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- Let's be honest,
who doesn't love looking at a triathlon bike,
or at least dreaming about one?
'Cause, well they look pretty cool, don't they?
Now these bikes come with a whole host
of beneficial features, compared to a regular road bike.
And today, I'm gonna walk through the benefits of those,
and tell you why you should seriously consider having one.
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First and foremost, the striking feature
about a triathlon bike is the frameset.
Now when we're riding a bike,
up to 80% of the drag that we have to overcome,
comes from us, as the rider, rather than the bike itself.
So that means that the frameset has to be able to put us
into as aerodynamic a position as possible to beat that.
Now these triathlon bikes come with a whole host
of alternative features,
namely a steeper, more aggressive seatpost position,
a more aggressive and dynamic cockpit layout,
and in more expensive models,
you can have hydration and integration options too,
but I'll touch on those later.
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Now you'll notice that the framesets on these bikes
do come with different shaped tubes.
They're usually deeper, wider, and larger
than you'd see on a regular road bike,
and that is essentially so that they can
cut through the wind a little bit easier.
But those potentially save what can come
with a trade-off, I'm afraid,
and that is usually that these bikes are
stiffer, a little bit less forgiving,
and genuinely a little bit more uncomfortable actually,
and they can also be usually a kilo or two heavier,
but that is all in that quest to beat the drag.
The second consideration for manufacturers to take
into account when designing a triathlon bike like this,
is the seat tube angle, and what that means is
they're able to push the saddle forward
in relation to the bottom bracket, which is down here.
And what that allows us to do is
open up our hip angle when we're sitting on the bike,
and what that brings into play is the larger,
glute muscles in our backside, which are much more powerful,
and then you can actually save the
quads and hamstring muscles,
which allows us to be able to run off the bike a bit easier.
Now as a starting point,
you can certainly stick a pair of clip-on tri bars
onto a regular road bike handlebar,
and that will certainly be great for you, as a beginner,
but it isn't gonna give you a very aerodynamic position,
like you would get on a triathlon-specific bike.
And that's largely because on road bikes,
and like I talked about earlier,
they tend to have a slacker seatpost angle,
and you're sitting farther behind the bottom bracket,
which, in turn, lifts the body up,
and presents more of us to the wind.
So looking at the triathlon bike in general,
and the associated steeper seat tube angle
that we talked about, as opposed to the road bike,
what we generally have in our cockpit or front end
is a base bar, which is here,
and then an attached, clip-on tri bars,
which will always have your gear shifters up here,
be that mechanical or electrical shifting.
And then, a final, more expensive, I guess, option
that you can have in a triathlon bike
is what we've got here today,
and we generally call it the fully integrated option.
Now what that means is that
everything that you would need for the bike,
be that your brake cables, your gear cables,
and even your brakes, which are hidden in here,
are all completely out of sight and hidden from the wind,
which is far more aerodynamic
than the previous options that we talked about.
Now this fully integrated option
does come at a premium cost.
But the aerodynamic advantages
that it brings are substantial,
especially compared to the non-integrated option,
or certainly, the standard road bike,
like we talked about before.
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A further extension to the integration options
that these bikes can offer is
usually they've got some sort of storage compartment,
and you can add tools, food, or even hydration into.
Now on this bike here, we've got a handy rear storage unit
behind the seatpost, which you can add in
puncture repair tools, or the likes to.
And a lot of these bikes, and this one too,
offer a second supplementary position for a further box,
which is really useful for long training rides,
or certainly in racing, where,
like I used to do, you can add in food,
and things that you'll need for on the go.
Now broadly speaking, the deeper the set of wheels,
the faster you'll go, but this isn't always the case,
and is certainly weather and specifically, wind dependent,
but the preferred option for going fast,
and especially for all the top athletes,
would be for a rear disc wheel on the bike.
However, rarely, if ever, is a triathlon bike
actually sold as one of these.
In fact, often they don't even come with a
optimum deep section set of race wheels,
'cause these are an expensive extra addition.
But if it is something that you're thinking about having,
I would certainly suggest looking into it,
as most aerodynamic experts would see that the benefits
from having a good set of deep section wheels,
much like these ones, or especially a disc wheel,
is an advantage that could hopefully,
even potentially the savings from a very aero frameset.
Don't be too concerned with the saddle
that your TT bike would come with.
If it's comfy, then great, stick with it and keep using it.
But what you find is that an awful lot of people
will end up trying a variety of saddles
and swap that out over time,
because it is a really personal choice.
Now you may have come across the discussion
about whether a triathlon bike is UCI legal or not.
Now this is in reference to global cycling events,
and they have to conform to their governing body
which is the UCI, and the rules
and regulations that they stipulate.
Now, these rules and regulations generally mean things like
tube shape, geometry of the frame, and its design.
Now, the major rules that these have to conform to
to be UCI legal are that the frame has to have this
classic two triangle shape
that we can see here on this bike,
and secondly, that the saddle position has to sit
five centimetres back of the bottom bracket,
which is down here.
The rules and regulations for triathlon bikes, however,
are far more relaxed than UCI legal versions.
Now what that means is the riders' positions
can be far more aggressive,
and the bike designs can be way more radical.
In fact a really good example of this is the Cervelo P5X.
Now interestingly, this bike here can actually
conform to both those codes of regulations.
As it sits at the moment,
it is in a triathlon or non-UCI legal position,
but, if I was to take this rear storage unit away,
I would be able to move the seatpost from
its current position where it is in a triathlon position,
move it into this new position that would become available,
and then it would become a UCI legal bike.
So there we have it, a tri-specific bike.
Now if you come across somebody talking about one of those,
then hopefully now you're gonna know
what they are talking about.
And if you're considering getting your first triathlon bike,
then hopefully you found this video useful,
and you will of course let me know
in the comments down there below.
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and if you fancy seeing a video that was done
about triathlon versus TT bike,
then you can get that up here.
And a further video about a road bike
versus a TT bike is here.