Especially the bike course.
Road bike or tri bike?
I’ve never seen the course, but I’ll answer the question–tri bike. That’s why you have it, to ride in triathlons where time is important. Not trying to be sarcastic here, but your road bike should never be faster than your tri bike. If it is, then you need a new position or bike or you should just sell it and always ride your road bike. I see this question all the time and don’t understand why people ask it.
Chad
I’ve never seen the course, but I’ll answer the question–tri bike. That’s why you have it, to ride in triathlons where time is important. Not trying to be sarcastic here, but your road bike should never be faster than your tri bike. If it is, then you need a new position or bike or you should just sell it and always ride your road bike. I see this question all the time and don’t understand why people ask it.
Chad
Thanks Chad; no, you did not come across as sarcastic. Patronizing yes, but not sarcastic.
When I say “road bike”, I mean road bike frame with road bars, with clip on aero bars. Something that someone like hmmm, let’s see, oh yeah, got it, Simon Whitfield would ride in an ITU event. Those sure are slow bikes.
Perhaps you do not realize that duathlons are often quite technically challenging ie lots of corners. When I look at the Du Worlds course map, I see at least 50 corners over the two laps, not including the long sweeping curves. On a course like this, I would think that riding a road bike in the drops would be more efficient than being on a tri bike. Maybe I’m wrong, but I would guess that would make all those pro road cyclists wrong too… the ones who ride on the drops in criteriums.
Course map:
http://usatriathlon.org/content/index/4428
The website shows the course maps but does not show elevation. Does anyone know if there are hills or if this is held in a flat area inside the city?
Feedback from people familiar with the area and/or people who are racing the Du Worlds would be great! Thanks.
Is the duathlon worlds a draft-legal race? I think its not, so the comparisons to ITU and crit riders doesn’t hold. Whitfield et al. ride road bikes b/c there races are draft legal and ITU does not allow tri bikes. Crits also are draft legal so the benefits of a tri bike are overshadowed by pack riding.
That is why Chad is patronizing.
Ride the tt bike. This course is not any more technical or hilly than the Richmond Nationals course, where tt bikes were the order of the day.
This is NOT like a crit course and isn’t really in Charlotte…
Cassie, some things you might like to know:
Those ITU bikes are only “not slow” because they are drafting. And those guys and gals would be “not slow” on Big Wheels. 
(they’d be faster still on tri bikes, but they are not allowed to ride 'em)
Chad knows just a little bit about duathlons.
Unless it’s a crit, ITU event, or uphill TT - then the correct answer is ALWAYS tri bike.
And we’re on the super speedway. WOOOOO! At the startline, my inner redneck will come out will come out and I’ll punch all the racers from France. “Rubbin’ is Racin!” USA! USA!
Seriously though, that course looks like someone had a seizure while designing the map.
Especially the bike course.
Road bike or tri bike?
What would be really cool would be if somebody could come up with a computrainer course for this race.
JJ
knows just a little bit about duathlons.
**
Just not that one in New York, with all the hills. 
I’m and 0-fer there.
Chad
Let me give a little more amplifying explanation. The purpose of your tri bike should be to help you go really fast by yourself. As such, it should be MUCH faster than riding your road bike solo in any condition save riding straight up a 10 percent grade. The difference between my road and tri bike is probably a good 3-4 miles per hour. The difference is huge.
I’m glad you used Simon Whitfield as an example. I raced against him at the 2008 Desert duathlon and our bike splits were within about 10 seconds of each other. Why? Because I was riding a full-on tri bike with deep wheels, rear wheel cover and a very extreme superman position. Simon was riding his road-position with draft legal tri bars. Am I as good a cyclist as Simon Whitfield? Hahhahahahah. Did I ride as fast as he did that day because he was riding a road bike and I was on a tri bike in an aero position? Yes.
Unfortunately, most tri/cyclists probably took 5-10-20 years of riding a bike after they got their first drivers license and they are not good bike handlers. Learning to corner confidently either in or out of the aerobars is something that will save a lot of triathletes a lot of time. You also ought to be able to transition from full aero to your brakes in about 1 second to avoid the less than obvious pitfalls.
Mr. Empfield often writes that there is a large segment of the tri population that is not athletic enough to maintain an efficient tri position for the necessary duration and thus, ought to be riding road bikes. Everybody else needs to be on a tri bike in a good aero position they train in enough to maintain it for the duration of their chosen race.
Chad