IRONMAN 70.3 · Richland · Last raced 20 Sept 2026
How to train for IRONMAN 70.3 Washington Tri-Cities
Three easy promises sell this race. A downriver swim in the Columbia River, a rolling ride through wine country, a flat run on shaded park trails. All three are true. The trap is that people hear "rolling" and train for hills, and then lose the day on the flat road the hills are scattered across.
The bike climbs 580 m, and nine short climbs of 3 percent or more are what people remember of it. They are real, one of them reaches 8 percent, but for a Trained athlete they fill about a tenth of the bike leg. The rest is flat road. The last edition was raced in Richland, and the organiser has not yet published the next date. What follows is about the course, which is what you train for either way.
By Kian Briel, founder. Analysed by engine 1, updated
What is actually on the road
The organiser's own course files, drawn the way the Event Analyzer draws a member's race.
- Swim1.91 km4 m upCourse file
- Bike91.9 km580 m upCourse file
- Run21.1 km66 m upCourse file
It starts in the Columbia River, one point-to-point swim of 1.9 km with the current. You enter the water at Howard Amon Park, near the Lee Boulevard Boat Dock, 1.2 miles upstream of transition, and leave it at Columbia Point Park. Spectators walk the Riverfront Trail beside you the whole way down. Transition sits on the grass athletic field at the park.
The bike is one loop of 91.9 km through country roads and wine country, and it comes back to the same park. The organiser gives it around 1,800 feet of elevation gain. The file measures 580 m. The first 15 km are dead flat. Then the road climbs: 687 m at 5.5 percent, a short flat, and a cluster of rises around kilometre 21 that includes the day's steepest pitch, 735 m at 8 percent, and lifts you to the high point of the ride. A fast descent follows, then more than 18 km of flat road, then two more climbs of 5.5 and 5.9 percent near the halfway mark. After that the road rises gently for 15 km, drops back through a 7.8 percent descent at kilometre 74, and finishes with 17 km of flat road into Columbia Point Park.
The run is 21.1 km, flat, out and back through parks and on paved trails with the river in view most of the way. It climbs 66 m in total and finishes where it started, at Columbia Point Park.
Course shape by distance
- Flat 93%
- Climbing 4%
- Descending 4%
The longest stretches
- Bike, climbing0.74 km3% of the bike
- Bike, flat18.4 km19% of the bike
- Run, flat21.1 km100% of the run
Each row is one unbroken stretch of the course that keeps the same shape the whole way. The number is how much of that leg you spend inside it, and it comes out the same whether you are fast or slow.
What this course asks of each leg
Twelve training dimensions scored for each leg against its own course, the way the Event Analyzer scores a member's race.
Aerobic endurance and muscular endurance, and the bike asks for them loudest. The demand model scores those two at 85 and 82 for the bike leg, threshold capacity at 70, and aerobic durability and threshold durability level at 66. Because the bike is more than half of a Trained athlete's day, the top eight demands on the whole course belong to it. The run's pair reads 85 and 81, and so does the swim's.
Two scores tell you something particular about this race. High-intensity capacity reads 56 on the bike against 40 on the run and the swim, which is the nine climbs asking for short efforts above steady power. Environmental resilience reads 60 on every leg. That one is the weather. The organiser logged a high of 33 C in 2025, 26 C in 2024 and 17 C in 2023, and describes the region as a place of 300+ days of sunshine. You do not know in advance which version you will get.
Put the bands beside it. A Trained athlete swims 38:29, rides 3:07:57 at 182 W and runs 1:59:34, for 5:56:00. The Competitive band finishes in 5:11:09, from 4.15 W/kg at 75 kg and 4:20 /km threshold pace, about 21 minutes faster on the bike and 18 minutes faster on the run. On this course that gap is bought on the flat, because the flat is where the minutes are.
- Aerobic endurance85
- Muscular endurance81
- Threshold capacity70
- Aerobic durability65
- Threshold durability65
- Environmental resilience60
- Technical skill59
- Fueling resilience55
- High-intensity capacity40
- Anaerobic capacity25
- Strength / force20
- Sprint power5
Nymiva reads what you can already show, from your own data
Connect your training history and the Focus Lab scores the same twelve dimensions this course demands against where you sit today. The gap between the two is what you train.
- MeasuredFrom your thresholds and testsThreshold power, threshold pace, critical swim speed and field tests you have done. The dimensions they can carry are scored directly.
- EstimatedFrom your training historyConnected activities are read for what they prove: long efforts, late-session fade, repeated hard work, fueling on long days. Each score says how it was read.
- ProxyFrom a stand-in, and named as oneWhere only an indirect signal exists, the score carries the proxy it came from and a lower confidence, never a number dressed as a measurement.
