IM Steelhead 70.3 Notes from MattA and WilliamJ
Team Steelhead,
Below is a cut and paste job of email notes from Matt Aaronson and William Jenks regarding Steelhead.
Good luck!
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I last did the race in 2010, and I checked out the web site…the bike and run course are the same, but they have changed the swim since then. (It used to be point to point, but no more.) I’ll go through Matt’s notes, and made various additions/comments.
On Jul 28, 2015, at 1:26 AM, Aaronson Matt <> wrote:
Well I should be preparing for a big meeting this morning rather than writing this but hey...just a few points. Feel free to post on the EN site if you want. You'll want to make sure to communicate the following:
Logistics
- Very nice area…enjoy it. Check-in lineup can be in the baking hot sun (it is at the site not at the school anymore), so arrive early
- Personally I take advantage of not being required to rack bike the day before and I bring mine on race day
- Parking is a bitch so arrive early
- Bring a bit of cash on race morning if you want to buy coffee from one of the trucks that is selling it
Agreed on all points here.
The year I raced it was rainy on race morning which made things worse, but the transition area was not lit at all. I was doing my bike setup et in very dark conditions. I would advise bringing a light in case they have not solved this problem. It’s a completely unnecessary way to get flustered in the morning.
- Dinner…HIGHLY recommend Tosi which is a bit out of town south but very nice. I arrived at prime time and had to wait an hour (they don't take reservations but it is a very large restaurant). This is different than the Tosi Café which is right in St Joseph and more of a café and not a restaurant
Swim
- Point-to-point so you'll have to walk a mile to get from transition to the swim start. Unlike Racine which has the same walk, there is no easy route that will allow you to avoid doing that walk on the sand. Give yourself time.
This has changed. I don’t recall which year it switched to a triangle course, but I know it was a triangle last year and it is set to be a triangle this year. Buoys on the right. Turn at the red buoy. Very straightforward.
There is a current in Lake Michigan. When they did it point to point, what they would do was have you swim with the current along the beach. Some years, they would actually have you switch which way you swam (changing the start point by 2 miles!) if the current was going the other way. The way they have the triangle drawn, the second leg is with the predominant current and the “out” and “back” legs are slightly against the current.. However, the current is variable.
- The course is a beach start, a very short couple of hundred yards to a buoy, then about a mile, totally straight, parallel to the shore. Then a right turn around a buoy and back to shore
- They used to alter the direction of the swim depending on the current and wind but now it's always the same way. So you might have a "slow swim course" or a "fast swim course" depending
- If the weather is bad the swim will be cancelled. This happened to me in 2011 and I think also in 2009. It is not uncommon.
Yup.
Bike
- This course can be damn fast, but depends a bit on the wind. You want the wind from the North. NNE or due north would be ideal. SSW and you are in for a long day. The whole course is really flay. Not pancake flat due to the occasional roller, highway overpass or 1-2 hills on the Blue Star Highway, but pretty damn flat. A ton of the riding is an out-and-back on the Blue Star Highway which is just awesome riding. In fact they re-did the course sometime between when I did the race in 2011 and when I did it in 2014 to feature even more of the course on the Blue Star Highway and less on the country roads.
I looked on the current map and my Garmin recording from 2010. The map looks identical to what I rode.
Otherwise, my memory comports well with Matt’s account. It does not “appear” flat in lots of places because the terrain undulates, but in truth, these are very minor, and it is a “flat course”. 5 year is a long time, and the following two observations may have changed since then:
1) There are long sections of very nice, smooth, fast road. There are short sections of crappy road on the loop.
2) The placement of the bike bottle exchanges was quite irregular, and the volunteers were not super well trained. This latter point meant that it was not quite so reliable to get two clean exchanges at the stations like I usually do. However, I knew where they were and figured out that I was ok not to go back. If I were racing, I would want to make sure I knew where they were if there’s any chance it’s going to be a hot day. On the map, they appear to be at 10 mi, 25 mi, 36 mi, and 46 mi, but I would double check that.
- I split the course into 4 segments (distances approximate…you'll have to check them on Google maps):
1. NNE on the Blue Star highway. About 7-8 miles or so. Very straightforward. A few false flats that you go up so it feels a bit slow. Get into your groove.
2. East on Hager Shore Road. About 7-8 miles or so. This is the crappiest part of the course. The road is chip-seal and not very smooth. The good thing is that with the wind often being from the West you may have a good tailwind (although this is convection-induced wind so in the early morning it's not likely to be strong). Just hunker down and get through this part. The road isn't narrow but it's only 2-lane country hwy so you will need to take care when passing people.
They are now on 44th, not Hagar Shore. Strangely enough, in 2010, they were not on Hagar Shore either. My memory of where the bad road is is not as precise as Matt’s, except that it was somewhere on this loop.
3. Some country roads, mostly going north with the occasional section taking you west. Maybe ~15 miles or so. Varying quality of roads. Some bits patched so keep an eye on the road ahead. A bit narrow at times so take care when passing.
4. Straight shot ~22-23 miles SSW back on the Blue Star Highway. This is where the wind plays a big role. If it's at your back, you will be rocket-like all the way home. Combined with some of those rollers and false-flats going down and it is just an awesome ride. Psychologically it is great because you are going fast and because you executed the EN way you are now passing everyone and their brother. On the other hand, with a SSW wind this is going to be a massive slog so just bear down, keep constant power at your target watts.
I must have been on a lucky day, though I don’t recall thinking that there was a notable wind. I presume it must have been a bit breezy in my favor, though, as this race had my fastest bike split ever. That said, I mostly do moderately hilly races like Kansas 70.3 and WI.
RUN
- The course keeps you honest. It's not hard but it's not easy. It's a "lollypop"…you go out a mile and a bit, maybe close to 2 miles, then do a couple of 4-ish mile loops around the Whirlpool corporate campus, then back the way you came.
I agree. It’s not got nasty hills, but it has a couple quirks that make it a little weird. Again, I double checked my Garmin record against the map, and the courses is identical to when I ran it in 2010.
My note of the time talk about one big hill at the beginning and a smaller one you have to do twice on the loop. That sounds pretty much like what Matt reports. I specifically have notes of Mile 11 noted as one of the toughest miles and miles 12 and 13 as flat or downhill. Mile 11 would be the end of the second loop and going out to the highway again, so it almost certainly includes that “small hill”.
Another quirky feature of the “loop” is that one of the big downhill sections is a twisty walking path. I am a pretty good downhill runner, and can take advantage of a straight downhill to get some free seconds…I had a harder time doing that here. It’s not that it’s so hard or anything, but it’s a little frustrating to have to pay the price going uphill without getting the benefit of going down.
Finally, there is a small section running a slightly non-obvious path over one of the timing mats in a parking lot. It’s not a big deal, but just watch out to make sure you’re going the right direction and all.
- The "stick" part of the course is nice. Shaded. One really quite big hill before the loop start…take it easy on the way up, and you get to run down it with just over a mile to go to the finish.- The "loop" is tougher than most people care to remember. There are some longish false flats going up which suck, and there is minimal shade. The part of the course inside the campus is okay (still, not really shaded) but the perimeter where you do a lot of running is basically just running along a highway, wide open sunshine. There is one gigantic hill when exiting the campus each loop. It's not very long but make sure to just jog it and not kill yourself on it. Spectator support minimal.- Finisher chute is pretty well-done…you feel like a pro!
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Comments
So, we can check in on Friday, does that mean we can put our bikes in transition on Friday?
I'm guessing this is a "no".