As I said in that other thread about StG, I’ve been scared of this event for as long as I’ve known about it. The main reason is how slow I am in the hills, both on the bike and the run.
I’m a solid MOP age grouper on flat ground, at least up to T2. Actually reasonably fast on the bike on flat ground. But get me in the hills and I feel like I’m dragging a dead rhinoceros behind me.
Since where I live is kind of flat, compared to StG, I drove out today to do a route in the Red Rock Scenic Loop outside of Vegas. This is legitimately the closest I can come to replicating the elevation out in StG.
Did a 40 mile ride with the steepest elevation hitting around 9-10% for a couple miles. Total time was just shy of 2:40.
So why do I feel the need to start a thread about this? I’m looking for opinions (reassurance?) of those who have ridden StG in the past. Below is a map with an elevation chart of my route this morning. 40 miles and 3100’ of gain. The way I’m looking at it, that gives me 16 miles for just another 300’ in StG.
My goal is to be OUT of T2 by 5 hours (I’m about a 45 minutes on the swim) because I may need every bit of that for my run.
I did IM StG in 2022. I would consider myself a pretty decent bike handler, but the descents in IM StG had me legitimately terrified for my safety. The road surface is totally fine, and the roads were closed so there weren’t cars. That day there was a lot of gusting wind, which when you’re descending on a P3X with 80mm wheels front and back make for scary sideways jerks. Make sure you have decently fresh brake pads because I was getting brake fade, which as you rocket down that hill is not enjoyable. The ascending part isn’t too bad, snow canyon is pretty steep, but just keep grinding away.
TLDR: make sure you’re comfortable descending at speed on your TT Bike and plan your wheels for winds.
The way I’m looking at it, that gives me 16 miles for just another 300’ in StG.
I live somewhere quite hilly- with many big climbs- but was born and grew up somewhere pancake flat. I’d say this is EXACTLY what to tell yourself. You’re only tacking on 300 feet for an extra 16 miles so it’ll feel a lot flatter on race day. Another strategy that I’ve always implemented, but especially MTB racing, is that from a nutrition and pacing standpoint you’re often actually racing to the top of the last climb because you have to descend back to t2/ finish line. Unless this is not the case in StG specifically, this thought process might take some of the sting off of it, too.
I could be wrong, but I think they modified the course somewhat in 2025 vs prior years like 2022 so that the descent isn’t as terrifying, but I don’t have prior maps to confirm that.
I’ll also add you can sign up for Rouvy and test-ride the St George 56 mile course, hills and all if you have a smart trainer. I did it last weekend, took me 2:50 to do it on 170 watts average (I’ll probably be 200+ on race day.)
I’ll wait for others who actually did the race course in reality to chime in, but just guessing from your 2:40 for 40 miles and 3100’ gain, you’ll have no problems riding the remaining 16 miles with 300’ climbing in 1:20 to go under 4 hours total for the bike. (At your 40 mile pace, you’re riding 20 miles with 1550’ gain in 1:20).
45 min swim + 4 hr bike + T2 15’ and you should be out onto the run in just about 5ish.
I’d love to do that route in Vegas, as well. Have looked at that specific loop quite a few times and planned for it, but haven’t had the time to get out there to ride it. Looks lovely!
I have a set of Reynold’s 80mm wheels but I will only run them if the air is absolutely dead still. When I first got them I did a training ride through some hills and I know a little something about terrifying. Coming down a hill with a little land feature to block the wind, then all of a sudden get into an open spot and get hit with a 25-30mph side gust. Holy shit. Talk about white knuckling the bars.
For race day, I’ll more likely run my 41mm wheels. Those were what I rode today. They’re far more stable in a cross wind. Cross wind, I can deal with. Tail wind would be lovely. But for the love of all that is Holy, please no more head winds on the descent. I ran into that on the Bee Line last year for IMAZ. I was struggling just to maintain 18mph where I should have been cruising along comfortably at 25mph.
Ya, looking at the map posted on the IMStG page, the hills really don’t look too bad for the first 35 miles or so. Lots of smaller ups and downs, only maybe a couple hundred feet gain for any of them. Looks like around mile 38-39, I start the big climb that’s more than 1000’ in just about six miles. If I compare that to the route I rode this morning, I can do that OK, but it’s going to be a grind. The good news is that, according to their map, after mile 46, the last ten miles is almost entirely down hill. Rest and recharge the legs.
I don’t have any kind of “smart” trainer or power meter so I’m flying blind a little bit in that regard. My strategy is just to map out routes in areas that I know that have comparable features. It works well. Of course, there are always variables you can’t necessarily account for, like temperature and wind.
Don’t know where you are, but if you ever do make it out here and want to do that Red Rock loop, let me know. If I have time, we can meet up.
