Chattanooga Waterfront Triathlon Official Website

The "Nitty Gritty" Details (User Opinions)

jason s.
Lumberton, MS

  (07-11-2011)

"Almost backed out, but glad I didn't. I had a cut on my foot, but since they offer no refunds, and I had invested alot of money in registration for my wife and I, we pushed through it. Here is my experience with the race:

Saturday afternoon - Drove up from Mississippi. 6 hour drive. Stayed at the King's lodge which was decent, definitely not the Hilton, but that would have been $150 instead of $50.

Sunday morning - Arrived at 6am at the Tennessee Aquarium. No problem finding parking, although you do have to pay $9 for all day parking. Body marking is done with temporary tattoos and you are given stickers with your bib # to mark all your possessions including your bike, transition bag, helmet, swim cap, tri-top, etc. After setting up your transition spot based on your race #, you are shuttled about 1.2 miles away to the swim start which is the dock for the UTC rowing club.

SWIM:
7:30am - First swimmers enter the water. You enter the water via time trial fashion as opposed to a mass start. It takes a little longer to get everyone in (I entered at 8:30 b/c my race # was 1159), but it is a lot more efficient and you don't get kicked in the face as much. Nice touch for this tri. You swim downstream, but there was no current this year, so it was basically a lake swim for 1.5km.

TIP: Your swim start time is based upon what you put as an estimated swim time, so if you don't want to wait around at the start, estimate a faster time.

BIKE:
Hwy 27 north out and back course has 1 very large long hill and 2-3 medium sized hills. It is otherwise a smooth course. What is nice is the large hill I was going 8mph on the way out, I got up to 42mph on the way back...was kind of scary, but exciting. I was praying for no blow outs! I think I pushed it a little harder than I should of b/c my legs were jello for the run.

TIP: Keep your seat as high as you can so you don't over use your quads and save them for the run.

RUN:
Mostly a flat course except a couple of small hills in the beginning and end of the out and back 6.2 mile course. There are aid stations every mile with water, gatorade, and a person with a hose to cool you down if requested. At mile 2 and 4 you can get a gel. You run along a running path on the riverfront and it is nice, would have been a good run if I had saved some glycogen in my legs for it.

TIP: Careful with being sprayed down with water during the run b/c the water gets to your socks and you can be sloshing in your shoes and get a blister... I did.

OVERALL:
Great course, friendly staff, and pretty organized. Nice T-shirt as well. Will probably make this an annual event. "

Reviewed by a: First Time Participant for 2011

Jon M.
Chattanooga, TN

  (09-14-2009)

"Great race in the Scenic City. No extreme elevations, but some decent hills to ride. iMultisport covered this event and here's a link to the video:
http://imultisport.com/2009/07/26/episode-2/"

Reviewed by a: Repeat Participant for 2009

Eric W.
Gadsden, AL

  (07-20-2009)

"Chattanooga Waterfront Triathlon:

Despite only having done two races so far this year I couldn't pass up the allure of an Oly distance tri an hour and a half from my house. I knew my run wasn't where I needed it to be but I gave it a go anyways.

Despite it being 1.5 hours away I had to leave at 3AM because Tennessee thinks it should be in the Eastern Time Zone. I pried myself from bed, cranked on the Radiohead in the car and battled through.

I arrived in plenty of time but had to do some fancy re-routing at the last minute because of how the course blocked traffic and then I had to dodge more idiots riding their bike in the dark without helmets riding against traffic to get to the race.

I signed in and was a bit taken aback that my number was 130 out of over a thousand folks.

I got my transition all set up, no surprises other than it being wicked dark. I was able to do all of my "business" because there were plenty of restrooms. Then I hopped on the bus to ride up to the swim start. We were all coralled on a practice field and I was a little nervous becuase I had to start so early and I couldn't see the water. Eventually we all got started and they lined u up and slowly shuffled us onto the dock.

We hopped into the water and slowly made our way to the end of the dock, then we were told to go and off we went.

The swim wasn't miserable for me, but it was hard. I am always afraid to push too hard on the swim because I don't want to cramp up or get too tired, but then i end up too slow. There were a couple of moments where I was able to follow feet, but then I drifted off to the side and lost them. I decided to wear my Garmin during the race swim and all, and while my heart hate didn't register during the swim it did confirm what I felt, I zig zagged all over creation. I must have gone well over a mile with my corrections and subsequent overcorrections.

After passing all of the bridges and swimming past the big steps on the river i made it to the exit and there were folks grabbing your arms to help you out of the water, it was big help to start getting up the submerged stairs.

My T1 wasn't too bad, and I made my shoeless mount pretty easily. We had some quick hills on the course and that put a hurt on my legs. Eventually though I got into the groove and started making time on the course. We merged onto a highway which was a little odd, but it didn't seem nearly as dangerous as I expected. for most of the race I was stuck in the same ballpark as about 5 other folks. None of us drafted, but we spent a lot of time making passes and getting passed. The course was rather hilly so I was able to drop them on the climbs, but once we got to the downhills they would zipp by me on their fancy tri-bikes with full aerobars, disc wheels and aero helmets. C'est la vie.

I made a really good turnaround and got back up to speed quickly (again thanks to the road bike as opposed to the heavy tri bikes) II was able to drop a couple of folks for good. I did get passed on the course several times, but I think it mainly had to do with starting so near the front. I had one bottle of carborocket on the bike and one gel. I felt ok stomach wise but because of the length of the race I wanted to get food in me early.

I made my now comfortable flying dismount and had a nice quick t2. Then things got bad... cue ominous organ music.
I started running and got that typical heavy leg feeling. I managed to make it through that and pick up my pace only to be slammed with cramps, side stitch at first then whammo stomach cramps. I had to walk for good chunks of the course and stop and stretch. The course was a nice out and back with plenty of water stops. I also had to take a quick leak, but i couldn't shake the cramps. I ended up picking up the pace on my last mile. I even passed about a dozen folks there including a little sprint with a guy in my age group.

When I finished I found I had a ton of bloody blisters on feet, i guess the cramps were so bad I didn't notice all of the blood.

Not a bad race overall but it hurt. I realized I have been focusing on shorter workouts and just need to add some length.

Times put me the bottom half of my age group by a skosh. I am not happy about that but. I am done and on to another race!

57 out of 93 in AG
Eric Wright 30:04 2:01 1:17:19 1:45 59:11 2:50:19 "

Reviewed by a: First Time Participant for 2009