Keefer Madness

Trying to Test Ride Specialized Time Trial Bikes Locally

// April 16th, 2010 // Cycling, Local (Raleigh Durham)

I have ridden my share of road bikes, and a few different mountain bikes, but I’ve never ridden a time trial bike. All of my TT efforts have always been on either my Specialized Allez Comp steel frame with clip-on aerobars or my carbon fiber Specialized Tarmac Expert.

I’m interested in the future in doing more time trials, and maybe some duathlons down the road, and that’s made me consider a TT-specific bike. I’ve got several saved searches/RSS feeds at the local Craig’s List. In a perfect world with zero debt, being the Specialized fanboy I am, I’d love to get a Specialized Transition, but I’ve run into a bit of a stumbling block trying to test ride one.

None of the local dealers seems to stock the Specialized Transition, and would never even consider stocking the super-high end and brand-spanking-new Specialized Shiv module. My bike shop of choice — The Bicycle Chain doesn’t want to deal with Triathletes, their specialized fitting, etc. They’re not allowed to order a bike for me to fit. They’ll order me one, but only if I’m prepaying, and who’s going to buy a bike they’ve never ridden — especially when it’s a category of bike they’ve never ridden?

I tried emailing another local chain of bike stores, All-Star Bike Shop, and they didn’t even return my message, which has kind of been par for the course with my dealings with them. Outside of those two chains, I’d have to travel and hour or more for the possibility of another Specialized dealer that may or may not stock the TT bikes.

Now there’s always the option of moving away from Specialized to something like a Cervelo, Felt, or a slew of other reliable brands, utilizing a dealer locally that caters to the TT/Tri crowd. But I’d really like to add yet another Specialized bike to my arsenal. I wonder if it’s worth contacting Specialized to see if they have a solution. Maybe I just need to wait till we’re visiting the in-laws in Central Florida, where I know their very sizable local bike shop stocks both Specialized road bikes and the more niche Transition.