I currently have a 2013 Shiv Comp (Rival) it’s been a really good bike to me and have been mostly happy but having gone back to riding my Cervelo roadie again for a while can’t help but hate the enormous weight of the thing and the fact it feels completely ‘dead’. I am a strong FOP rider with reasonable handling skills if that makes a difference.
At the moment its stock with some old S80 wheels, garmin vectors and cheap alloy rear dual bottle holder.
I am trying to decide now whether to upgrade some of the parts to try and get the weight down or if it’s better to sell it and buy something better (Thinking P5-6)
If I was to go down the route of upgrades what would be the first things that you would suggest? And am I going to be noticeably happier with a more lively bike on a P5?
Firstly, weight for tris really only matters when you’re climbing, so dropping weight on the bike won’t make much performance difference unless it’s a hilly course. Secondly, the P5 from what I’ve heard through the occasional ST thread, is not light. Making deep secctions adds weight. So going from a Shiv to a P5 may not drop any weight, the P5 may be faster, but if that is the case it is more likely to frame design than weight.
What feels faster may not actually be the case. 10 years ago I used to pump my tubulars to 140+ because it felt fast, but all rolling resistance test have shown the optimal pressure to be around 100-110. It may be the same with your tri bike v. your road bike, just because the Shiv feels slower doesn’t mean it is. And you might find the P5 isn’t any lighter than the Shiv.
the P5 will not handle differently if you have the same fit on it. Buy yourself a real power meter instead.
weight is insignificant. All about aerodynamics. Read some threads on here.
In addition to a power meter, I would upgrade the wheels. Also look into the Fuelcell for the SHIV. Not going to help the weight but will help the all-important aerodynamics and a place to store your sandwiches.
You may do a quick experiment by riding both bikes with the same wheelset & tires + same inflation. Wheel/tires are as big or bigger ride determiner as the frameset.
The problem with dropping weight on the bike through upgrading components is that you’ll spend a ton of money for very marginal gains. If money is no object, then by all means go ahead and drop the coin as long as you make sure not to compromise reliability or aerodynamics. However, if cost effectiveness is important then I recommend you spend some time searching ST and reading all those tons of posts over the years about how little difference weight actually makes.
There really are only a few components that can make a significant difference in weight; wheels, crank, aerobars. After that you start chasing really tiny weight savings for a lot of money. Your wheels are pretty heavy, although fairly respectable performers aero-wise. Something like Zipps or Enve will be a bit faster and save a pound or two, of course at a huge cost, although if you’re careful you can often save a lot by buying used wheels that were only used for racing. See if you can borrow a pair, you may find the bike ‘feels’ a bit livelier with a new set of wheels (just don’t confuse that ‘feel’ with the actual performance gains). Be forewarned that the carbon braking tracks will not work nearly as well in the rain as what you currently have.
I think the Parlee has a reputation as a relatively light tri frame but you’d spend a ton of money to switch and it may not be as aero as what you have, so you might actually be slower. Better to spend your money on something like a power meter that can be a great training tool and be used for field testing of your aero position.
I’m going to echo what a lot of the others have said here: unless you’re on a really hilly course, weight isn’t holding you back. Is a P5 more aero? From the tests I’ve seen, yes, but you’re talking 30secs max over 40k. You could probably come up with a similar if not greater gain by aero field testing different positions and helmets. So long as you’re not having problems with your seatpost, the Shiv tri is a fine bike.
I have the cervelo P5-6, came from a P4 and before that a P3c.
Road bikes are cervelo R3 and Scott foil as well as a Merlin Extralight titanium bike.
The P5 is" heavy and dead"…but it feels very efficient, like all the power goes in to the back wheel. The P4 has a livelier fel but feels less stiff and less efficient. The Merlin is the liveliest with the nicest feel, but also a bit bouncy feeling. The R3somewhere in between.
I think it’s a lot in your head and My guess is that the Shiv and the P5 will feel similar with the same wheels. Try putting on the wheels from your roadbike and see if the difference is less.
Dude, contrary to what these STers say weight does matter, even if aero is way more important. If you think it’s slow, it will be slow (think Under Armour at Sochi), b/c what matters is the rider on the bike. That said, I’d wait before buying a P5. The main offender in the weight debacle is probably the s80 wheels, those things are bricks. With the cost of the P5 you could buy yourself an arsenal of lightweight/aero wheels. You could also swap out the stock crank with a lighter, like Sram Red bb30 or even Cannondale SiSl. You could cut about 3 lbs right there. The Shiv frame isn’t light but it’s not your main offender.
There isn’t really anything categorically “better” than a shiv.
