diff --git a/.github/workflows/run-nitro-test-node.yml b/.github/workflows/run-nitro-test-node.yml
index 03bcb1f..da9ede3 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/run-nitro-test-node.yml
+++ b/.github/workflows/run-nitro-test-node.yml
@@ -12,7 +12,7 @@ jobs:
       - uses: actions/checkout@v4
       - uses: ./run-nitro-test-node
 
-  run-with-token-bridge:
+  run-without-token-bridge:
     name: "Run without token bridge deployment"
     runs-on: ubuntu-latest
     steps:
@@ -28,7 +28,7 @@ jobs:
       - uses: actions/checkout@v4
       - uses: ./run-nitro-test-node
         with:
-          args: --detach
+          args: --pos
 
   run-with-simple:
     name: "Run in simple mode"
diff --git a/run-nitro-test-node/action.yml b/run-nitro-test-node/action.yml
index 2b0d5a7..e9984f5 100644
--- a/run-nitro-test-node/action.yml
+++ b/run-nitro-test-node/action.yml
@@ -19,7 +19,7 @@ inputs:
     description: "Additional args that can be supplied to the test node script"
   nitro-testnode-ref:
     required: false
-    default: "release"
+    default: "gz-debug"
     description: "The nitro-testnode branch to use"
   l3-node:
     required: false
@@ -44,9 +44,6 @@ runs:
 
     - name: Start background nitro-testnode test-node.bash
       shell: bash
-      # Currently, you can't run parallel steps, so we add the "&" to run this step in the background
-      #
-      # See https://stackoverflow.com/a/72203688 for more info
       run: |
         cd nitro-testnode
 
@@ -57,11 +54,11 @@ runs:
           export TOKEN_BRIDGE_BRANCH="${{ inputs.token-bridge-branch }}"
         fi
 
-        ./test-node.bash --init ${{ inputs.no-simple == 'true' && '--no-simple' || '' }} \
+        ./test-node.bash --init-force ${{ inputs.no-simple == 'true' && '--no-simple' || '' }} \
           ${{ inputs.l3-node == 'true' && '--l3node' || '' }} \
           ${{ inputs.no-token-bridge == 'true' && '--no-tokenbridge' || '--tokenbridge' }} \
           ${{ inputs.l3-node == 'true' && inputs.no-l3-token-bridge != 'true' && '--l3-token-bridge' || '' }} \
-          ${{ inputs.args }} &
+          ${{ inputs.args }} --detach --nowait
 
     - name: Wait for nitro startup
       shell: bash
diff --git a/run-nitro-test-node/waitForNitro.sh b/run-nitro-test-node/waitForNitro.sh
index 8e212ba..ffa8ef7 100755
--- a/run-nitro-test-node/waitForNitro.sh
+++ b/run-nitro-test-node/waitForNitro.sh
@@ -2,12 +2,18 @@
 
 PORT=${1:-8547}
 
-while true
+# timeout after around 1 minutes, should be enough because test-node.bash only detach after everything is ready
+for i in {1..6}
 do
-  curl -X POST -H 'Content-Type: application/json' -d '{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":45678,"method":"eth_chainId","params":[]}' "http://localhost:$PORT"
+  curl --silent -X POST -H 'Content-Type: application/json' -d '{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":45678,"method":"eth_chainId","params":[]}' "http://localhost:$PORT"
   if [ "$?" -eq "0" ]; then
+    echo "nitro ready at port $PORT"
     exit 0
   else
+    echo "nitro not ready yet at port $PORT"
     sleep 10
   fi
 done
+echo "exiting: printing docker logs for everything"
+docker compose -f ./nitro-testnode/docker-compose.yaml logs
+exit 1
diff --git a/run-nitro-test-node/waitForTokenBridge.sh b/run-nitro-test-node/waitForTokenBridge.sh
index 3346625..47519e7 100755
--- a/run-nitro-test-node/waitForTokenBridge.sh
+++ b/run-nitro-test-node/waitForTokenBridge.sh
@@ -1,10 +1,15 @@
 # poll the token bridge deployment file until we get a 0 return code
-while true
+# timeout after around 1 minutes, should be enough because test-node.bash only detach after everything is ready
+for i in {1..6}
 do
   docker compose -f ./nitro-testnode/docker-compose.yaml run --entrypoint sh tokenbridge -c "cat $1"
   if [ "$?" -eq "0" ]; then
     exit 0
   else
+    echo "token bridge not ready yet $1"
     sleep 10
   fi
 done
+echo "exiting: printing docker logs for tokenbridge deployment"
+docker compose -f ./nitro-testnode/docker-compose.yaml logs tokenbridge
+exit 1