I can almost guarantee that the result (for me) would be that I road the R3 in at least one of the triathlons when it was too much hassle to change it out for the race.

In my opinion, it is totally worth the extra money to have two complete bikes instead of swapping parts back and forth. The cables would fray quicker with all of the switching of the parts. Also, breaking a chain every time you want to switch bikes is not ideal. Check out the for sale section of this forum. There seems to be a lot of people selling mini groups so it shouldn't be a problem to get the parts you need for cheap.

If I get the frameset, I would have a $500 bank. So maybe I can use that to get components? I gusss I don't have get the crankset since I can switch that out fairly easily.

That seems like a huge amount of work. Have to agree with previous comments I would end up just riding the built frame just out of laziness

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http://www.jarredscycling.com

Ok. This might be one of the crazier things I have read recently. How about using the $500 to just buy the complete bike? Seems like an easier solution to me.

I don't care how great a wrench you are, the pain in the ass that would be involved with switching over your components would never be worth it. Hell, I use my PowerTap training wheel on my cross bike and it doesn't get used as often as it should because I have to change a tire. I can only imagine how infrequently the bike would get used if I had to switch out components.

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Jason
None of the secrets of success will work unless you do.

Building up your bike before each race will greatly increase your odds of mechanicals. Go with two complete bikes.

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ECMGN Therapy Silicon Valley:
Depression, Neurocognitive problems, Dementias (Testing and Evaluation), Trauma and PTSD, Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI)

Hear me out. As expected, switching components every bike change would be a bad idea. So now I'm at the point of justifying the frame difference. The R3 frame has a slightly better fork than the R2 frame from what I've been told. The R2 ($2500) comes with 105 components and stock wheels. For the R3 ($2000), I feel like I could get just about the same components, possibly used, with the $500 difference, especially considering that I already have a extra crankset. Would that be a safe assumption? I would still have to get handle bars and possibly a saddle. I don't need the stock wheels.

you can definitely get a used groupset for less than 500.

Too much of a hassle to swap components and dial everything in. Most of us don't even want to take a wheel off, let alone do a full bike build. Save up more money or just buy a used road bike.

Terrible idea to try to swap components. I've built / re-built / swapped over components on umpteen occasions. A complete tear down and re-build still takes me 2-3hours to do. Then I need to do a shake down ride to make sure everything has been adjusted properly. Then you also have to consider that you'll also need to buy separate shifters for your road bike (or at the very least, brake levers). ...this idea is less and less appealing by the second (and I already didn't like it).

An 11speed 105 group set from Ribble cycles is under $500. Buy the R3 and get the 11speed 105 group and swap wheel when you go between bikes.

...or, find a used cervelo road bike for under $2000 and have the best of all worlds!

No way. Forget about it.

I'm not particularly lazy but even I found that something as simple as installing an aero cover on my rear wheel was annoying enough that I've skipped doing it for a few non-A races during the season.

If I had to swap components, I'd almost certainly just suck it up and just take the time hit from riding the nonaerobar bike, and that's for a race. For training - fuggetaboutit.

No freakin' way just get a full second bike. And skip getting a second Cervelo (unless you're a boomer) and pick up something cheaper and awesomer like a CAAD10.

Do you like Shimano componenets? If so, then the 105 it comes with would be great. I prefer SRAM on a road bike, so I would rather buy the frame and a used 10-speed SRAM group.

But if your road bike is 11 speed, you may have a harder time picking up used components for that price.

The two times I have built up bikes, I was surprised how much little things like seat posts, bars, stems, cables/housing add up vs buying a complete bike. I would only buy the frame if you want to pick every little component vs trying to save $$.

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/kj

http://kjmcawesome.tumblr.com/

Not sure what your size is, but there's a 58cm CAAD10 with SRAM Red for $2250 in the classifieds. Or a 2010 Madone for 1550.

John

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Top notch coaching: Francois and Accelerate3 | Follow on Twitter: LifetimeAthlete |

This is the perfect example of "Penny wise and pound foolish."

The first thing in components that are ruined are the threads. They will function as long as 15, even 20 years if they are just kept in one bike. But move them around and they will last 15 or 20 months. Bike components, don't break and detoriate much from usage but more from removal and installation.

.

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If you're just using the road bike for training there isn't enough of a difference in the frames to justify having to swap components. Might be a different story if you were racing on the road bike and the tri bike.

I'm actually moving toward more crits for about a year or two and keep triathlons on the backburner. Sprints/olympics couple times a year on the tri bike unless I get lazy then I'll go with the road bike. Based on everyone's feedback, I think I'm just going with the R2 and not worry about components would be the best idea. Maybe put the ultegra components from the tri bike to the roadie and 105s on the tri bike.

Problem solved:


http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/us/en/shimano-105-5800-11-speed-groupset/rp-prod116477

As others are saying, swapping components every time is an awful idea. Just get the R2.

I have the new R3, which I built up with Ultegra/DA. It's great, but the R2 is going to be just as good, and you'll never be able to tell the difference on the fork. I actually don't think the R3 fork is anything special -- it's just a good fork -- and is just as "good" as the R2 fork. Swapping parts back and forth is also going to cost you money and huge amounts of time and hassle.

Thank you everyone for your input! I'll be going with the R2. You guys just prevented me from doing something stupid.

Or, you could always set up your P2 like this. If the fit is right, it can work great.

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Advanced Aero TopTube Storage for Road, Gravel, & Tri...ZeroSlip & Direct-mount, made in the USA.
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The rule is n-1.

Wise choice. FWIW the R2 fork I wouldn't say is any better or worse, just different. Some (including myself) would argue it's actually better because of the flexibility of running a much wider tire. A 25 Conti GP4000s 25 on a HED Ardennes Plus measures to be about 28 and it clears it fine.

I recently rode a R2 with an upgraded crankset and nicer wheels, maybe that joshatsilca guy is on to something when he says he picks bikes based on the people behind the company, wheels, and tire pressure.