A P5-6 might be a little bit, sometimes, depending on how you carry spare kit and water and food.
Not sure the P5-6 is any lighter either.
The dead feeling might be due to your wheels/tire, or just imaginary!
Hi,
I currently have a 2013 Shiv Comp (Rival) it’s been a really good bike to me and have been mostly happy but having gone back to riding my Cervelo roadie again for a while can’t help but hate the enormous weight of the thing and the fact it feels completely ‘dead’. I am a strong FOP rider with reasonable handling skills if that makes a difference.
At the moment its stock with some old S80 wheels, garmin vectors and cheap alloy rear dual bottle holder.
I am trying to decide now whether to upgrade some of the parts to try and get the weight down or if it’s better to sell it and buy something better (Thinking P5-6)
If I was to go down the route of upgrades what would be the first things that you would suggest? And am I going to be noticeably happier with a more lively bike on a P5?
Thanks for all the replies, what I am presently thinking is replacing the cranks for SRAM Red if I can find a good deal, new carbon cockpit (3t Mistral Pro seems a good price?) and getting a race day 808/SUB9 combo and keeping the S80’s for training.
Interested in what was meant by get a real power meter? The vectors I have seem fine and recently rode them on a Quark equipped bike which gave near identical figures. I can’t see any advantage in changing those especially being that I can swap them amongst my 3 bikes easily?
If you want to reduce weight the low hanging fruit is probably your wheels right now. Also look at the cassette and saddle. It doesn’t really make sense to spend money/effort reducing weight since it has very little effect on performance at almost every race there is, but if you wanted too, I would look at some modern carbon clinchers or tubulars before replacing your crank/cockpit.
The 3T Mistral isn’t the most aero option. Consider bars like the 3T Ventus, TriRig Alpha, USE Tula, or, I think whatever your bike came with is really good…The aerobars are up at the front of the bike so whatever you do don’t sacrifice aero for weight there.
TriRig omegs brakes will be lighter and more aero, so that might be fun.
I don’t necessarily see any reason to change your power meter if it has been working well. Do be sure to follow the install procedure carefully though so that you get good data (torque wrench, hard effort to seat them, then zero etc)
Thanks for all the replies, what I am presently thinking is replacing the cranks for SRAM Red if I can find a good deal, new carbon cockpit (3t Mistral Pro seems a good price?) and getting a race day 808/SUB9 combo and keeping the S80’s for training.
Interested in what was meant by get a real power meter? The vectors I have seem fine and recently rode them on a Quark equipped bike which gave near identical figures. I can’t see any advantage in changing those especially being that I can swap them amongst my 3 bikes easily?
I love my P5, but I can’t imagine there’s that much of a weight savings over the Shiv. I have a 51 cm 2013 P5-3 Red which I upgraded to the six fork and Aduro bar (which adds a considerable amount of weight), a Dash saddle, Quarq Red compact crank and Zipp 404’s. The total weight of that set-up is a little over 20 lbs. The P5 is about 3 lbs heavier than my S2 rival with Mavic Cosmic Elite wheels. I can sustain MUCH faster speeds on my P5 than my S2. Even at 3 pounds heavier, aerodynamics wins (and the S2 is a reasonably aerodynamic road bike). I’m all for getting a P5, but not because the Shiv is heavier.
btw, when I first got the P5 it took about a month for me to get past the weight, despite knowing it didn’t matter. The proof is in the perfomance.
So the bike comprises about 15%-ish of the total rider weight on race day. Spend hundreds to thousands of $$$ to cut bike weight? How about the rider dropping a few kilos instead? Much cheaper…
So the bike comprises about 15%-ish of the total rider weight on race day. Spend hundreds to thousands of $$$ to cut bike weight? How about the rider dropping a few kilos instead? Much cheaper…
Or you’ve maximized body weight loss, and you’re really light to begin with
what I am presently thinking is replacing the cranks for SRAM Red if I can find a good deal, new carbon cockpit (3t Mistral Pro seems a good price?)
Interested in what was meant by get a real power meter?
It would be interesting to find out what the weight of your bike is right now. As mentioned before, the biggest problem in an over weight bike and rider system is the rider so why worry about shaving grams off the bike when the guy in front of the mirror is packing extra Kilos in his gut??? How tall are you and how much do you weigh?
Keep in mind that time trial bikes are naturally going to be heavier than road bikes so an easy solution to your over weight worries is to get a road bike.
If you don’t want to lose your fat or throw away your Shiv, get ready to spend a ton of money on components and you will need to spend more on a crank set and get something better than Sram as there are lighter cranks than Sram Red. Since you are hell bent on getting weight off your bike, keep in mind that a power meter will add weight to the bike.
