Saying hello from the PNW

Welcome to BT. You will like the Cd'A Ironman 70.3. Nice town, good volunteers, pretty course. I am local to the area and I am doing the race for the second time in 3 years. If you need intel on Coeur d'Alene or the race, let me know.

Thank You, I appreciate the welcome. My family and I were in Coeur d'Alene a couple of years ago for New Years and some skiing/snowboarding and absolutely fell in love with the town. It will be nice to experience the town while it's not buried in snow and sub freezing temperatures. So far the only thing I don't like is the price gouging by the local lodging, for that particular weekend.

Dan

An alternative if you can't find reasonable cost lodging is to go on outdoorsy.com. It is a site that lets people post up campers for rent by the day or week. Kind of like an Air BnB or VRBO.com for campers. Book a site somewhere and you might be able to have a fun, memorable time by glamping over the week / weekend. Also don't forget to check craigslist Spokane for vacation rentals. A lot of folks advertise there.

Thanks for all the help. I did manage to find a reasonably priced Hotel in Post Falls. We would've prefered a VRBO type place as they seem a little more comfortable as well as being able to prepare our own food instead of eating out all the time. What got a little frustrating and made me glad I started all this in September, was on more than one occasion I found a place through VRBO and agreed upon reservation, only to be contacted later by the owner claiming they didn't know what weekend it was and because it was Ironman weekend the rate was double. It may actually work out better this way because a co-worker of mine has some friends that own a ranch with a rental house just east of town and if it still hasn't been rented by May we will be able to use it.

At this point all that is taken care of so I can focus on the other things needed to get ready, which we all know is the fun stuff.

Dan

If you are in a Post Falls hotel it should be only a 15-20 minute hop to downtown Coeur d'Alene and all the action. Plus if you get here early and want to do some last minute rides or runs you can hop on the Centennial Trail, which runs through PF.

If you want healthy, Mediterranean type food (with lots of garlic) in Post Falls, go to The White House for lunch or dinner. Thank me later!

Edited by HaydenHunter 2018-02-02 1:07 PM

Welcome! I'm also from the Northwest (most recently the Boise area, Oregon before that) though I work overseas during the school year). Have done both CDA and Chelanman 70.3 (the latter was my first HIM). They are actually quite similar in difficulty and nature--cold-ish lake swim, hilly bike course, rolling hills and sun on the run course. Similar weather in many years as well--dry, low temps in the morning and warm to hot by mid-day, potential to be cool all day if it is cloudy or rains (more likely at CDA).

Thinking about both of them, CDA may be a bit tougher on the bike. I had a really hard time of it last year. I think partly due to getting chilled in T1 (I'm skinny and used to training in the tropics) and on the early part of the bike, when temps were still quite low, which led to persistent cramping on the bike and then in the later stages of the run. The bike was very hilly--it seemed like we were always going up (mostly steep and/or long), or down (steep), with very few flat parts. A few "false flats". It was a tough course and despite strong fitness I was 10 or 12 minutes off my best bike split (at Calgary, which itself isn't an easy course and is slightly at altitude).

The bike course at Chelanman as I recall is a bit longer than standard, so that would have affected your time. Two really substantial hills as I recall; the rest were mostly small rollers. All in all I think CDA is a bit tougher as the hills are just relentless and it can be hard to get into a rhythm. I would guess you would see similar times for the two courses, unless some issue other than course difficulty caused the disappointing time at Chelanman. In my case hard to compare--somel years had passed between. I did 5:53 at Chelanman and 5:32 at CDA. (My best has been 5:16, at Calgary 70.3). But I had really improved my bike fitness and upgraded equipment in the 4-5 years between them.

Hit those hills in training. I do almost all my biking on the trainer in Saigon, and CDA was a cruel shock. Good luck!