Road Bike With Aero Bars Vs Tt Bike

I ve got 4 bikes currently and my argon 18 nitrogen is noticeably fast than my other bikes but my mate is in another league when on his shiv.

Road bike with aero bars vs tt bike. The question tri bike vs aerodynamic road bike with clip on aero bars however it is a very interesting question. As with everything there will be a balance between quality and price. You wouldn t want to accidentally mix the bikes up however as each is specially engineered to fit the task at hand. To emulate the benefits those angles provide a pair of clip on aero bars is an inexpensive modification to achieve a lower more aerodynamic position.

As above an aero road bike will be faster than a traditional road bike on the flat but not as fast as a dedicated tt bike all other things such as wheels being equal. Flexibility and strength will determine which bike you use as the relative fatigue of a tt bike is higher than a road bike. Road bikes are more versatile than dedicated triathlon or time trial bikes and adding quick release aero bars lets you take full advantage of a single bike. Tri tt frames generally make poor handling road bikes since they are optimized for a low forward position in the aero bars.

Stay tuned for our next post in this series where we ll explain why you need to change up your saddle position. If you put a triathlon bike side by side with a time trial bike it would be hard to tell the difference. First in my series of real world tests comparing my tt and road bikes. Follow me on strava and instagram.

In collaboration with boardman bikes and anton sport sykkeldelisk i will test it out in the spring. In fact at first glance they look identical. Ok so i put aero bars on my bike. Handlebars with aero tops are nothing new and many brands realised long ago that you could save a few watts buy optimising yet another leading edge on the bike but it s not the frame it s.

Clip on aero bars the key difference between a tt bike and a road bike is in the angles of the frame and components. Take the aero bars off a tri bike and you have a bike without the speed of a tri bike and without the handling of a road bike.