Menden Cross-Triathlon: Course, Route Profile & Map

Course & Elevation

The start is at 9:30 in the heated 50 metre pool of the Bürgerbad Leitmecke in Menden in the Sauerland: 1,000 metres in the pool, so lengths and turns rather than buoys and wetsuits. Transition sits directly beside the baths.

On the bike come four laps of the 6.2 kilometre Waldemei forest circuit. The organiser puts each lap at around 120 metres of climbing, so roughly 480 across the four. Only mountain bikes or cyclocross bikes are permitted, aero bars are banned and tyres must be at least 1.5 inches wide, not a formality but a description of the ground.

The cross run is four laps of a 2.4 kilometre forest loop from the Bürgerbad. Its profile is classified as hilly and is decidedly restless: 28.6 metres of climbing per kilometre, only 13.6 per cent level, but around 15 per cent steep up and as much steep down. Every lap opens after a hundred metres with a 550 metre climb at 7.2 per cent and brings a second at kilometre 1.1, 500 metres at 4.9 per cent with peaks of 10.1. Four times round makes eight climbs across 9.4 kilometres. This 30th edition is staged by the Marathon-Club Menden together with the Bürgerbad Leitmecke; race day runs in two blocks, with the short-distance block in the morning.

Pacing Strategy

A thousand metres in the pool is twenty lengths and nineteen turns; swim them to a time per 100 metres rather than to feel, because a pool offers no natural brake and the bike course starts climbing immediately.

The race is decided on the third bike lap. Four identical forest laps of around 120 metres of climbing each mean every misjudgement repeats three times, and on soft forest ground fatigue punishes your line choice as well: what gets ridden on lap one gets pushed on lap three. Ride the first two laps deliberately in an easier gear and in the saddle.

The main trap is the climb at the start of every run lap. Five hundred and fifty metres at 7.2 per cent straight out of transition, and then three more times at each lap passage: attack that climb at race pace and you will crack by lap three at the latest. Treat it each time as a short, deliberately slower section at high cadence, and take the time back on the 15 per cent of steep descending that follows; on this course that is where the time is won, not on the way up.

Training plan for Menden Cross-Triathlon: 12-week build

The short distance at Menden takes roughly two and a quarter to three hours depending on your level. The demand is variable throughout: four bike laps of around 120 metres of climbing each on forest ground, then eight climbs of two to five minutes on the run, with steep descents between them.

Two abilities decide it that barely feature in a road triathlon. First, traction and line choice off-road under fatigue; the course is explicitly built for mountain or cyclocross bikes with tyres of at least 1.5 inches. Second, downhill running on unmade ground: almost 16 per cent of the run lap sits in the steep descending band, and that is where the largest time gain lies.

The training emphasis accordingly belongs on off-road sessions with 6 to 8 efforts of 3 to 5 minutes on a climb of 6 to 9 per cent, ridden seated on soft ground with the descent as the only recovery. Add a weekly brick run of 20 to 30 minutes on a forest loop with the same rise and fall rather than on asphalt.

For the run, deliberate downhill work pays: 5 to 8 times 300 to 500 metres downhill on forest track, consciously with short strides and high cadence, ideally at the end of a session. The swim, by contrast, is the simplest task of the day; 1,000 metres in a pool means turn practice and clean 100 metre pacing, not open-water work.