Chicago SuperSprint

With all the crazy rain that has been going on in Chicago, they had to cancel the swim part of my triathlon. There was some sort of sewage issue. Instead, I had a 1 mile run, 6 mile bike, 1.5 mile run. It was POURING rain when we got there. It only stopped right before the race. But, the roads, the sidewalks, the running paths had puddles, mud, and sand everywhere.

It started out great. I had my best timed mile to date! I had a 8 minute 30 second mile. I ran into the transition to take off my running shoes, put on my biking shoes, helmet and grab my bike. Here comes the trouble....

There were about 3 dozen bike racks. My husband and I had walked the transition area so I would know where my stuff was. I had some fixed advertisements and trees to cue where to go in. The bike racks were also posted with a range of bib numbers. WELL! The signs with bib numbers on the one side of the bike rack DID NOT match the other side of the bike rack. I came running in looking for the ads to locate my bike. My mistake was looking at the bib signs as well. I ran up the aisle with my bib number and my bike wasn't there. I looked about 4 aisles to the left and right and did not see my bike ANYWHERE! So then I ran to the end of the aisle to make sure I saw the sign right, looked at my bib again, then ran back up again. There were literally hundreds of bikes still in the transition area making it impossible to find my bike! I finally saw my bright blue towel about 7 aisles from where I was standing. It was so frustrating. It added about 3 minutes to my 8:30 mile. I was SO mad!!!

I did the bike ride which was three 2 mile loops well. The hardest part about that was slowing down each mile to do the turn around and then picking up my speed again. The last 1.5 mile run was pretty exhausting. Luckily, I didn't have any issues finding my stuff in the transition that time because I was coming in from the other side.

They didn't separate the transition time from the actual race times. I would have loved to know how long I was in that first transition.

It makes me SOOOO mad that the signs were wrong. It was like they numbered the racks low to high on one side and then high to low the other way on the racks. But, I really do feel like I did well despite the actual time recorded.

I feel ripped off that I didn't get to do a REAL triathlon. So, I think I'll be signing up for the triathlon near home that is in a few weeks.

Sorry you had such a frustrating circumstance, especially in light of your good performance. Best wishes in your next Tri!!

There have been several complaints on other forums about this. Sorry you had such a bad experience. Maybe with all the other complaints things will change for the better next year.

But your run rocked!