Question:
Can anyone share their experiences with Trek Bikes. I am currently looking
at the 5200 as a performance road/triathlon racing bike
My concern is that it is a carbon frame... roads here in Belgium are rough
to say the least. Would I be better off with alu or steel...
but what about the weight and responsiveness - sacrificed? I obviously want the leg power
transformed into speed and not bike bend - but don't want to get off the
bike after 5 hours still shaking from the vibrations of an uncomfortable
ride.
Answer:I don't have any firsthand experience with carbon fibre bikes, never
having ridden one. All my knowledge comes from reading reviews of them
and talking with people who own them.
No, carbon fibre would be good for this. All the reviewers say that
carbon is good at damping high-frequency vibration. I'm not sure why,
it's in the nature of the material itself. This is why lots of alu
race bikes have carbon forks. The roughness of the roads won't be a
problem for the longevity of the bike. The main worry about carbon is
that in a crash you might damage the frame more than you would an alu
or steel frame. But the tube thickness on the lightest alu bikes is
getting thin enough that you can have similar problems with alu.
Carbon bikes are supposed to be quite stiff, so you'd be all right
there.
