Going to get some popcorn for this one

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Make Inside Out Sports your next online tri shop! http://www.insideoutsports.com/

neither , get drum brake ;-)

I would buy the Rafael drum brake bike in a heart beat!

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Alex Arman

Strava

Nice bike ^^

If you want to use it for racing, get a rim brake bike so your wheels are compatible. If you want to use it for training, I'd say get disc brakes because you can benefit from the improved braking and the disadvantages of discs don't really apply.

The important questions are: How are you going to use it (training, racing, etc...ride in mountains, rain, much?) and what's your budget?

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http://bikeblather.blogspot.com/

FWIW- my default on this is if you have a buying used, the best value is in people dumping their rim brake road bikes for disc models- especially the endurance and gravel ones.

If you are buying new, get the disc.

I have multiple bikes, extra race wheels and training wheels.

For me, the cost of upgrading all was too much

So I went with another rim brake bike

Had I not wanted to keep everything in my garage simple, I’d have bought discs

I own 5 bikes and 10 sets of wheels. All are rim brakes. My next bike (within 18 months) will be a disc brake aero bike. I'm just not sure which one. But I am sure enough that I bought a set of Hed Jet 6+ disc wheels as my back up for it.

I own quite a few bikes myself and wanted another road bike last summer to ride around France. I bought a Canyon with disc brakes and have not regretted it at all. Finally have all the confidence to really push the downhills with a lot less worry about my brakes. I had hated the braking on carbon wheels so much that I went back to aluminum because the brake fade was real and not nearly as bad with aluminum. With the disc brakes I feel even more confident. I'm glad I waited this long as I feel the somewhat standard through hole will be around a long time. I even bought a 2nd set of wheels and they went on with no problems. To me, changing the disc brake pads is easier than rim brake pads. Just drop them in after opening the disc calipers first and they self align with no problems. I've changed flats just as fast as my rim brake bikes.

I recently upgraded my road bike to a current model with rim brakes - for the most part I'm happy although my wheel swap ability is pretty limited. New bike has carbon rims ( & brake pads) and the stock aluminum rims are set up with some large heavier duty tires for dirt... the 28mm tires don't fit in my tri bike. I have a CX bike with disc brakes - so I can ride chunky stuff on that. Swapping rims means swapping brake pads, so it is not the 2 minute 'change of character' I envisioned.

As others have said - depends on what your goals are. If you are interested in some of the gravel riding that is growing, a disc road bike like the Domane or Roubaix could take you from a paceline to a farm road. If you want to hang with roadies and hit the Wednesday WC races or join a team, you probably want a more purebred race machine. The race bike could still come with disc's - but many won't. You'll probably still end up with a set of everyday wheels - I don't like deep rims in pacelines cause they always cause a bit of wiggle.

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" I take my gear out of my car and put my bike together. Tourists and locals are watching from sidewalk cafes. Non-racers. The emptiness of of their lives shocks me. "
(opening lines from Tim Krabbe's The Rider , 1978