I haven't heard much about it and (unfortunately) wasn't able to make a stop in their booth during our whirlwind tour of the Interbike Trade Show in Las Vegas. The concept sounds interesting. They did a tri bike some time ago that, like most tri bikes of its era, left most athletes wanting. However, given Serotta's dedication to fit and workmanship I would be willing to suggest the possibility that their new effort could be impressive.

As for Spinervals tapes, man: We get a ton of people asking for them in our store so I just bought a bunch of them. People seem to love them. Don't know about Troy as a coach- no personal experience there.

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Tom Demerly
The Tri Shop.com

The new Serotta tri bike will have as steep or shallow of a seat angle as an athlete needs, since they will all be custom built. Knowing this, the fitter you work will needs to be knowledgeable and have experience with tri fitting.

If you're going to do the Serotta, and therefore are going to a Serotta dealer, make sure the fitter at that shop has been through Serotta's Advanced fitting class. In the Elements class (a 3 day fitting class on the basics of fitting, biomechanics, frame design to which all Serotta dealers have to send fitters) I teach a couple hours of tri fitting. Advanced class students will have had this and then come back through for another 3 days on fitting, etc, and I spend a full day on tri fitting there (the Advanced class is not mandatory).

I would recommend interviewing shops before getting fitted for this bike to see how much tri experience they have. Some fitters who work with Serotta, such as myself and Paul Levine (in NY) specialize in tri fits, others just dabble.

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Christopher Kautz
Director of Technology, Product Development, and Education
GURU Sports, a division of Cannondale Sports Unlimited

It seems to me that getting a tri-bike from Serotta would be like getting a tri-bike from Seven. You had better know exactly what you want, because they don't specialize in tri-bikes.

But the real question I have is how you can make a fully custom bike, but not offer it in 700c unless the customer forks over another $500 for carbon stays?!? What is that all about? It sure isn't my idea of a custom.

According to Serotta's website:

"700c wheels only on CXII CS version"

I interpreted that ambiguous statement to mean that the CXII CS (Carbon Stay) version was only available in 700C. If you wanted 650C then you would need to go with the CXII. Makes sense to me if the brand of carbon stays are only available in a 700C length.

J.

Oh, I get it. That interpretation does make a lot more sense.