Posted: January 23, 2006

Triathlon: Course change for IRONMAN Austria

The final meeting regarding the planned course change for IRONMAN Austria 2006 took place on Wednesday the 17th of January. The short running passage after a first lap of the swim has been removed and the bike course is changed from three 60 km loops to two 90 km loops.

The participants of IRONMAN Austria 2006 can expect some alterations regarding the race course. The race course of the long distance triathlon race in Klagenfurt has been stretched due to high demand of participation.

The swim course

Contrary to the previous years, the swim start will no longer take place from the beach. It will be an in-water start. The Pros will start 30m in front of the field, the under-one-hour swimmers in the second wave followed by the rest of the age groupers. The bottleneck around the first turning buoy will be removed by positioning the buoy at 1500 meters into the 3,8 km swim instead of 800 meters as previous years.

In the same context, the running passage is foregone.

The bike course

The 180 km bike course is changed from the previous three 60 km loops to two 90 km loops. The new course runs from Klagenfurt through Südufer to Velden. The course then continues through Rosegg, St.Niklas and anti-clockwise around Faaker See lake. From St.Niklas, the course then runs back to Velden to join the old course and continues through Schiefling, St.Egyden, Ludmannsdorf and Köttmannsdorf back to Klagenfurt. This loop will be repeated twice.

Thanks to these changes the athletes will make a calculated 61000 passes less!

The above changes were necessary safety measures. Therefore, they should lead to a more pleasant and stress-free race course.

The municipalities of Villach and Finkenstein / Faaker See have agreed to the prolonging of the race course. The final clarifying meeting with the municipality of Rosegg was held on the 17th of January. The result of this meeting was likewise positive.

As a consequence, the number of registrations for IRONMAN Austria 2006 can be increased, which is for the benefit of the athletes on the waiting list.

2400 starters are expected to show up on the 16th of July.

Despite everything, the regular registration cannot be re-opened.

Website: www.ironmanaustria.at.

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