That's what I have been asking for - an aero CX bike! The frame won't hold you back, but you may have issues getting into a fast position.

If you only have space for one bike, it makes sense. Otherwise you may want to just race on your S22, it will probably be faster than anything you put together and prevent you from needing to make compromises/aero bars/forward seatpost on your new CX bike.

Owning a tri bike and a cross bike will cover you pretty well for everything. You can also choose to go with disc wheels and not worry about compatibility with your current race wheels.

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/kj

http://kjmcawesome.tumblr.com/

It will be slightly less aero than a road bike but I did a recent sprint on my Raleigh RXC Pro. I threw on my 82/101 Planet X carbon tubulars and even though I was very out of shape, I still averaged 18.9 on the bike. You will be fine on this setup if you don't mind the aero loss from the brakes (I have TRP CX8.4 mini V's).

I would say it depends on your goals. If you want something that will allow you to finish said races, then simplify your life and roll the CX bike across all platforms.

But you're giving up something in both road and tri applications by not having a road or tri specifc bike.

For tri, it's hard to imagine you're going to get down to an ideal position w/ clip-ons on a CX bike. Plus, CX bikes are terribly un-aero. That means you're giving up valuable time on your bike split. Depending on your position, it could be minutes.

For road, the biggest thing you'd be giving up is high quality braking. My CX bike has canti brakes. I can't feather them in and out nearly as well as a traditional road brake. Plenty of stopping power, but not much feel. You could go w/ disc brakes to alleviate this problem, but that's not legal for racing. (Although, the UCI is considering it.) If you're not gonna road race, then go w/ discs and that solves this problem. And, of course, the bike frame will be a slower than an aero road frame, but if you're using a round tube road bike, the aero difference is probably negligible.

You've just got to decide what's going to work best for you.

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-Stephen in Arkansas

Yeah, all this. I should mention that after the one race on the CX bike, I vowed to fully rebuild my tri frame that has been sitting in the storage locker all season.

http://www.bikeradar.com/us/road/gear/article/how-aero-is-aero-19273/

CX bikes tend to have a little more laid back geometry. If you shell out for a carbon CX bike, you might have to mess with the seatpost height before every tri-race. I'm sure you could achieve what you're hoping to, but it might turn out to be more trouble than it's worth to be changing the setup depending on the discipline.

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Dtyrrell

Are you going to race tri and road on a 46 big ring, or change out the crank and chain?

You are giving up a lot, and all you are gaining is a carbon fiber cross bike that is going to get coated in 3 pounds of mud anyway.

No. Just.... no. A 10 year old tri bike is better than any CX bike for a triathlon.

Laid back geo is not quite right, cross bike geo typically (not always) have:

1) Steeper seat angle than a comparable road bike (not always, but many times). benefit for a tri position and sliding the saddle forward.
2) Slacker head angle - more stability like a TT or tri frame when you have weight on the front. But not as "responsive" as most road bikes so cornering is a little less sharp.
3) Higher bottom bracket - sucks for descending and aggressive cornering but that is not such a factor in a tri, more for road riding
4) Longer wheelbase - to support larger tire and treads. That plus clearance gives up some snap, but again not fatal.

That being said, if you have modest goals, no problemo as long as you put road wheels, good tires (like a Conti GP 4000s), and can get a halfway decent clip-on position given geo.

But, I would not call it ideal by a long shot.

J

Different tools designed to different things.

I did the USTS Detroit race (late 80s) on my cross bike. (Alan single front chainring). They were in a garbage strike and the course was perfect for a cross bike. Belle Island was totally trashed for the run, and I was surprised how clean the Detroit river was for swimming. If you are a just for funner triathlete and could only have one bike a cross bike would be my choice. It won't be as fast as a tri bike in a triathlon, but a hell of a lot better than a tri bike in a cross race or out gravel grinding.

If I were you Tony the tri guy I would get a Ti frame instead of carbon. That thing will last forever and won't get scratched up like a carbon bike. I have beat the hell out of my Moots cross bike and with a little WD 40 on a rag and it looks brand new

I'm currently still using my road bike for tri's; converted for tri events by adding clip-ons, lowering stem, sliding seat forward, and installing my fancy wheels. It works just fine.

In practice - just clip-on's mounted to road bars usually won't get you as "aero" unless you make corresponding changes to the bar height (and slide the seat forward/up).

A while back there was a link to an article that compared a converted specialized road bike to a Shiv; an article that concluded the road bike could be fast but left time on the table compared to the Shiv. My take from that article was this: Specialized thinks you should buy an expensive carbon road bike AND a more expensive Shiv. The article shows the rider on both bikes with the rider being visibly higher on the aero-converted road bike. I would guess the time gap would close still further if the rider were brought forward / down to get actual seat / bottom bracket / elbow pad dimensions the same.

It is the 100% conversion though that is the PITA. I lose an evening on both sides of every event setting up the road bike for the tri events. I'm currently building up an ancient (2009) aluminum tri frame to save wear and tear on the road machine's fasteners, bars, and steerer tube. I'd say if you want to ditch any one bike, then ditch the roadie and keep the cross & tri.

i completely agree with you here. I guess I was a little jumpy in saying "laid back".

It all comes down to what you want to do. If space in your house is an issue and you don't care about having the "best" tool for the job you're doing, then by all means, a cross bike will do the job. It would be fun for you to blow by people on that bike too.

I did this for my first few years. Been much faster with my new road bike but it's all much more high-end and I'm fitter. As others have mentioned the cross bike is probably higher in the front which might be a limiting factor. If you have a set of clip-ons you could always do a field test.

Thanks everyone for your replies! Definitely was torn over what to do, situation is this: Small house so my four bikes and my wife's bike are out crammed in a storage shed. Am in the process of tripling the size of the house (500 to 1,400 sq ft), but also doing the whole Dave Ramsey "cash only" deal while also paying off $80k in student loan debt... Eventually, we will have plenty of room, be debt free, and able to afford some toys, but we're talking two or more years. Work part time for extra cash at a bike shop so can buy one bike a year at an awesome price, but only if I have the cash which is what got me thinking about selling the old tri bike. New solution though after reading all the replies is: Going to keep the tri bike and sell my road bike and cross bike, use the proceeds to buy a new cross bike with canti brakes and 10 speed so I can swap the cross wheels with my 60mm tri wheels when I want to ride my cross bike fast on the road with some training groups or jump in an occasional road race or crit. So I'll drop down to 3 bikes and maybe have some left over cash to buy a mnt bike for my wife! Thanks again for all the replies!

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Tony
http://www.triathleteguru.com

Smart man. In my mind, aero matters much less than debt. I think a lot of ST'ers would call that heresy :)

A cross bike will be between a minute to several minutes slower, depending on the distance. If you can live with that, then do it! Simplifying is great. My first cross bike had a compact crank, 50/34, which was not ideal for cross but worked great on the road. I have raced road races and tris on a cross bike and it's fine. Not perfect, but not that bad either.

Your only issue would be the different position required for each. For Tris you want a relatively aggressive position flack back... typically saddle a little higher and further forward. then for cross you typically have a more relaxed position with a lower saddle to really get into the pedals and hopping on and off.... As long as you dont mind changing your posn depending on the event... you'll be find.