want triple rings or compact cranks!
Although a ride that heads any point west of Boulder would make an awesome route, I think we can all agree that it will never happen. I think a route that included an out-and-back to/from Golden along 93 would be quite challenging, yet not impossible for the out-of-towner.
I hope they add some hills. I think it’s ridiculous that it was one of the flatter courses on the IM circuit as a whole… in COLORADO…ummm the rocky mountain state. Same with IM Choo. But It’s predictable. Yet IMWI still sells out even with one of the more challenging bike courses… in the supposedly flat midwest. Anyone see irony here?
Whats surprising about it never happening is you’d think the boulder area would be all about showing how amazing the area is for riding. But instead they throw the course out to the east which isn’t anything special at all. I don’t think a ride into the mountains would be impossible as long as you don’t make it up to longs peak and back or something nuts like that. People just need to learn that you can change the chainrings and cogs on their bike.
Exactly. You have a power plan and setup your bike accordingly. A LOT of riders need triple chain rings for iron distance based on their w/kg. If a pro is going 12mph up a climb at 4.5w/kg ftp… guess what… Joe age grouper at 3w/kg better only be going 6-7mph…since they have a 7hr bike leg to complete not a 4h30.
I did the Branson sprint a couple years ago when they had the 70.3 there, I couldn’t believe how many people were talking about how hard the bike course was. You can completely flatten a bike course, the bike course should never been difficult just slower. Run courses… well thats a different story.
It was a pretty fast bike course last year, I went 5:36:31 on 155 watts NP and weighed 73ish kg’s. The wind was down. If they put the Carter Lake climb in it will slow the bike split by 10 minutes or so. Its not that the climb slows you down so much, its the descent on the north side of the lake. The elevation loss is too rapid to make up for the climb. All but the super light and/or best bike handlers will have to use the brakes on that descent, especially if the wind is out of the south. If you are from sea level, don’t worry about the drop in power cycling at altitude, you more than make up for it with less resistance in thin air.
The run course is well shaded for a lot of the run, I hope that doesn’t change as August at altitude can be brutal if the sun hits you directly.
Yo thanks man!! I love the advice! It’s probably eutrophication in the lake from pollution. I hope the bike course goes along the mountains but not into them first time im if I wanted a crazy altitude bike course I would’ve done tahoe I think the run makes up for the fast bike from what I’ve heard it’s hot
My post had more to do with shutting down the roads in those locations for extended periods of time. I just think it would create a lot of static with the locals and with cyclist/vehicle tensions seemingly on the increase, adding an IM to the mix probably wouldn’t make things better. I could be wrong, but isn’t that why the IMCDA course changed…the folks up by the golf course weren’t happy with the roads being closed all day?
I agree that a ride up Boulder, Lefthand or S St Vrain Canyon wouldn’t be extremely difficult from a competitor’s standpoint, but the logistical/community relations part of it is what makes it challenging. Sure, they did it with the US Pro Challenge, but I want to say that the road closures were relatively brief. But I could be wrong there, too.