First time doing Troika. It has a bunch of options to choose from, The sprint, Olympic or Long Triathlon, a Duathlon and an Aquabike option. I signed up for the Olympic distance this time around for what was my first triathlon. Multiple start times with the long distance going first, then the sprint followed by the olympic distance.

Transition times open at 530 AM, tend to stay open until 815 AM (15 min after the Long Distance goes out). I just with that the bike areas were marked and in order than pick where you want your bike to be. Bring a wetsuit, weather and water temps can be variable. Most people were fine, but I'm not great controlling body temperature anyways so I was so cold the entire time (the kayakers nearly pulled me out I think). I was the last one out of the swim portion (you have an hour for the Olympic Swim).

The Bike for the olympic distance is 25 miles, not terrible. Some hills, downhills and flat. Be careful, as it's on open road. Marked at areas where you have to do something, but no mile/KM markers so I was relying on my Garmin. Only 1 aid station and really not much support on the bike route otherwise. You had a mount/dismount area that took some extra time.

The run was 10K and 2 laps around Medical Lake. You had to make sure you were following the long course route at certain points and at one point on the way back around on the first loop, I had no idea if I was going the right way. To boot, the volunteers were kind of clueless when I asked, since the only thing marked on it was for the long course, but nothing for the sprint/olympic distances (turned out it was the right direction). Aid stations were every mile or so; give or take.

Overall, on the fence on this one. Wish the bike course had something in terms of marking and more course support. If something happened or you got hurt, you were sort of out luck and no one would know. We'll see if I come back for this one.