I was an original 2020 sign up. And actually when we signed up we lived in Alberta so Penticton was just a drive away whereas now we live in southern Ontario so the logistics of a trip out are rather more complicated and incredibly unappealing. The hotel prices also seem to have gone up.
If anything happens locally (maybe Barrelman in September?) we’ll probably sign up for that. I’m looking forward to giving something other than the tri plans a go!
Ahh, yeah the move out East complicates things a bit for sure. I’m in Sask so it’s still drivable (albeit a really long drive), but my wife was planning to fly in/out later/earlier than me due to work which seems like it could be a challenge given how flight schedules have and are continuing to be pulled from smaller centres especially. Hotel prices are always ridiculous there, especially for the quality of hotel/motel in a lot of cases. 
Even pre-pandemic trying to book flights from Toronto to Kelowna were an absolute pain. Of course, let’s not talk about how much of our money Air Canada is sitting on 
We were actually booked into the brand new Marriott suites that only recently opened so we were hoping it would be an upgrade from the Tiki Shores (
). We have also stayed at the Best Western towards Skaha Lake and they were super accommodating for cyclists - they even gave us a massive box of their old towels for us to use as bike rags!
I think they may have gave the rest to Shoreline to use as their regular towels!
i did im florida in 2011 and got passed by around 2250 people on the bike. being a good swimmer has disadvantages too
Ha - I know that feeling too 
Hopefully Ive got just one more year of running focus before I finally try excelling at what I’m fairly good at. 2022 will have a swim focus.
I know what you mean.
I remember doing IM Germany in 2006, it was the 1st ever Non-Wetsuit IM in Europe and I had a great swim. Not super fast, but fast faster than what seemed most people. … Then everyone in the world seemed to pass me on the Bike 
it really sunk home when the two guys on fat bikes came past hangs head in shame
Ha ha ha. I’m in the other boat. After a $#it swim, I enjoy passing my mates while sarcastically shouting “nice swim Kyle”, and hearing the reply “damn you, I was wondering when you’re gonna come flying by me”
You laugh now, but one day I will learn to run and pass all the uber bikers suffering in their marathon 
Weeeeeelll, that part I left out. Fortunately I pull enough of a gap on the bike that even my fastest mate can’t catch me on the run. As for the rest of my AG competitors; well they do however and return the favour by shouting “ha, nice bike there bud” LOL
But it’s all part of the gamesmanship.
So, I think I can give a view on this now - it’s been pretty tough these last five weeks, and the 4th workout of the week - the over/under session - has been impossible. I tried shifting things around but even with a day off the bike then the easy endurance ride the day before, or two days off running, I cannot do these intervals. My advice is set the Intensity at -10% moving them back to sweet spot zone makes them tough but doable. Maximum volume of running has been 3.5h per week, this week should be 4h.
I still have two more workouts this week and recovery week to go before deciding whether I want to do SSB MV2 with this level of running six days per week but I think some adjustment is in order if I go as far as 5h running per week.
Last year I got through SSB MV2 while lifting 3/wk and only 1-2h running and the occasional swim, but I was sick and off training in week 2, and injured not running in week 6, so I’m not too sure what I can learn from that. This period I’ve just been seeing how much easy running I can to with SSB MV.
I think I have four options;
I wanted to do SusPB after SSB2 then back off the bike by switching to Tri plans.
A-firm! That’s the one. They hate swimming and strength training.
Or approach it from the other end, and do HV but drop a ride so the rides you do are lower intensity - as far as I can tell, HV doesn’t have anything above FTP.
IMWI I had calf cramps on the swim and had an awful swim (on top of the fact that I am already an awful swimmer🤪). Came out of the water like 880 of something like that…got off the bike in 80th, I think.
Was flying past a conga line of riders on the way out to the Verona loop…just slingshotting the whole way.
So getting out of the water later can have some advantages, I guess…but I’d prefer to be a better swimmer. 
My sprint experiences have been - out of the water at the front, no wetsuit so i can back as much time on the transition, kinda sorta hold on the bike, and then hope I banked enough time to not have 80% of the field run faster than me 
Works well for short races, somehow I doubt it would work on anything longer than Sprint…maybe I should just stick to Sprints or maybe take on aquabikes - fields are tiny and no running!
Agreed–if you @JoeX want to focus on trying actual SS riding while doing your run plan you could try modifying the HV plan for an appropriate amount of volume for you (i.e. dropping rides and/or choosing shorter variants), rather than using the TR LV or MV plans that crank the intensity and negatively affect the run right now.
The swim is definitely a little more “balanced” for Sprint and Olympic distances, but once you get to Halfs and beyond the advantages out of the water become less and less (unless of course you can back it up with your bike and run then it’s a really big advantage either way 
).
I am toying with the idea for this year sprint to swim as leisurely as possible and come out with the main pack and see if that would just make my run easier. I am focusing on the bike to make that leg easier and have as much on the tank as I can on the run.
Hopefully you’ll have lots of race opportunities to try out some different tactics at! (Not looking so good here right now… )