Taylor Knibb is, without a doubt, one of the favorites for the win in Kona this year. In 2023, she made her first, and only, appearance on the Big Island, placing an impressive fourth. Since then she has been on an unbelievable tear, racking up seven wins and three more podiums in T100 and 70.3 races. She is the three-time reigning 70.3 world champion, and she is looking to add an IRONMAN world crown to her already extensive resume.
Anyone in the world of triathlon knows that Knibb is so tough to beat in large part because of her tremendous power on the bike. She routinely posts the fastest bike splits at some of the toughest, most competitive races on the planet, and although she would be quick and strong on any frame, she has the added benefit of riding the always-fast Trek Speed Concept SLR.
Slowtwitch got an early look at her ride ahead of the big race on the Big Island. She has a new paint scheme on the bike from Trek, which they’ve called the Project One “Gamut” — a look that Knibb’s fellow Trek riders Holly Lawrence and Skye Moench will also be repping on Saturday, as well as one that is now available to consumers.
Not just that - rumors are the road helmet is back. I….don’t get it…the bike looks very close to her old set up - she went to the wind tunnel to…use the EZ gains?
Interesting that so many of the women are using 2x with the compact cassette as opposed to 1x with a 10-36, which is what we saw on a lot of the men’s bikes at Nice.
Unless something odd with the perspectives, that’s the mid/flat base bar. The low drops the grips below the centre. (apologies, I’m not deliberately looking to find faults in these great articles/posts. Very much appreciating them).
Hmmm. Has that changed from past model years? Was sure that there was a -ve grip option on the SLR (I’ve got high, so can’t compare on mine, but in the gallery on teh SC thread I was sure there were ‘frowning’ bars in front on shots from those with the ‘low’ bars.
So given how much money some of these companies throw down the tube for proprietary cockpits and BTA bottles…do you guys think that someone like Trek who clearly still supports triathlon specific bikes (unlike Specialized) that they will start going away from this stuff? Like I was actually surprised when Trek debuted this and went the way they did.
I like what Canyon is doing now, after Frodeno being the one guy to being fully custom cockpit to now every one of their athletes getting a customized cockpit.
I wonder if she might be holding out based on a helmet sponsor? If she does decide to wear the road helmet, does that mean she’s planning to blow the bike record apart and doesn’t want to risk overheating? Or does it mean she’s thinking she’ll comfortably sit behind whatever Lucy puts out and back her own run?
She’s a The Feed athlete so should be helmet agnostic unless she has a sponsor - I don’t know. But if she is going for the bike course record - why would you choose to put out more watts in order to go faster when there is another way? I just don’t know - obviously concerned with overheating, but I can’t remember anyone since Chrissie in 2011 and Crowie in 2010 (when he got beat by Macca - then aero helmet to win in 2011) making this choice. Maybe…maybe the info I got is wrong, we will see…
