New Wheels!

I decided that I liked triathlons so much that I was going to go a little crazy sign up for 5 more of them this summer, and because I signed up for so many, I was going to need upgraded wheels to get me across all those finish lines. And upgrade I did. 

I went from this...

My first road bike! 

To this......

My first tri bike!

Like many of the things I do in life, I decided to go after triathlons full force..I hired a professional coach (she is awesome, more on that later I am sure!), started a training plan (compliments of the awesome coach),bought an indoor bike trainer (don't want to miss a work out), multiple books on triathlons...so buying a sexy tri bike was the obvious next step. 

So meet my Specialized Shiv Comp with Zip 404 race wheels. We need to spend a little more time together before she is officially named, but I have one in the works. 

I have to say that I was SUPER intimidated about the bike buying experience. When the Husband and I bought our first road bikes last summer we more or less walked in to a store, said we wanted bikes, and came out with, you guessed it, bikes. There was minimal research involved. We didn't know our carbon forks from our cassettes and certainly didn't know the different between Sram and Shimano. And it turned out just fine and we have loved our bikes this past year. But for this bike, I wanted to make a very educated decision. So I attacked the internet and read everything I could about tri bikes. Honestly, I am not sure what I would do with out youtube and google?!? 

So much internet-ing later, I found myself at the coolest bike store in the world, ready to make a big purchase.

All hail Pelton- Specialized mecca. 

Seriously, Peleton is the coolest bike store I have ever been in. It is gigantic, the people are nice and it is full of really incredible Specialized bikes- nothing not to love. I will spare you the details of the love affair I have with my salesperson and bike fitter, but they were unbelievably nice and amazingly helpful! 

Once the Shiv was picked out, it was time for a Body Geometry fit. 

Do I look aero? 

Yes, I know I know it looks like a teeny tiny clown bike but I am assured that they are supposed to be compact and my short torso and long legs means my bike has to be little so I can reach the aerobars! 

Multiple hours on the bike later, it was fit to me like a glove and I got to take it for a spin around the block before they boxed it up and got ready to send it to New York. The first ride was....terrifying! Having a bike this nice, and one with aerobars (you want me to shift the gears where?)  is a totally new experience and I nearly fell off on at the first intersection. But  my new friends at the bike store assured me that it will get easier and I will not always look like a complete idiot riding this thing. Crossing my fingers!!!

Sadly she is now in pieces, in a box, in route to New York- but hopefully she will arrive next week and we will start spending a LOT of time together. I am sure there are going to be some stellar stories about the tri-bike learning curve so stay tuned for the inevitable tales of my tri-bike related mishaps.