Geoff, I rode a Litespeed Tachyon for two years with one IM. I had no problem getting comfortable on the bike. It was superceded by the saber. Mine was shipped as a built bike from Litespeed with Syntace Time Trial Aero bars, for some reason Litespeed built them with Layback Thomson seat post (does any one know why?), and they were also built with Look Carbon Fiber forks. Great bike after being tweaked with some parts upgrades, but I decided to upgrade to Kestrel KM40.

Geoff:

I ride a tachyon and mostly like it. However, the geometry differs from the Saber in one regard; the length of the top tube. For my 55cm size, the top tube on the tacheon is 55.75 vs 55 on the same size Saber. This overly long top tube (for me anyway) causes me to use to shorter than normal stem.

Litespeed tri bikes have longer top tubes vs others and the tacheon's was really too long, hence the change made on the saber.

The Tachyon and Saber are very, very different bikes- which is one reason Litespeed changed the names of the bikes. The Saber has completely different geometry (especially head tube and top tube length per frame size)than the Tachyon. The tachyon was a necessary step to get to the Saber. The Saber is an absolute home run. It is arguably the single best bike Litespeed makes and has almost no flaws. The Tachyon needed work, and it got so much work it morphed into a new bike: The Saber. The two bikes are not comparable- they represent totally different generations of bike development. We've sold a lot of each.

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Tom Demerly
The Tri Shop.com

Tom, would you or anybody else happen to have the geomtery specs for the Tachyon handy...I have looked on the WW to no avail...email to g.dickson@cqu.edu.au. Thanks.

That would require an archeological dig that I am not capable of. The one thing I can recall is you better have VEEERRRRRRRRRYYYYY long torso for the Tachyon.

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Tom Demerly
The Tri Shop.com

I understand..thanks :0)

I had one last dig of the WWW and looked what popped up (http://www.bikepro.com/...s/frames/lstach.html) ...TT refers to top tube. All of the figures below are based on what the manufacturers refer to as their 57cm frames. Non-Tachyon figures taken from manufacturers website. All are 650c wheels at at 78 deg. The Saber/Blade has a TT only 0.5cm shorter than the Tachyon, but is 2cm longer than the P3 and the Tequilo...

Litespeed Tachyon TT 57

Litespeed Saber/ Blade TT 56.5

QR Tiphoon TT 55.5

Cervelo P3 TT 55 (57.6 at 73 degrees)

QR tequilo TT 55

The upshot for this to me is that noone has said that the Tachyon is a bad bike, it's just the Saber has an improved geometry...