Great question! I'm sure you will get a lot of feedback on great races...I have a few favorites that I try to do every year. I'm skipping most of them to hit only a few key races due to my training schedule for Ironman. However, I fully plan to get back on to racing almost every weekend next spring. Here are a few favorites of mine...

Motor City - The swim is not for the faint of heart due to the current that can be somewhat strong as you pull around the last buoy and head in for T1. However, you will find the bike course to be about the fastest you will ever race; the wind on the leeward side of the island will push you along the back straight to speeds you never see in training - it's a guaranteed PR for your bike split. The run is dead flat and very fast as well, and it's quite a popular race on the island.

Craig Greenfield - Great race venue in Clarkston, with an easy swim and quite a challenging (read: hilly) bike and run course, both of which are 2 loops so you get to see a lot of spectators and racers in close proximity.

Clark Lake - A largely underrepresented race for our club, it's usually just me and one or two other members due to the location (google for Clark Lake, MI). In mid-July, and the weather has been hot in the past. The swim is easily my favorite of any triathlon I've done. The water is like glass, it's cool but not cold, clear and on a closed inland lake. The bike course takes you through a lot of farm country, no traffic at all on a Sunday morning, and the pavement for most of it was just repaved in the last two years...some hills, but very fast. The run course is flat and fast.

Those are 3 favorites of mine...good luck and happy racing!

Jay Adams