Ironman St. George, Utah Training Weekend

Hey this last weekend I road tripped with 5 of my training buddies to St. George, Utah to train on the Ironman course for the upcoming race on May 1st. Two of the guys in the group are doing the race for sure and wanted to give the course a look.

Group Picture – snow capped and red rock Mts in the background

Day 1  – Travel to St George

After going from house to house picking the men up for the trip we had 5 guys and 5 bikes in Bangers Ford which was a tight fit.  Just the long road past Las Vegas in some killer winds – glad we missed the rain that blew through the area.

Day 2 – The Bike Course

We got up early and ate some steel cut oatmeal in the pot on the stove. We then loaded into the truck to drive the bike course loop and it looked tough; but not as tough as when we got on our bikes.

The course starts from the resevour swim 30 miles from T1 as seen below. The climbs from the swim to town are very challenging with 8 % grades and some fast downhills, however they make you turn just enough to take the speed out of some of the decents.

Ofter one of the climbs that hurt we saw this deer stuck in a barb wire fence on the side of the road; we had never seen anything like it so we took a pic – poor guy didn’t have chance once he got stuck.

We decided to ride the 40 mile loop from town seen on the left side of the map below which is the bulk of the course. The first 30 miles are killer with climb after climb after climb and a head wind that takes away your downhill speed and any momentum. It took us over 2.5 hours to go the first 27 miles.

After that you hit hwy 18 leading back to town and if the wind is at your back it is a screamer downhill into town where we reached 51 miles per hour; so fast we were frightened to be in our arrow bars because of periodic side winds.

We all rated the course after the ride and it will be the hardest North American race even over the ride in Wisconsin. 

Day 3 – The Run Course

 The person who created this run course was equally as sinister as the bike course creator. After leaving the transition area downtown the run goes up hill for at least 4 miles and doesn’t stop there, the rest of the run is rolling hills with a partial break coming back to T2 where you have to do it all over again. It was a challenging run a day after riding the course it will be extremely hard right after getting off the bike on race day; especially with no shade.

We also went for a swim in the afternoon at the Sand Hollow Aquatic Center located about 10 mintues from where we were staying on Hwy 18. This is an awesome indoor facility with two huge pools, with one side recreation for kids with a water slide and kiddy pools and the other side an olympic lap swimming pool with diving boards. As you can see it is inside a large tent-like canopy which feels inside like you are swimming outside – very cool.

We had to stop for at least a few moments of site seeing becuase of the awesome landscape and canyons around the area. Our great host Wade tool us to this gorge just outside the city that seemed to go back for ever – man it was beautiful at dusk.

 
Day 4 – Travel to OC

It was a bummer leaving Utah after two days of torturing our bodies for the sake of triathlon. The Drive back was uneventful besides some great stores of the battles on the road and of course the food stop at the famous Mad Greek to have some awesome greek food and check out the worlds largest thermometer. 

Awesome fun weekend with a bunch of great men!

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