If you did 40 miles in 2:40, you should easily be done the entire St. George ride in under 4 hrs. There is nothing that is crazy steep on the course other than 1km on snow canyon that gets up over 10 percent, but it is does not last forever. Just make sure you have sufficient gearing and you’ll be OK. Once you get to the stop of Snow Canyon, it is crusing all the way back to T2. Some of it you get into town is pretty steep. In 2022 with a cross tailwind I got over 80kph, but last year with a headwind it was barely over 70kph in the aero position but if you sit up a bit with hands on the brake hoods/basebar, you can easily use body surface braking to get down to 60 kph before you have apply any brakes (I find body surface braking by sitting up like a sail is always a safer first step to bleed off speed before pressing any brake), but there is nothing technical going back to town that you need to apply brakes (other than wanting to bleed speed for safety which is a totally good reason) !!!
Oh man no smart trainer? Hopefully you at least have A trainer. That is required in my opinion for tri training. You need a reliable bike option when weather , dark, or time constraints stop you from riding outside.
I live in southern Nevada. This time of year, the only thing that is going to stop me from riding outside is crazy wind. We’re getting into our “rainy season”, but considering we only average about 4" a year, that’s really not much.
But yes, I do have a dumb trainer. I just hate using it.
Ya, the gearing is where I’m a little worried. I’m planning on riding my P2 instead of my Shiv. I don’t know exactly why, but it’s just a faster bike. It might be that it has 54/39 on the front and 170 cranks whereas the Shiv only has 52/36 and 165 cranks. Thinking about investing in 52/36 for that P2 and see where that gets me.
I did that steep loop on the Shiv a few weeks back. Had the same wheels as I was using on the P2 today, so we can take that out of the equation. And the Shiv was definitely easier (but still not easy) on the ascent. Everywhere else, the Shiv is slower. I haven’t figured out why yet.
Head winds are my biggest fear. Mainly because my neck and back simply won’t tolerate a low, flat aero position for more than a few miles. Consequently, my aero “tuck” is only slightly lower than a roadie on the drops. I have been able to get lower over the years, but I think there is just a limit to how low these old bones are going to bend.
You don’t need to go crazy with the aero. If it’s still problematic to hold for more than a few miles have the shop raise you up more. It’ll still help significantly compared to no aero bars.
Keep doing that route. If you can do the first five miles of the Red Rock loop (you did), you can do Snow Canyon. For some extra elevation, you can always add Calico or take a right up to Late Night.
There’s actually quite a bit of climbs through the entire course. I get the feeling the elevation chart obscures it a bit with how weighted it ends up looking based on the Snow Canyon climb at the end.
We’ve got the climb out of sand hollow, the climb out of hurricane, the climb on telegraph Street, the climb to Papa John’s (that’s what I call it everytime now since the first time I raced StG there was a couple sitting on the side of the road eating Papa John’s waving at me…hah), the climb at pioneer Park on Red cliffs, and finally the climbs in Snow Canyon.
You will feel them all. The good news is after every one of those climbs you get a nice downhill to recover.
Problem is, we’re now less than five weeks out. I have basically two weeks before I start my taper so there’s only so much I can get in between now and then. All my hard riding has to be done on the weekend. I still put in some training on the weekdays after work but I’m time and daylight limited to about an hour and a half.
well I don’t like that. But how long and how high are these climbs? Are they more than a few hundred feet? Are they more than a mile or so? I can deal with the short burns. It’s that long slog that is soul sucking.
You got this. You have 4 hours to do the bike, plus another 25 min left over from your swim that’s tagged on.
Make sure you have proper climbing gearing. 50/34 front and a 30T cog in back. The climb at mile 38 or so is a solid 13-15% grade so if you don’t have proper gearing, you may end up walking. But that’s ok. Just don’t burn yourself out there.
Enjoy the course. It really is my favorite course of the North American races and don’t forget a few days for the amazing national parks in the area.
45-60 minutes of riding on that trainer during the week makes a huge difference. The dumb trainer is fine, and while it’s always mentally challenging, you can find youtube spin videos that make it better, or play a game like watch an action movie and any time they start running, shooting, or fighting, you start pushing the pace.
You can get a good deal of bike training done in the 3 weeks before taper.
I rode the Rouvy course last weekend, and agree with you.
You can get misled by the course profile into think it’s all about Snow Canyon, but the roller section in the middle ends up being overall equally challenging (at least to me) if not moreso than Snow canyon since it’s a much longer distance and the punchy and surprisingly steep short hills keep on coming. Snow canyon you expect it to be tough (most folks online seemed to say it was overhyped) but that middle section will surprise you if you’re not ready for it - I studied the elevation profile and just took it for granted, but once I rode, it was like ‘these are some real hills!’ Nothing killer, but far from as easy as you might think on the elevation profile.