- UnmeasuredHonestly blankA dimension nothing in your data can answer stays unmeasured. It is never a zero, and the plan does not pretend to know it.
Every dimension ends in one word
- Develop the course asks more than you can show
- Maintain close enough to hold at the minimum dose
- Covered nothing to build here
- Unmeasured the course needs it, your data cannot say yet
Nymiva reads the same twelve dimensions from two directions. The course side comes from the file the organiser publishes. The athlete side comes from their thresholds and connected training history, each score carrying a note on what it was read from and how far to trust it. A dimension counts as a gap only where the course asks for more than the athlete can show, and the gaps are then weighted by how much of the day they fill. The bike here is 53 percent of a Trained athlete's race, so a bike gap outweighs a swim gap of the same size several times over.
No athlete stands behind this page, so the season beside it cannot know anyone's gaps. It takes the plainest case, that they sit where the demands are biggest, and lays out 24 weeks in 5 developmental blocks with a two-week taper at the end. Aerobic endurance leads the first block in all three sports, aerobic durability the second, threshold capacity the third, muscular endurance the fourth, and aerobic endurance returns before the taper. A member's season is built from their own numbers instead, and it will disagree with this one where their numbers say so.
Train the bike to protect the run
Which demands matter most across the whole race. A leg's demand counts for as much of the day as that leg takes, so a score of 85 on the bike outweighs the same score on the swim.
- 01Aerobic enduranceBike leg, 53% of the day85 × 53%45
- 02Muscular enduranceBike leg, 53% of the day82 × 53%43
- 03Threshold capacityBike leg, 53% of the day70 × 53%37
The bike takes 53% of the Trained reference band’s day, so its demands carry the most race weight. What the bike leaves in the legs is what the run gets.
Which demand gets a block, and when
The engine freezes one lead focus per sport on every developmental block, holds the rest at maintenance, and verifies before it reprioritises.
An illustration, not your plan. This page has none of your data, so the season below is the engine’s answer to one stated assumption: that your gaps line up with what IRONMAN 70.3 Washington Tri-Cities demands. Your own season is built from your history, your thresholds, the days you can train and the races you have entered, and it will differ from this in its priorities, its sessions and its load.
- 01Run muscular endurance, a practice block4 weeks
- 02Run aerobic endurance, a development block4 weeks
- 03Bike muscular endurance, a practice block4 weeks
- 04Bike aerobic endurance, a development block4 weeks
In the order the allocator places them, general first, most race-like last.
- Week 1PrepPrep
A lead-in week. It develops nothing by design.
- Weeks 2 to 5Foundation 1Closes with a recovery week
- PriorityBike aerobic endurance
- PriorityRun aerobic endurance
- PrioritySwim aerobic endurance
- SupportBike muscular endurance
- SupportRun muscular endurance
- SupportSwim muscular endurance
- SupportBike threshold capacity
- SupportRun threshold capacity
- SupportSwim threshold capacity
- SupportBike aerobic durability
- SupportRun aerobic durability
- SupportSwim aerobic durability
- Weeks 6 to 9Foundation 2Closes with a recovery week
- PriorityBike aerobic durability
- PriorityRun aerobic durability
- PrioritySwim aerobic durability
- SupportBike aerobic endurance
- SupportRun aerobic endurance
- SupportSwim aerobic endurance
- SupportBike muscular endurance
- SupportRun muscular endurance
- SupportSwim muscular endurance
- SupportBike threshold capacity
- SupportRun threshold capacity
- SupportSwim threshold capacity
- Weeks 10 to 13Foundation 3Closes with a recovery week
- PriorityBike threshold capacity
- PriorityRun threshold capacity
- PrioritySwim threshold capacity
- SupportBike aerobic endurance
- SupportRun aerobic endurance
- SupportSwim aerobic endurance
- SupportBike muscular endurance
- SupportRun muscular endurance
- SupportSwim muscular endurance
- SupportBike aerobic durability
- SupportRun aerobic durability
- SupportSwim aerobic durability
- Weeks 14 to 17Event shaping 1Closes with a recovery week
- PriorityBike muscular endurance
- PriorityRun muscular endurance
- PrioritySwim muscular endurance
- SupportBike aerobic endurance
- SupportRun aerobic endurance
- SupportSwim aerobic endurance
- SupportBike threshold capacity
- SupportRun threshold capacity
- SupportSwim threshold capacity
- SupportBike aerobic durability
- SupportRun aerobic durability
- SupportSwim aerobic durability
- Weeks 18 to 21Event shaping 2Closes with a recovery week
- PriorityBike aerobic endurance
- PriorityRun aerobic endurance
- PrioritySwim aerobic endurance
- SupportBike muscular endurance
- SupportRun muscular endurance
- SupportSwim muscular endurance
- SupportBike threshold capacity
- SupportRun threshold capacity
- SupportSwim threshold capacity
- SupportBike aerobic durability
- SupportRun aerobic durability
- SupportSwim aerobic durability
- Weeks 22 to 23PeakPeak
The taper. Load comes down toward the race, content stays specific.
