A new bike and starting with sprint races

[Goku]

Hey all,

I am currently running and swimming and to encourage my training, I told myself once I'm decent in these two disciplines I was going to buy a new bike for tri training. I am most likely going to be purchasing a race bike. My question is, how much did you guys spend on your first bike? How many of you got your first bike used? I was thinking the purpose of this bike is to train with it a few years and see if i really do like triathlons. I don't plan on going past half-tris in my lifetime.. If I do like participating in triathlons, I think I will purchase a tri-bike instead. But once again, that is a few years down the line.

[cjbruin]

Just remember that tri's are addicting.

Do you plan to ride in groups? If so, I recommend buying a road bike...it will be just fine for sprints. If you plan to always ride alone, a tri bike might be a better choice.

There are lots of opinions about how much you should spend on your first bike. My personal opinion is to spend as much as your budget allows up to about $2K. You can get a great bike for that much and over that amount, you don't get that much more for your money. You can also find very good bikes for half that.

If you read through the road forum, you will see that the majority of people on here immediately start looking to upgrade their bikes (or buy their next one) when they are bringing their new bike home from the shop. YMMV.

[Goku]

I don't actually know if I'd be riding with a group. I was thinking of joining a triathlon team or club so that I could be surrounded with people who are interested in triathlons like myself. I am hoping to learn pointers from them... So perhaps I'd be riding in a group. However it would be a triathlon group hehe... I was kind of looking at some triathlon websites and looking at the pictures. I couldn't help but notice that most participants had road bikes... I'm not sure if that is a good indicator what I should get first.

[trin2du]

I think most will start out on a road bike. Get a good entry level bike to make sure that you are going to stick with this, then make an investment in a tri bike when you're more experienced and will likely have a much better idea of what to spend that couple $K on.

[Sponge]

Find a good shop and they will find something that fits your needs...new, used, or leftover.

I would look at a used or leftover from a year or two (most big shops have them) throw down $500 and ride the crap out of it. You'll learn what you want out of a bike, what's working, what's not and most importantly what's comfortable and what's not.

Then when you become more familiar with what you want and like drop 2-3K and get your self a nice bike...you will know what you want better after using it...and the best part is you'll have a bad weather bike then!

Heck you may like riding so much a tri won't fit your needs as much!

Good luck and let us know what you get!