In the same vein as my recent post regarding aero advantages of different helmets, what is the consensus on rear wheels? How marginal are the gains from using a disc wheel over something like, say, an 808? Obviously, bike, fit, and kit are important. After those, are there more cost effective areas to address than upgrading to a disc wheel?
Its all marginal gains and dependant on how important minutes/seconds are to you. if you were wanting a disc I’d bet very good money there is 2/5ths eff all difference between a mega dollar Zipp/Princetons works disc for example compared to a ‘cheap’ discs now available…
Over the course of an IM though you are only talking a very small amount of time over normal rims. I always rant about this but even a road bike over a TT bike is only about 17 minutes at 200 watts.
Looking at the 84mm Vanquish vs. the disc (same brand, so a good apples-to-apples comparison), you would save 15-20sec. per 40k with the disc…so 40sec. range in a HIM and close to 1.5min in an IM (the lower the speed the greater the absolute time savings for a given distance). For a competitive AGer that’s not trivial. There are upgrades with better bang for the buck (aero trisuits, helmets, bottle placement, etc.) but it’s not an either-or for most racers at the pointy end.