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| *Vultures Knob>>>Mountain Bike |
Can I convert my Moutain Bike to a road bike for a triathlon? |
I enjoy doing sprint triathlons, but only do two a year. I like to Mountain Bike more than I cycle. Instead of buying a road bike, can you give me some tips (hopefully cheap tips) on how to convert my biek for the road. I just put road tires on my bike and feel a huge difference. Is there a better option than Aero bars? MTBs and tri- bikes aren't so different. Both are designed to race very similar distances. Road bikes are completley different animals - you're not wanting to convert to a road bike - thats a pointless exercise. You don't need 27c wheels to be competitive in a triathlon - and you can certainly complete a short course event easily on converted MTB. Many of the top Japanese guys actually race on little frames with 26 inch wheels and totally kick butt. I wouldn't even bother swapping your bars out - if you want to optimize your riding position try working with what you've got on the MTB - inverting you stem will often give you a zero rise which will lower and spread you center of gravity - in effect reducing the pitch of the front diamonds angles. You don't need aero bars to adopt a aerodynamic riding position ! Just drop your forearms onto the top of your bars or place your thumbs over the top of your bars and clasp the stem with both palms and tuck your elbows in.( I've hit over 70 kph on sealed downhills on MTBs doing this). You don't really have to put a lot of effort into controlling the bike in a triathlon - it's pretty much point and shoot. To convert to a rig that will really rock you will need a set of rigid forks, a new back wheel, chain, and a couple of biggish chain rings. If you are a taller person you could try some longer cranks - jump up to175's. All these changes will totally depend on the size of your frame, the dish of your new rear wheel , your chain line and your bottom bracket dynamics - but if you can get these things dialed all at once by a good mechanic - there's no need to splash the cash for a tri-bike just to hit up one or two events a year. Don't be put off by people telling you your MTB is too heavy. It won't be. Now that you can draft in triathlons - who cares about weight? Your MB frame is built to be strong enough to take the offroad abuse. Whatever you do, you are going to have extra weight in the frame, using it for a road bike. take off the handles and rent someone elses's ( or borrow) road bike handles and install them on yours to get rid of that extra wieght Not too much really other than the tires and aero bars. the mountain bike is really not designed to tri use. It is oberbuilt for road riding and probably has gearing and geometry that are counter productive. i tink..u not use to it... once use to it shld b alrite~~ enJOy riding Sounds like you are as far as you can go with it. I had a guy in my road bike club he did Ok with the tires and aero bars. On the cheap, nothing elase I can think of to do. I solid fork and higher gearing would also help. |
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