- ONLINE RETAILERS who service the tri-specfic community.
- F.I.S.T.-CERTIFIED tri bike fitters.
- CONTACT INFORMATION for the dealers below.
- GUIDELINES for these pages.
- INDEX of all retailer profiles.
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Total Tri Sports (
March, 03) is the long-awaited tri-specific shop in Sacramento. Yes, there's Steve Larsen's Wheelworks, but Davis is not Sacto. Also, as of this writing Steve Larsen has sold his shop and moved to Bend, Oregon, and we're waiting to see just what that will mean for that shop's dediction to tri. There are other very good bike shops in Sacto (like City Bike Works just down the street from Total Tri), but they've been slow or unwilling to pay much attention to the multisport market. This left an opening and owner Chris Ross has aggressively gone after it.
Pros: Total Tri Sports sells Cervelo, Felt, and Aegis bikes; Ironman and Aquaman wetsuits; De Soto, Zoot and Sugoi apparel. Its principals are F.I.S.T. certified tri bike fitters.
Cons: The shop is new, less than two years old as of this writing. Business plans are like war plans, they never survive past the first contact with the enemy. This means that things will change with this shop, and with nimble business owners this usually means good changes. But we've see tri shops morph into shops that specialize in selling tandems. We don't expect Total Tri Sports to go in that direction, but you never know what can happen given enough time. (Contact information for the above dealer).
Signature Cycles (April, 03) is not a shop per se. But frankly speaking the service offered there is sufficiently notable that it bears mentioning, both because of the front-person and because of the area. Paul Levine is the person behind Signature Cycles, and if you buy a bike from him it can be a custom Serotta or, if you prefer, a custom Serotta. In other words, not a wide selection. But you don't have to buy a bike at all, and whether you do or you don't you'll get a fitting from Levine himself. He's both F.I.S.T. certified, and he's the head of Serotta's sizing school (he teaches other retailers how to fit their customers to bikes). Yes, Levine's sizing school has historically been based around road bike fit, but he himself performs fits to a base of customers that now is split 95%/5% in favor of triathletes. The other specific that makes Signature Cycles notable is that Levine is in the metro NYC area, and it's not easy to get a good tri-specific fit there. Plus, he'll travel to you. (Contact information for the above dealer).
Pros: You're not going to get a better tri bike fit on the East Coast than from Paul Levine.
Cons: A bike fit, and possibly a custom-built Serotta based on that fit, is all you'll get from Paul Levine. Well, that's not exactly true. While a Serotta is the only bike Levine sells, he'll tell you with precision what bike(s) would work for you. That includes the specs of a custom bike, if that's what you want, or of any productions bike you're interested in, including what size, what length stem, how many spacers underneath, etc.
Bob's Bikes is, as of this writing, one of two bike shops in the entire state of Alabama that we can recommend to the triathlete. Bob's is run by Roger Byrd and has been around for 30+ years. It's a full-service shop, but the do speak tri. They've got Quintana Roo, Kestrel, Cannondale, Giant, Specialized, and Litespeed bikes. They took a year off from carrying wetsuits and realized the mistake they made, so they're reordering QR's wetsuits as well. They stock Garneau and Pearl apparel, and Zipp and Reynolds wheels. Go to their Vestavia store. Their Hoover store is just a satellite branch and you won't find the tri stuff there. (Contact information for the above dealer).
Pros: Obviously from their brands carried one can see that they make a commitment to tri. They've just taken out a wall of comfort bikes to make room for more tri bikes, this is at a time when other shops are taking out MTB to make room for comfort. They pony up cash for the local Powerman, which is a big early-season race. Bike fit is a priority with Roger. They're committed.
Cons: There are notable omissions in their line-up. No Felt, Cervelo, Softride, no De Soto, Tyr, Zoot, no Hed wheels, no wetsuits other than QR.
Tri-it Bicycle Shop sits on Pleasure Island, on Alabama's Gulf Coast. "Who cares?" you might ask. There can't be that many triathletes there. Not true. Late in the season their Sandman Triathlon fills at 750 athletes, and earlier the Santa Rosa Island fills three months in advance with 1100. Robert Driskell takes triathlon more seriously than almost any Gulf Coast shop East of New Orleans. (Contact information for the above dealer).
Pros: Carries Cervelo, Guru, Elite, Raleigh. Owner Driskell has been a triathlete for more than 20 years, and is a board member of the Tri Gulf Coast team, and is also involved with the Gulf Coast Area Triathletes club (G Cats).
Cons: This shop is almost a mirror of Bob's Bikes up in Birmingham. If you take the brands of both shops and put them together you've got all that you'd want. But neither shop carries what the other carries. One has QR, the other Cervelo. One has Cannondale, one has Guru. One QR wetsuits, the other Ironman. In othe words, neither of these two Alabama shops can boast the brand line-up of a top tri shop in San Diego. But then, there are plenty of towns whose triathletes would kill for a shop like this one.
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