I think you will find it tough to find an all around bike that will be good for Tris, road and Off-Road. I have a road, tri and cross bike and the tough part will be using the cross bike for off road. That being said, the one option, if you can only have one bike, is to get what is known as a 29 incher. This is a 700c Mt bike that will accomodate 700c, 2.5 inch Mt bike tires. Quite a few 29 inch riders will use rigid forks since the bigger tires will act like a suspension. I would bet it would be fine for a off road tri. Then you can slap on some road tires for road riding or tiris if you want. Airborne makes a titanium frame (no fork) for $1,300 which will be on the light side (for a MT bike) or Surly will sell you a frame and fork for $450 but this one will be heavy. You could also get two sets of cranks. One for road and one for off-road.

I plan on building up a 29"er for commuting, touring and off-road. I plan to set it up with drop bars and add cross brake levers, for off-road, to go with the drop levers. If you go to www.mtbr.com and check out their forums you will find one for 29" bikes and you will find pictures.

Willy in Pacifica

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Willy in Pacifica