Any triathletes/ road bikers

[KittyVonCatsworth]

My daughter is planning on doing her first triathlon next year and needs a road bike. She’s looking at a couple, the muddyfox omnium and the wiki 100 but is unsure of what features she needs to particularly look out for. She’s joining a triathlon group soon but I’d like to get an idea on costs so I can budget in what I can contribute. Can’t believe how costly bikes are 😨

Sorry, I know it’s not an AIBU post but I don’t have any fitness friends 😂 in fact friends in general 😂

Join a cycling or tri club and use them to get advice. My local cycling club also offers discount in a number of local shops so you may find this is doubly beneficial.

I started with a cheap (£600ish) road bike which I have just kitted our for winter and am now upgrading to a much better one after a summer of more regular cycling which led me to work out what I wanted.

I found cycling got very addictive very quickly.

Disclaimer I don’t run or swim so can’t advise on tri specifics

@lampygirl £600!!!! I’ve spent less on cars 😭 it must be addictive though, I’ve heard some paying in excess of £2k for bikes! She’s joining a triathlon club in the next couple of weeks so I’ll try and persuade her not to make any hasty decisions just yet. Thanks for your input, I appreciate it x

I'd join a couple of cycling forums and have a look in their Buy/Sell sections and perhaps post for advice on a second hand bike with a realistic budget.

You can spend as much or as little money as you have on a bike. It does get tricky at the lower end as components that are very cheap will be heavier, more difficult to keep in good condition and wear out more quickly. A quality second hand bike is likely to be better value than a cheap new one but I appreciate if you don't know what you're looking for that's pretty tricky.

If you do want to buy new, Decathlon's brand BTwin gets very good reviews in terms of value for money. If you can get to a shop your daughter can probably try one for size.

Hello , I have a £2K bike or 2.....

Now until Christmas is actually an excellent time to buy bike, as new season bikes are released now (there's fashions in bikes!) and old season stock can have reductions of several £100.

The best bike is one that fits, and not all bikes fit the same, even if the frame sizes purport to be the same, geometry will be different and the bis will fit differently. Your DD needs to try a few out before settling on one.

Next most important is the weight of the bike. Steel frames and heaviest, then aluminium, then carbon, but if you are baulking at £600, then you are definitely in the leagues of a steel frame. These are not bad, but have been superseded by superior frame materials.

Lots of road bikes now have disc brakes. These add expense and weight, and you don't really need them.

Sub £1500 bike will probably have quite heavy wheels. Once I'd shortlisted bikes, I'd get the bike with the lightest wheels possible, as its the rolling weight of these that makes a big difference.

I would recommend looking second hand tbh. Once your dd joins a try club, I am sure she'll be swamped with offers of second hand bikes.

Or try Decathlon, they have the best bikes of the warehouse type shops and reasonably knowledgable staff.

Can't better BikeRunSki's advice.

I have a Felt zw25 which is at the lower end of the decent but not cheap scale. I love it and wouldn't upgrade to carbon as the fit is so good and it's cheaper to lose some lbs off me rather than the bike

I'd definitely go for Decathlon over muddy fox.

Oh, I kept my wheels but swapped the tyres, that about 2-3mph difference in my average speed.

Bikes are expensive. Look at 2nd hand. Then as she gets know people she can sse if she can get good 2nd hand wheels as these will make the biggest speed difference and can be hugely expensive new. (£2k wheels would be seen as cheap winter trainers by the more serious)

Hi Kitty. How old is your dd? I was about to post a message on the “extra curricular” board asking if there are any other tri- parents out there.

My dd is 8 and has done two “proper” triathlons over the last few months. (She also did a “tri-it” activity with school but that doesn’t count.) It’s very stressful to watch particularly the transition. For her first one she didn’t have any proper kit so was trying to put a t-shirt in over her swimming cossie except she forgot to take her goggles off and got stuck! For her second we had bought her a tri-belt and she put it on upside down. There are not many numbers that make another number when you turn it upside down but typically she had one!

She has an Isla road bike (she’s in a cycling club which is how we heard about the triathlons in the first place) although her second triathlon was on grass so she had to use her old (too small!) bike with knobbly tyres. We got it second hand.

BikeRunSki obviously is the one to listen to here, as regards actually buying a bike.

I would just add that it might be worth your daughter finding out if she likes biking and/or triathlon before she runs out and remortgages her (?your ) house buying a new one. I’ve done a couple of sprint triathlons and there are bikes there worth anything from probably £100-5000. I saw people riding bikes with shopping baskets. It really doesn’t matter what bike you have if you’re just trying it out.

Unless she’s entering an Ironman, or knows that she is keen to do a lot of road biking, I would really recommend she joins the tri club first and sees how she gets on. There’s bound to be people there selling bikes second hand (ime cyclists don’t need much incentive to upgrade) and she can have a look at a few in real life before heading to the shops.

Having said all of that triathlon is a lot of fun, so probably she’ll get addicted, but thought I’d try and give the argument for reining her in a bit just now

Unless she wants to get seriously competitive from the start I wouldn’t get too hung up on the bike. I spent my first season riding an ancient bike that a club member lent me, which was his winter training bike. I got used to the riding position, clipless pedals etc. on that then bought my own. Mine is from the Giant range - I can’t remember the model now but £600 sounds about the right level.
I take part for the enjoyment rather than winning and I feel like I’d have to get a lot more serious about training and competing before I could justify upgrading the bike. As a PP said, for all but the fittest it’s a lot easier to loose a few lb off you rather than the bike!

Good for your daughter! I'm a relative newbie but have done a couple of short triathlons and loved them. As you have discovered OP, the kit is painfully expensive and as other posters have said going second hand is your best bet.
This Facebook group is good:
m.facebook.com/groups/286348785156394
Also, for Christmas / birthday presents or if you would like any new kit for your daughter, Wiggle have a girls section on their website.
Good luck for her first triathlon!

Halfords do a reasonable entry level ladies road bike. You can also pick up a Boardman relatively cheap. My Halfords sub-£400 bike did my absolutely fine for a season and a bit. I’m going to buy a Liv or similar next season (was off for most of this year pregnant) but will almost definitely be buying secondhand. The great thing about cycling/triathlon is that loads of middle aged people with way more money than me are into it and get bored/upgrade very quickly so you can pick up some real bargains 😂