Trek engineers Mark Andrews and Scott Nielson as well as Product Manager Tyler Pilger spent Friday afternoon in Kona counting bikes. Eighteen hundred athletes were required to put their machines in the transition area the night before the Ironman World Championship race in preparation for the big event.
The count, organized by Triathlete Magazine's Sean Watkins, gives Trek an idea of who is riding which Trek bikes. It's a snapshot of the end user. Our guys learned a ton (one of which is that we can do better at getting the news out on how good Trek bikes are). On-lookers had interest in the count too.
Chris Lieto rolled his TTX SSL by on his way into the transition area. It looked great. Chris has his race face on but took the time to say hello and chat. Good luck Chris!
Trek employees Mark Joslyn and Mike Ziegle are competing at Ironman Kona this year too. Mike's photo escaped us but Mark's didn't. Good luck to both these bike-passionate Trek workers!
The pros start their swim at 6:45 on Saturday morning. We will be there to cheer them on. Stay tuned for a summary of how the race went for Chris and others we are following in the event.
sygyzy
Why should Ironman participants be required to allow a for-profit corporation to make a census on their bikes. I can understand if race organizers wanted an over all number but the article says they were only interested in Trek.
P.S. I just got back from a morning ride on my Trek 2300 so please don't think I somehow dislike Trek.
October 13, 2007 at 12:10 PM
Thomas Talbert
And good luck to Columbus Indiana's Nelson (Grant) Watson riding his TREK TTX, purchased from the Bicycle Station!
October 13, 2007 at 08:49 PM
Scott Daubert, Trek Road Bike Brand Manager
Sygyzy wrote: "Why should Ironman participants be required to allow a for-profit corporation to make a census on their bikes. I can understand if race organizers wanted an over all number but the article says they were only interested in Trek."
Ironman allowed Triathlete magazine to organize a bike count out of curiousity's sake. Representatives from Scott, Specialized, Zipp, Trek, Fizik, Guru and many others were on hand to make the count. Company representatives were not allowed to record the official count of their own brand. We were all kept behind a fence and asked not to corrospond with the athletes as they passed by. As I mention in the post, we do the count because it gives us a snapshot view of what is happening on the consumer level.
October 14, 2007 at 10:40 AM
Ken
Were all the Trek users on the TTX as opposed to the Madone road bike?
So what was the final talley of the different brands?
October 14, 2007 at 07:14 PM
Scott Daubert, Trek Road Bike Brand Manager
Ken asked about the split and where to find the tallies. The Trek bikes raced in Kona were about 50/50. Half were TTX or TT bikes, half were converted road bikes. We saw all models - 5.2 and SSL Madones as well as 2300 and Y-Foils.
The bike count figures are here: http://www.triathletemag.com/Departments/Features/2007_Features/2007_Triathlete_Magazine_Hawaii_Ironman_Bike_Count.htm
October 16, 2007 at 09:19 AM