Wrecked my tri bike. Convert road bike or rent TT bike?

Triathlon Forum
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I wrecked my tri bike this week (don’t ask how). Anyway the manufacturer’s crash replacement isn’t much of a deal and would be almost as expensive as buying a new bike (which I can’t afford). So - the only options I have now are to rent a tri bike (probably a Cervelo P1). put my wheels on it and go. Or try to convert my road bike (a 2010 Madone 5.1) to something resembling the geometry on my old tri bike. The last time I rode a road bike in a triathlon, I was about 2mph slower than my equivalent time on the tri bike for the same course. I’d like to go faster, so I think the key would be getting as far forward as possible (I rode very steep, probably more than 80 degrees on the tri bike). What would you do? Rent the unfamiliar aluminum P1 and deal with whatever handling weirdness it might have on the day of the race - or - try to convert my road bike as best I can for my upcoming races? If you’d convert, do you have any tips or pointers for doing so? My Trek has the weird seatmast cap thingy so that might complicate matters. I do have a pair of Vision short aerobars but if I am able to achieve something near an 80 degree seat angle, would longer aerobars be more appropriate?

My tri bike was not quite 2 years old :frowning: I will miss it. I really wish they had a better crash replacement policy. Oh well, I will make do for the time being and save my shekels. When I have enough, it will be Speed Concept time :slight_smile:

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Lemme guess… Garage Door?

Anyway, this is America, and this is why we invented Credit Cards :wink:

Seriously though, you could probably find a good framset on ebay to get you through until you could afford a full replacement. I assume that the majority of the parts are still good. That is unless you pulled a Me, and lost the bike off the roof for the car at 70mph (which woudl ahve been fine BTW) and then watched no less than three cars run it over at highway speed as you ran back down the shoulder hoping to save your new toy… ugh, still makes me want to cry…

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How long’s the race?

For an Oly I’d put on some full length clipons (ideally with some pad setback). See how steep you can go given the limitations of the seat mast setup. Ride it a few times just to make sure you have a position you can hold in the aerobars for the duration.

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All olympic distance or thereabout races for the rest of the year.

And yeah, it was the garage. I am locking the garage door opener in the glovebox whenever the bike is on the car from now on. Also I’m going to put a trashcan or something in the garage so I can’t pull in.