until they go back to a shared day i’m not interested. it is interesting none the less to think about Aug 3 to Sept 14 turnaround for an IM, and the logistics involved, would be an interesting 6 weeks!
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That’s why I think they should really do a Jan-Dec qualifying cycle for Amateurs (same for 70.3 world’s). You’ve got 15 months or so to plan your next vacation. If their pitch to the local communities is that we stay and contribute to the local economy before/after then the way you maximize this is by giving your qualifiers more time to plan.
At 6 weeks notice, I might not go or I’m going alone. I’m there to race and that’s probably it.
At 12+ months, I’m bringing my family and planning a whole vacation around it.
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I apologize if this has already been discussed, I haven’t read most of this thread but I looked up the ottawa web site and noticed only 300 meters of climbing on the bike, this is a joke and comapres to the roughly 2600 meters and 2100 at the last 2 IM Canada courses and over 2000 meters at LP. I guess this will appeal to the one and done crowd or are they appealing to the rapidly aging IM demographic?
It will be more than 300m on the bike - Someone posted a route via Strava and they got 174km and 677m elevation on the bike. Not the climbing of Penticton, but not the flatness of Maryland either.
I suspect there’s still tweaks to be made - 174km is too short so they’ll probably move the cones out a bit on Kitchi Zibi. Not sure why the turn around isn’t at Carling. Ditto for the swim - it’s too shallow where they’ve picked so might need some tweaks.
But it’s not like there isn’t elevation to be had here - loops of Gatineau Park would get you similar to Penticton or Whistler for elevation and they chose the parkways as the route.
ETA: not my route, but here you are Ironman Ottawa Bike Course | 173.6 km Cycling Route on Strava
I’ve done Penticton and Whistler and I’m kinda dreading the Ottawa course more than the former ones. 95% of the time in aero with no hills to break things up and it can get windy on the parkway.
So funny that the Canadian Iron 226,which ran for a dozen years or so in Ottawa,was a fringe race until it died and then you slap an M-Dot onto a race venue and the bloody thing sells out.
Now THAT was a bike course!
10x up and down the canal?
Yeah,I forget how many laps it was but it was pretty mind numbing which is weird because the Esprit in Montreal the following weekend had way more laps but was way more fun.
I just did the Canadian 113 last weekend and it was 9x laps of 10k, so would have been 18 loops up and down the Parkway. It’s a well-run race, but I can’t imagine doing that many laps.
There used to also be the National Capital on the same course, but the loops were 15km
Race track looks way more fun than going up and down the canal
I think loop 2 and loop 3 West to east bike wind will make it sufficiently mind numbing to make up for lack of elevation…and first weekend of August is almost guaranteed to be Kona type heat and humidity. It could be pretty darn miserable, or it coud be really fast!!!
So its not a real IM bike course unless it has huge elevation? What about Florida, Texas, Maryland, etc??
I guess its how you define huge, but yeah I don’t think of those flat coures as real IM, its kinda like downhill marathons. but i guess its all about money like lowering the time standards for the boston marathon so you can let in over 30,000 runners, or Kona moving men and womans races so they can get twice as many entrants, where now its a joke.
is this a similar argument to there being no real ironman since they eliminated mass swim starts?
being a small dude i personally prefer the hilly courses, but, i can tell you i’m looking forward to the flat run in Ottawa…although as others have said, the wind and high chance of hot steamy weather will negate any part of a flat course…
No that was a safety and common sense decision, my wife who won her age group several times and a sub 1 hr swimmer had black eye from swim start in IM Oz
Hey Pokey, another way of looking at this is races have to stay in business. If they don’t stay in biz, then we don’t have races to do. Placid and Nice are tough courses, but they are also close to a lot of population. Penticon, Whistler, Lake Tahoe, require a bit of a hike (OK Whistler is close to Vancouver, but not really close to anything else).
It seems these “in city courses” tend to survive longer (ex Frankfurt or Texas basically in Houston).
The Ironmans I have done are generally on the harder end (Penticton, Whistler, Tremblant, Placid, Nice, South Africa with ~6000ft of climbing). The easier ones I did were Texas and Kona on 4000 ft climbing courses. I never got out to Florida/Arizona/Cophenhagen/Kalmar, but putting that aside, with my fitness being around 20% lower than when I did all those hard events (for context I was around 5.5 hrs this year St. George 70.3 and around the same in Muskoka 70.3 which would roughly translate into a 12.5 hrs day on double that course with 1000-1100m climbing), I have not even dared to try a full IM in 10 years (last one was Lake Tahoe 2015).
The Ottawa course is next door to home, and the only reason I am signed up is I don’t think the bike course will kill me to the point that I have to hike the majority of the marathon .
The tough courses are great when people are fighting for KQ level performance. Or they are fine for most people in half IM. For full IM, people are voting with their fitness and wallet and I don’t think the really hard IM courses appeal to the fitness of most of us (we just won’t sign up for a miserable day)
Good points, I think I have one more ironman in me and I guess I better sign up for Lake Placid in the next 2 years before it to disappears. We live on the west coast but both grew up in southern ontario, my wife and I did Lake Placid in mid 2000s with her winning her age group and we both took Kona slots, good memories, loved the cable underwater!
Is a swim with a cable to guide you underwater a real Ironman. Seems equivalent to equating elevation to justify the recognition of your efforts. You go just as hard, one course is faster. Both are very long days.
IM Ottawa is going to be awesome! Flat, windy, hot, humid, cable swim ;), hilly, whatever… it’s going to be an awesome looooong day just like all of em 
Ha Ha, you noticed my contratiction, i’m a weak swimming a 1:02 to 1:05 so need alll the help I can get in he water.
I especaiily like how the early challanging hills in LP, Canada etc break up the packs, I would hate to come out of the water with so many slower swimmers and be stuck in large draft packs due to no elevation changes to break things up, I love how Canada had over 2K entrants but never felt packed after McLean Creek sorted things out, i have seen the huge draft packs in Arizona, Florida, Brasil, Barcelona etc…