Paul's Powerman Zofingen, ITU World LC Duathlon Championship race report
“The Powerman Zofingen is the greatest
race in the whole world!” Mark Allen,
1993 winner.
What is Powerman? It is a duathlon world series dating back to
1989 and a self-declared world championship event held in Zofingen,
Switzerland. Although most series events
are shorter, Zofingen itself is a 10K run, 150K bike, and 30K run, all over
extremely hilly courses. The course is
not designed for the faint of heart.
Instead, it is designed to brutalize you and test your strength and will. More than the distance, it is the elevation
profile that is deadly. Over the years
it has become recognized as the king of duathlon events. In addition to Mark Allen, other Ironman
Hawaii world champions that have also won Powerman include Scott Molina, Paula
Newby Frazier, Erin Baker and Natasha Badman.
Because of its fame, it has been also been awarded the ITU World Long
Course Duathlon Championship title the last seven years and is already on
contract with ITU as the 2015 and 2016 world championships as well.
American Zofingen is a tribute race to
Powerman Zofingen. It is a little
shorter and possibly even harder.
Reading race reports from fellow ENrs who have completed AmZof, I would describe it as a cult race,
while Powerman is a polished and very well organized production. To race the Powerman long course duathlon,
you can sign up for one of 300 open division slots, or be selected to race for
your national team. In short, Powerman
is a perfect bucket list race and I wanted to participate as part of Team
USA. The only way to get a slot for Team
USA was to race the USAT National Age Group Duathlon Championship which this
year was held in Cary, NC in May. I came
down with the flu a week before the race, did poorly, but took a rolldown slot
confident that I could perform in Switzerland.
So this summer, I spent a lot of ‘admin’ time driving to the ‘hills’ of central Florida,
and driving to a few locations with hills for running. Indoors, I hammered on Spinervals DVDs such as Hillacious, Ascending Mountains, Bending Crankarms, and similar. I knew the race would be hard but I thought
I was well-prepared. I thought wrong!
My plan of attack was to treat
Zofingen similar to an Ironman race and execute smartly. In fact, I think the race is well-suited to
the EN protocol. So I followed my IM
race nutrition plan and decided I would take the first 10K run very easy…in
retrospect, a wise decision.
At 8am, elite women, ITU age group
women and open age group women all started together. Elite men and ITU age group men started at
9am with open age group men starting at 9:02.
All have until 8pm to complete the race with various time gates that
must be achieved through the day to be allowed to continue.
The first run consists of two 5K loops
that run straight up the side of a ridge into the woods and comes right back
down in a quad busting start. We started
under a large inflatable arch with the Powerman logo and with ‘trees’ of
balloons on both sides for a couple of hundred yards. Spectators lined the streets for a mile up
until we continued climbing into the woods.
I was amazed at how fast how everyone took off. I was just jogging but was breathing hard on
the climb. Finally we hit the top and
the course turned right down. After the
pounding descent you run right through the stadium that is T1/T2…presumably so
everyone can laugh at your stupidity…then right back out to repeat the
loop. As I was running down the hill way
above the roofline of the city including the old church steeple, the church
bells started going off. I thought that
was ominous and hoped they weren’t tolling for me. Coming into T1 most all of the bikes were
gone except for those from a short course event that would start a little
later.
The bike course is 3 x 50K loops
(about 93 miles) with 3 mountain passes on each loop. In order, I would describe them as momma bear,
papa bear, and baby bear. Papa Bear was
the famed Bodenberg ascent…only 4K long, but steep. I took it out easy trying to shake my legs
out before the first climb, but cognizant of the fact that you had to be on the
3rd bike loop by 2pm in order to continue. My goal was to try and stay in Z3 on the
climbs and push the downhills. I brought
my tri-bike (which most all folks in the ITU division were using) with a
compact crank and an 11-28 cassette thinking that would do the trick. Ha! I
did OK going up the first pass although I was solidly into Z4. But when I hit the Bodenberg I had extended
periods at 250-280 watts just to hold about 7 mph (my FTP is only 243). There were a few areas where it flattened out
and I dropped down to 220-230 watts, but then it would go right back up. Spiking the watts was a fact of life if you
wanted to stay up right. As I was on my
trip up the Bodenberg, I was quickly passed by Emma Pooley (2008 Olympic
cycling silver medalist and 2010 cycling time trial world champion) who was on
her second lap (recall the ladies started an hour earlier). She had a press helicopter and media
motorcyclist following her and just like that she was gone! Although she is a Brit, she lives in
Switzerland and was demonstrating the home court advantage. Man, I need some of that climbing power.
The entire bike leg is like riding in
a Swiss postcard. The villages and
mountains were spectacularly beautiful.
I literally expected Julie Andrews to jump into the road in front of me
and start singing “the hills are alive with the sound of music”! I was panting too hard to have heard her
anyway.
