Mrs PB is a keen triathlete and last Sunday we found ourselves at the Barcelona Half Ironman. I rode out onto the bike course to see her come past and met an Australian girl who had retired from the race as the bike she had hired the previous day had mechanical problems. Turns out that when she tried to put her disc equipped race bike into transition on Saturday evening, the organisers told her that she wasn’t allowed to ride it. This is despite the event being a ” no drafting” event, allowing tri bars and requiring riders to keep a large car’s distance apart or risk disqualification. I cannot work out the basis for banning disc brakes on such events notwithstanding the average triathlete’s poor riding skills.
Paradoxically, while we were waiting for my wife to come through, another rider appeared having retired on guess what, a disc braked Giant!

Makes sense.

I’d agree for draft legal events where riders are in close proximity but if you have to leave a 6 metre gap to another rider, it’s very unlikely that differences in braking efficiency would be a factor.

Less aero/heavier and I imagine braking is the last thing omn your mind in a Tri. Just pointless I’d say.

Just silly to ban really as they offer no advantage. However its the organisers ball….

Just pointless I’d say.

Inclined to agree. While I love my road discs, I can’t see why you’d take them to a Tri.

Ban triathlons.

Yes but the question is why not allow people to compete with discs if they choose to ? Sounds ridiculous to me as do your replies DT.

The bike course on Sunday involved 1200m of up and down over 90km on twisting mountain roads so decent brakes were fairly crucial.

Depends how many bikes one owns?

Who were the governing body for the event? If any of it falls under the Spanish cycling federation then they’ll be banned. I can’t see the issue myself discs will be pointless in an event like this anyway.

While I love my road discs, I can’t see why you’d take them to a Tri.

Yeh, they’re great. THere’s a time and a place though. Love mine, can drag my brakes till my hearts content and not be thinking “that’ll be a new rim next month”

I’ll get bollocked for this though; to me, race bikes and discs just don’t go hand in hand. Racing is about aerodynamics, light weight and going fast, discs are about giving confidence to sportive riders on steep downhills or something.

There were 2400 riders on Sunday, not all were racing, many see the finishing as the main goal. They just wanted to ride their bike and have fun. Don’t know if it was a Spanish federation rule but seems daft to me, especially as the implementation seemed variable.

They were all racing whether you like it or not and hence same rules should apply to everyone. Variable implementation is a bit rubbish though.