Did my first ever time trial today (10 mile) on a 22lb road bike with mudguards.

Most of the other riders had TT specific bikes.

Is there a general guide as to how much faster a TT bike is compared to a ‘normal’ road bike?

Cheers.

You would appear to be a marketer’s dream.

One of my fellow trainers races both road and TT and reckons TT bikes are faster if your skills are sufficient. I tried riding his TT bike and it’s insanely fast but uncomfortable.

a TT bike will be quicker on some courses, but the question is for what reason do you ask? for the money that is involved why bother unless you are intending to be serious.

As for the specific question there are a huge number of variables. A normal bike with discs or deep section wheels, aero bars or an improved position etc can make most of the difference, it is only when you start needing the extra seconds that tube shapes, aero chainrings, etc come into play.
You need to remember that the biggest air brake on a bike is the rider.

Unless you’re going to be properly serious about it I wouldn’t consider buying a TT bike over a normal road bike. With a few alterations a regular road bike can be almost as fast as a TT bike but much more versatile for the all round riding that most people do. See how you get on, if you start getting into it seriously and are posting decent times then maybe look to get a TT-specific machine, until then just use time trials as a good training/fitness tool.

Is there a general guide as to how much faster a TT bike is compared to a ‘normal’ road bike?
It depends on how fast you’re riding. If you’re doing a 10 in 30 minutes then it will make bugger all difference, if you’re doing one in 20 then it’ll make a huge difference. Probably not worth considering unless you’re doing sub 25 times but ymmv.
However if you want to make you’re roadbike a lot quicker then stick a set of clip ons on it, you’ll get most of the benifits of a tt bike with just this one change.

Just what I wanted to hear, you’ve saved me some money!

I reckon I’ll do no more than 10 TT’s a year so not worth the money. As above, main reason to do them is for training.

Also to improve the speed a set of tri bars will improve your times, the more aerodynamic you are the faster you will go, just see Chris Hoy in action!

bikeradar had quite a good article on exactly this recently. About 1 min for a 10 iirc.

This is the BikeRadar article discussing TT bike vs road, as well as benefits from clipons & aero helmets.

Thanks for that, very interesting read. (especially as at work with not a lot to do!)

How much does the peak on my helmet slow me down?

0.00235814456%

😉

i would say its about 10% but as another poster mentioned it would depend on your level. Also you can just jump on a tt bike they are very different animals but with a bit of patience and practice you'll improve fast.

good luck!