On my second and third climbs up the
Bodenberg, I passed people walking their bikes up the mountain…yikes. It was one of the hottest days on record
(upper 70s) and I was sweating buckets on the climb. I stopped at the food station on the top
after the second lap to eat a banana and chug an entire bottle of water before
starting the descent down. The first
mile down is very steep and technical, and if you overshot an outside
switchback you would have flown off into outer space before hitting
reentry. If you were lucky you would burn up
without a heat shield before cratering like a meteor. But once you completed the initial descent
you were treated to something like 5 straight miles of straight or only
slightly curving descending. I was able
to recover from the climb here and tool along at 35mph plus or minus 3 while
only pushing about 150 watts. This is
why Powerman is for tri-bikes not road bikes.
I was crushing folks on road bikes during the descents by just staying
low. And I was glad I brought deep dish
wheels (85mm front, 95mm back) as I was just flying here.
The final climb through a forest had a
lot of switchbacks which allowed me to stay in Z2/Z3. I was happy to get back to T2 without
crashing and well ahead of the cut-off.
The second run consists of two 15K loops and you had to start running by
4pm to continue and be on the final run loop by 6pm. I was close to an hour ahead by the run
start. I had pretty much burned up my
matches on the Bodenberg and as I started up the first 15K loop I looked up and
thought…YGTBSM!! The run climbed for 3K
into the forest above the town of Zofingen, then went up and down and up down
until it was time to make mush of your quad muscles on the 3K down trip. Most everyone was reduced to hiking the climbs
and jogging only for the downhills and slight uphill portions. You practically fell the final 3K down into
town and every step hurt. Coming into
the stadium you had to run right next to the finish and then turn around and
head out for the second 15K loop. Aid
stations were every 2.5k instead of every mile like in Ironman so you had to
push longer to get the next break.
I was so happy to finish in 9hrs 16
mins compared to the men’s cut-off of 11 hours.
My time was nothing spectacular but I did finish, passed Go, and
collected the T-shirt and medal. There
were 183 men and women who started the ITU division (elite and age groupers)
and I was only 130 of 155 finishers, 26 DNF and 2 DQ. These are all folks who had to qualify to
wear their national uniforms. Despite
my slow time, I beat 13 members of Team USA (6 finishers and 7 DNF)…about ½ of
the team. The 15% DNF/DQ rate for
experienced competitors tells you this isn’t an easy course. The open division had an even higher DNF/DQ
rate with 150 starters, 121 finishers, 28 DNF and 1 DQ. Although the open division were only racing
for themselves, these folks knew what they were attempting to do.
Powerman Zofingen is an ultimate
bucket list race. I highly recommend it
if you are looking for a new challenge and want to use your fitness “to do cool
things” as Coach R would say.
Logistics: I flew with my daughter on a direct flight
from Tampa to Zurich (Eidelweiss Air). They
fly only on Tuesday and Friday so we left Tuesday night and returned the
following Tuesday. The flight is
slightly over 9 hours on the way to Zurich and slightly over 10 hours on the
return. We spent 2 nights in Zurich
checking out the city including the transition area, swim and run for IM
Switzerland…a future event on my list.
We then took the train to Olten, about 6 miles from Zofingen where we
spent 3 nights. Zofingen hotels were
sold out, but dozens of athletes stayed in Olten because the hotels were
cheaper there and train connections between Olten and Zofingen were cheap and
plentiful. Note, traveling with the bike
in the case was no issue, but to bring your built out bike on to a train in
Switzerland you have to buy a ticket for it equal to what you would pay for
yourself. So on race day, I had a ticket
for me and my bike. Most trips I was
never asked to show a ticket, but occasionally an inspector would be on the
train and require all passengers to show their tickets. Because my daughter is
a month shy of 16, I was able to buy her a junior pass that covered all of her
train travel for the week. The morning
after the race we took the train back to Zurich and spent one more day there
shopping before catching the flight home the next day. Trains were prompt, clean and efficient. There was definitely no need for a car. If you do rent a car, verify the parking
charges before booking a hotel. One guy
I met was surprised to learn the hotel parking was 1.5 Swiss Francs per hour –
every hour it was parked.
Comments
Paul, you are a great role model for both doing those buck-it list races and for setting extraordinary goals and getting them done. Might I recommend the Leadville 100 MTB for your consideration? It could take you 9 hours as well, and I would come watch you suffer if you did it ...
Thanks for being a leader and checking out these random cool races, and sharing your experiences. I totally agree with Al's assessment!
Keep up the good work, and I'll see you in Sweden next year!
@ Ian - I talked with two different Swedish athletes at Zofingen who will be racing at Motala next year. One grew up in the area. The local intel is to expect a cold swim (60 degrees +/- 2) and mostly flat bike and run course. Could be windy with no place to hide. Sounds like they better bring in a lot of refs.
Paul...congrats on your finishing an iconic race and for the insightful and detailed report. This truely is a bucket list race. I think it so cool that you pick these races to do something fun and see the world. Having finished the American Zofingen 2 years ago, I can only imagine how tough the "real McCoy" must be.
Thanks for the intel about the Long Course Worlds next year in Sweden. See you there, hopefully sooner.