Maple Grove Tri review

I'm not writing race reviews because I'm not racing. But I have to say, the Maple Grove Triathlon was disappointing at best.

1. It's a lousy race venue. I don't like having to park 2 miles away and shuttle over. It wasn't "bad" but it wasn't easy--I was lugging our BOB duallie and three kids. The entire Weaver Lake Park is a valley--so there are hills everywhere you want to go. Hills and stairs. It was impossible to see the swim start because it was a good 15 feet down the hill--the hill that was cordoned off so no one could get down there. So, I had to figure out where the run from the lake to transition was to watch Jeremy come out of the water. HOWEVER, we couldn't hear the announcer and had no idea when he got in the water, so we didn't know when he'd be coming out. Impossible to see anything.


2. Pickle Events had some kind of lapse in functionality because Jeremy doesn't have a bike split. And his run time is listed as 10 hours. And it's not just him. Lots of people are missing times or they just are wrong. That's super annoying.


3. CLIX Portrait Studio has a lousy way of organizing official race photos--they're listed by clock time. No reference to race numbers at all. So, if you want to find pictures of your husband or Chris MACCA racing, you have to know what time they biked past the photographer. It's stupid.


4. I think having 3 races going on was dumb and confusing. There was no way to tell if the guys coming in were really fast Olympic racers or slow Sprint racers. AND for the love of all that is common sense, WHY IN THE WORLD, did five heats have on the same swim cap color? How am I supposed to find my husband in an orange cap if there are women in orange caps? Or two groups of orange caps swimming at the same time? DUMB DUMB DUMB.

So, I hope Jeremy doesn't want to do this race again. It's always fun to watch him race, but I don't want to go back to this one. Minneapolis Duathlon for him next year!