Spring Meadow Triathlon Official Website

The "Nitty Gritty" Details (User Opinions)

Mike J.
Helena, MT

  (08-03-2009)

"Great race for beginners and seasoned age-groupers."

Reviewed by a: Repeat Participant for 2009

Matt R.
Missoula, MT

  (07-13-2009)

"First things first - this was a Special Qualifier race for the 2009 Age Group Nationals - as long as you were racing the Olympic distance....not the sprint distance. There was a pretty good split of people both in racing the Sprint or Olympic and them between genders. This race had decent competition at all groups, had some outstanding young athletes, and even one para-athlete.

I have to be honest though, I think the big competition was in the Olympic distance race.

I had sprained my ankle about two and half weeks prior to this race and was concerned it wouldn't recover and wasn't able to do a lot of run training for that period of time. I did still cycle and swim. Fortunately for me, my recovery was far enough along that I felt comfortable racing.

I decided not to really push things due to the recent injury. I ended up being very happy with my time overall all things considered. I got a 1:30:27. Not great but pretty decent and considering I hadn't put in a distance of more than 2 miles (and on a treadmill) in running for at least 2 and 1/2 weeks before that. I was happy just to finish.

Since the hard-core racers were all in the Olympic distance race, I even walked away with a 3rd place metal. Funny. I'm sure that normally wouldn't have happened.

This was my first experience with a timing chip and it was also the first time this race used timing chips. There were some minor issues with some main pads not picking up racers, but they had back up pads and manual timing as well. Was very cool how fast results were available due to this.

All in all, this was a really well done race. They've been doing it a while it sounds like. I think I'm highly likely to sign-up for it again next year."

Reviewed by a: First Time Participant for 2009