Best in Class: Orca Transition Triathlon Bag (Review)

Large, versatile, and designed to take a beating, the Orca Transition triathlon bag is the best in its class. Here’s how this bag kicks all the butts.

The first questions people have when they ask me about my Orca Transition bag are of understandable confusion: Is this a backpack? A duffel bag?

To which I get to respond, “It’s both, my dude.”

Beyond the ability to swing the Orca Transition bag from duffel to backpack, this bag comes with a metric butt-ton of features that make it the best triathlon bag I have ever owned.

Here’s a more detailed review and breakdown of why I love this bag so much.

The Orca Transition bag is basically a Swiss army knife of triathlon bags.

The Orca Triathlon Transition bag is huge in size, and big in features.

You get all the features that you would expect to have in a bag that is designed for triathletes:

• Protective pocket at the top for your bike helmet, and not just a clip to dangle it off the side of your bag. This pocket also doubles down as a sturdy storage compartment for my expensive-ass headphones.
• Pouches along the side for the essentials of day to day life: keys, smartphone, triathlon watch, chap stick, passport, and so on.
• Two holders for your water bottle and/or shaker cups on the side. Gotta stay hydrated!
• High contrast green interior that makes it easy to open the bag and see exactly what you are packin’. Seems like a small thing, but bags with dark interiors make fumbling around looking for things take a little longer than necessary.
• Being a wet-dry athlete is one of the unique problems that triathletes face. Throwing your workout clothes into the same bag as your wet pool/swim gear is no bueno. Most tri bags have separate compartments to deal with this specific problem, and the Orca Triathlon bag does so as well. Separate wet and dry compartments for storing your water-logged wet-suit or swim skin or Speedos (or all the above).
• As mentioned, the ability to switch between Clark Kent mode to Superman by going from duffel to backpack. The backpack straps are combined to make one carry strap.
• Reflective detailing on the outside for visibility at night-time.
• The Orca Transition bag–while heavy in features–is also one of the more expensive bags you will find on the market.
• At 70L in volume, it’s at the top end of the spectrum when it comes to overall bag size. Cool beans!

There is one thing…

Now, before you get all excited about all the stuff you are going to cram into this bad boy, there is one particular measurement you need to be aware of. At 58 cm in height and total size of 122cm, it slightly exceeds the size requirement for carry-on bags.

For example, Delta’s carry-on baggage policy maximum height is 56cm, while Air Canada’s is 55cm. The linear size of the bag is 122cm, which is over the 115cm that Delta currently has as their limit for carry on.

So, what you get with all that extra space means you may also have to check it, or under-pack a little so that you can cram it into an overhead compartment. Or just hope that no one notices when you lug it on board.

Something worth remembering before heading off to the airport with your bag stuffed to the rafters.

Where to buy the Orca Transition Bag