- Week 24RaceRace
Race week.
Held at maintenance between blocks
- Runmuscular endurance, aerobic endurance, aerobic durability, threshold capacity, threshold durability
- Bikemuscular endurance, aerobic endurance, aerobic durability, threshold capacity, threshold durability
- Swimaerobic endurance, aerobic durability, threshold capacity, threshold durability, muscular endurance
Touches scheduled by each capability’s own decay, at a fraction of its development dose, so earlier work is still there on race day.
The sessions the blocks are built from
One entry per kind of work the block trains, at the intensity that work is meant to be done at. Where the same work runs at several lengths, the entry shows the span it grows across rather than one entry per length.
- Foundation 1 · Weeks 2 to 575 to 240 min
150 to 210 min at Zone 2
BikePower, Zone 2Trains aerobic capacity - Foundation 1 · Weeks 2 to 540 to 270 min
180 to 210 min at Zone 3, then 30 min at Zone 4
BikePower, Zone 3Trains aerobic capacity - Foundation 1 · Weeks 2 to 535 to 120 min
90 min at Zone 2
RunPace, Zone 2Trains aerobic capacity - Foundation 1 · Weeks 2 to 550 min
4 x 1.5 min at Zone 3, 6 min easy between
RunHeart rate, Zone 3Trains aerobic capacity - Foundation 1 · Weeks 2 to 545 to 51 min
4 x 8 min at Zone 2, 1 min easy between
SwimPace, Zone 2Trains aerobic capacity - Foundation 1 · Weeks 2 to 547 to 81 min
3 x 1000 m at Zone 3, 0.3 min easy between
SwimPace, Zone 3Trains aerobic capacity
9× rolling-course surges
1 min at Zone 5, then 1 min at Zone 5, then 1 min at Zone 5, then 1 min at Zone 5, then 1 min at Zone 5, then 1 min at Zone 5, then 1 min at Zone 5, then 1 min at Zone 5, then 1 min at Zone 5, 5.3 min easy between
Compiled by the deterministic course compiler from the organiser’s file: the course’s one repeatable requirement, rehearsed at a dose the progression allows.
- Bike
- 76 min
- Trains threshold durability
- Supports muscular endurance
- Supports high intensity capacity
24 weeks, laid out backwards from race day
The shortest runway Nymiva builds for this event type, with its blocks, recovery weeks, taper and race week in place.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
- 21
- 22
- 23
- 24
- Prep
- Foundation
- Event shaping
- Peak
- Race
- Recovery week
Your own season carries these same phases on your own dates, with the load solved from your fitness and the days you can train, and it changes when your data does.
What each level does on the day
Reference finish times per peer band, the pacing plan the model holds each band to, and where the day is decided.
| Band | Swim | Bike | Run | Finish |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Recreational2:11 /100m critical swim speed · 2.47 W/kg at 75 kg · 6:08 /km threshold pace | 0:45:25 | 3:24:03 | 2:23:48 | 6:43:16 |
| Trained1:51 /100m critical swim speed · 3.03 W/kg at 75 kg · 5:06 /km threshold pace | 0:38:29 | 3:07:57 | 1:59:34 | 5:56:00 |
| Competitive1:36 /100m critical swim speed · 4.15 W/kg at 75 kg · 4:20 /km threshold pace | 0:33:17 | 2:46:16 | 1:41:36 | 5:11:09 |
| Elite1:26 /100m critical swim speed · 5.27 W/kg at 75 kg · 3:50 /km threshold pace | 0:29:49 | 2:31:51 | 1:29:52 | 4:41:32 |
Pacing plan
- 0 km0%30.8 km/h29:46
- 15.3 km5.5%12 km/h3:26
- 16 km0.2%29.8 km/h9:29
- 20.7 km3.5%16.5 km/h0:37
- 20.9 km2.9%18.3 km/h1:08
- 21.2 km8%8.8 km/h5:02
- 21.9 km1.3%24.6 km/h1:44
- 22.6 km6.3%10.7 km/h1:52
23 more segments in the full plan.
- Run: reach 4:20 /km and this course gives back 44:51.
Where it is decided
On the flat stretch between kilometre 29 and kilometre 47.
It is 18.4 km of level road with nothing on it to react to, and it takes 19 percent of the bike leg, more than any other single piece of the course. It comes straight after the only hard part of the ride. You have just climbed the 8 percent pitch and dropped off the high point of the ride, and this is where riders do one of two things. Some sit up to recover and lose minutes they never see again. Others, still buzzing from the climbs, push above their plan for the whole stretch and pay for it on the run.
