Oceanside 70.3 - Question for Arizona BTers

South Mountain towers are MUCH harder than the climbs at Oceanside. Here is my Oceanside route from 2012:
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/163996092

Here is the South Mountain towers 3 times.
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/49696376

It's nearly the same total miles, but SoMo is almost 3x the climbing:

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The run at Oceanside is 100 feet of climbing over 13.1 miles. That's considered pancake flat. The problem is that the 100 feet are broken up into about 6 STEEP ramps you navigate to and from the strand.

(Capture.PNG)

All good comments.  Another hill ride that can help train you for Oceanside is Golden Eagle in Ftn Hills.  IN fact, in my opinion it more closely resembles the 'big' first hill at Oceanside.  It is about 18% grade, and we rode it a number of times training for Oceanside this past year.  When we came to the hill at the race, it was not really that bad.  The other hills at Oceanside are not as steep (in my opinion), and I was passing people (a rare occurrence on hills for me) with regularity.

The headwinds coming back to transition were light this year, but I have heard they can be much more formidable.  Nothing to be scared of, just save some energy and do not expect to be flying at 20+ on the way back.

As for the run, I agree with Chad (Slidell) - the run felt very flat.  You cannot ignore the ramps at the pier, or Wisconsin Ave as you climb off The Strand onto Pacific, but they are short enough I know many people either walked them, and/or ran down backwards.  Honestly I did not find them too difficult - they are short enough that your HR is not going to spike for long, and you only have to do them each twice.

Oceanside was an AWESOME race (even with the rain, clutter on the N part of The Strand run course), and I signed up right when registration opened this year.