diff --git a/circle.yml b/circle.yml
index f590e330..cd208015 100644
--- a/circle.yml
+++ b/circle.yml
@@ -34,6 +34,8 @@ dependencies:
     - bin/setup-circleci-secrets "$SECRET_PASSWORD"
     - mkdir -p $(dirname $SRCDIR)
     - cp -r $(pwd)/ $SRCDIR
+    - cd $SRCDIR/test; ./gce.sh make_template:
+        parallel: false
 
 test:
   override:
diff --git a/test/gce.sh b/test/gce.sh
index f2d7be82..55a577de 100755
--- a/test/gce.sh
+++ b/test/gce.sh
@@ -11,7 +11,7 @@ set -e
 : ${SSH_KEY_FILE:=$HOME/.ssh/gce_ssh_key}
 : ${PROJECT:=positive-cocoa-90213}
 : ${IMAGE:=ubuntu-14-04}
-: ${TEMPLATE_NAME:=test-template-4}
+: ${TEMPLATE_NAME:=test-template-6}
 : ${ZONE:=us-central1-a}
 : ${NUM_HOSTS:=5}
 SUFFIX=""
@@ -90,6 +90,7 @@ function copy_hosts {
 # Create new set of VMs
 function setup {
 	destroy
+
 	names="$(vm_names)"
 	gcloud compute instances create $names --image $TEMPLATE_NAME --zone $ZONE
 	gcloud compute config-ssh --ssh-key-file $SSH_KEY_FILE
@@ -159,5 +160,8 @@ destroy)
 	;;
 
 make_template)
-	make_template
+	# see if template exists
+	if ! gcloud compute images list | grep $PROJECT | grep $TEMPLATE_NAME; then
+		make_template
+	fi
 esac