The right ride is the dull one: 182 W for a Trained athlete, held on the flat exactly as it was held on the climbs. The 8 percent climb, for all the attention it gets, is 3 percent of the bike leg. The three flat stretches together are more than half of it.
Then the run. It is flat from the first metre to the last, and on a hot year you start it nearly four hours after the gun. A runner who rode the middle flat at the right number reaches the turnaround with something left. One who did not finds the out-and-back twice as long on the way home.
Getting it wrong
The first mistake is the swim. A current-assisted river swim feels easy, so people swim it hard to bank the time the current is giving them. The current gives it anyway. Arrive at Columbia Point Park calm, because the first 15 km of the bike are flat and fast and will ask you to start them at a number you cannot keep.
The second is the climbs around kilometre 21. They come early, the steepest is 8 percent, and the whole field rides them out of the saddle. A minute of that is harmless. Nine climbs of it, spread over the ride, are not, and the course hands you nine.
The third is the weather. A cool year, like the 2023 edition at 17 C, makes the run a pleasant out-and-back on the river. A year like 2025 turns the same flat trail into the hardest hour of the day. Pace the run for the day you get, not the day you hoped for.
Conditions on the day
- 2025high 33 C, low 11 Cwater 21 C
- 2024high 26 C, low 10 Cwater 19 C
- 2023high 17 C, low 9 C
From the organiser’s own records. Not a forecast.
Every session is a claim, every block is a test
A plan is not a calendar. Each key session states what it trains and how that is checked, and each block ends with a public verdict before the next one is chosen.
What a block promises
Bike aerobic endurance moves from your baseline to a stated target by the end of Foundation 1
- The baseline is your measured score when the block starts. The target is the score the model predicts for it.
- Verified at the block’s recovery week, by a field test or a refresh of the supply read from your history.
- Confidence rises by agreement between independent signals, never by one metric crossing a line.
- A block that misses its target is a public miss. The next block is chosen from what was proven, not from what was planned.
- 01Stimulus achievedThe work landed in the zone the session named, for the dose it named.
- 02Partially achievedSome of the work landed. The session banks what it can prove.
- 03Not achievedThe load may have been there. The stimulus was not, so nothing is banked.
- 04Data insufficientNo usable stream. The session is neither credited nor blamed.
- Session verified
- Progression banked
- Block verified
- Priority reassessed
- Plan adapted
Your numbers, this course
Analyze IRONMAN 70.3 Washington Tri-Cities against my fitness
The same simulation and the same Focus Lab read, on your thresholds instead of a band’s. Three numbers give a finish estimate and a partial read. A connected history gives the whole table.
The first 14 days are free.
- Trained band finish
- 5:56:00
- Of the day on the bike
- 53%
- Dimensions scored per leg
- 12
- Season runway shown
- 24 wk
Questions people ask
- How hilly is the IRONMAN 70.3 Washington Tri-Cities bike course?
- Rolling. The organiser puts it at around 1,800 feet of elevation gain, and the course file measures 580 m. The steepest sustained climb is 735 m at 8 percent, early in the ride. The first 15 km, a stretch of more than 18 km in the middle and the last 17 km are flat.
- Is the swim in the Columbia River really downstream?
- Yes. It is a point-to-point swim that starts 1.2 miles upstream of transition, entering the water at Howard Amon Park near the Lee Boulevard Boat Dock and leaving it at Columbia Point Park. The organiser calls it current-assisted and recorded the water at 21 C in 2025 and 19 C in 2024.
- How hot does IRONMAN 70.3 Washington Tri-Cities get?
- It varies a great deal. The organiser logged a high of 33 C in 2025, 26 C in 2024 and 17 C in 2023. Train for the hot version, because the run comes last and starts nearly four hours in for a Trained athlete.
- Is the IRONMAN 70.3 Washington Tri-Cities run course flat?
- Yes. The 21.1 km run is an out-and-back through parks and on paved trails with the river in view most of the way, and it climbs 66 m in total. It finishes at Columbia Point Park.
Course data from the organiser’s published files, analysed 25 Sept 2026 by engine 1, demand model 4. Reference times are simulated for a peer band at a stated reference athlete and are not a prediction for anyone. Nothing on this page is medical advice.
IRONMAN® and IRONMAN 70.3® are registered trademarks, and 5150 is a trademark, of World Triathlon Corporation. Nymiva is an independent training platform and is not affiliated with, sponsored by or endorsed by World Triathlon Corporation. Course data is read from the organiser’s public course pages for the purpose of describing the event.