I was a participant this year in the half. Below are a few of my thoughts (I will also be sending these to USAT):
1. I didn't have any issues with the potholes, but I did have issues with the final 10(ish) miles of the bike course. By that time of day there was enough non-event traffic on the roads that it just became dangerous. I had a few close calls with cars trying to cut across and in front of me. Maybe we can't close the entire road, but it'd sure be nice to have 1 lane just for cyclists if its a 2 lane road.
2. Event Staff: I know there were a lot of volunteers, but if you are going to give someone a staff shirt and place them by the run course the day before the race they should know something about the course. We had some questions about the run course and asked a staff person and they said "I don't know. Just go look at the course map over there." We explained that we did look at the map and part of it wasn't clear, and after she pulled over other staff people we found out they didn't know either.
3. Run Aide Stations: in areas where there is 2 way run traffic, the aide station should be placed in the middle of the road. If you have it off to 1 side on a 2-way segment, then you have athletes that are required to cross in to oncoming runners to get water/Gatorade/etc
4. Aide Station Offerings: most of us had been awake since probably 3am and were exhausted athletes. Finding out that Coke/Red Bull or any caffeinated beverages were not offered on the run course was a major miss on the events part
5. Zoo: This was presented as a "cool" draw for spectators. My wife was sent to 3 different areas to get more info on the shuttle, to find out that it didn't start til 10-10:30 and would take 20min to get to the destination and then 20min to get back(but was not told where it'd actually drop her off).
6. GPS Tracker: the GPS tracker on the phones was a joke. We are wearing hi-compression kits with minimal to no pockets and you expect us to carry around our cell phone on the bike/run course? In this day most of use have the newest Iphones and Androids that closely resemble mini-tables. Where exactly do you expect us to place these devices. Also, by making the cell phone the main tracker, you are just inviting athletes to use them while on course.
7. Finish Line Aide: there were still a few hundred athletes on the course and I was told that there was no more Gatorade or ice at the finish. I understand that it was a hot day and the ice may have melted, but running out of Gatorade to offer completely depleted athletes is something that should not happen
If this was just a regular local tri I could look past some of theses things, but when a race is advertised as USAT Nationals I expect a top level performance
1. I didn't have any issues with the potholes, but I did have issues with the final 10(ish) miles of the bike course. By that time of day there was enough non-event traffic on the roads that it just became dangerous. I had a few close calls with cars trying to cut across and in front of me. Maybe we can't close the entire road, but it'd sure be nice to have 1 lane just for cyclists if its a 2 lane road.
2. Event Staff: I know there were a lot of volunteers, but if you are going to give someone a staff shirt and place them by the run course the day before the race they should know something about the course. We had some questions about the run course and asked a staff person and they said "I don't know. Just go look at the course map over there." We explained that we did look at the map and part of it wasn't clear, and after she pulled over other staff people we found out they didn't know either.
3. Run Aide Stations: in areas where there is 2 way run traffic, the aide station should be placed in the middle of the road. If you have it off to 1 side on a 2-way segment, then you have athletes that are required to cross in to oncoming runners to get water/Gatorade/etc
4. Aide Station Offerings: most of us had been awake since probably 3am and were exhausted athletes. Finding out that Coke/Red Bull or any caffeinated beverages were not offered on the run course was a major miss on the events part
5. Zoo: This was presented as a "cool" draw for spectators. My wife was sent to 3 different areas to get more info on the shuttle, to find out that it didn't start til 10-10:30 and would take 20min to get to the destination and then 20min to get back(but was not told where it'd actually drop her off).
6. GPS Tracker: the GPS tracker on the phones was a joke. We are wearing hi-compression kits with minimal to no pockets and you expect us to carry around our cell phone on the bike/run course? In this day most of use have the newest Iphones and Androids that closely resemble mini-tables. Where exactly do you expect us to place these devices. Also, by making the cell phone the main tracker, you are just inviting athletes to use them while on course.
7. Finish Line Aide: there were still a few hundred athletes on the course and I was told that there was no more Gatorade or ice at the finish. I understand that it was a hot day and the ice may have melted, but running out of Gatorade to offer completely depleted athletes is something that should not happen
If this was just a regular local tri I could look past some of theses things, but when a race is advertised as USAT Nationals I expect a top level performance