Never eaced in Ottawa but it is probably the nicest city and area I've ever cycled in, it's beautiful this time of year and the roads and drivers are generally pretty good.
You're pretty close to MTL which is fairly english friendly, you probably found this already but their calendar is here:
http://www.fqsc.net/comp/Calendrier.htm and it looks like they have a lot of events around the montreal, laval, sherbrooke, and even ottawa area (Coupe de l'Outaouais?, my french is pretty rusty too).