I’m looking to try out unicycling at a biathlon thing but it’d probably be better to not come out last.
Anyone knows what’s the speed comparison between the average road bike and a 29" unicycle?
I can average about 10mph on my KH29 with a BA tyre and 150mm cranks. On my road bike I can average about 20mph if I realy go for it and 15 if I take it easy. If there are young people and people say on BMXs I would think you could keep up with them on a 29er but you would have to ride pretty fast.
I would say a factor of between 2 and 3 to 1, possibly even more if they are very serious biatheletes. You can shorten those odds wiht some short cranks, but not by a huge amount.
It’s not feasible to keep up with fit bicyclists on flats on a 29er. You can do it on uphills if you’re a strong rider, but you’re toast on flats and downhills.
Thanks for the help guys. Much appreciated.
I’d have thought as much but I haven’t riden a 29" or a road bike before so I didn’t have a good gauge of how significant the difference is.
Do you guys have a different definition of biathlon than we do? what are the events? Biking and shooting?
anyway yah unfortunately you don’t stand a chance in a road race on a unicycle.
I am going to be doing a winter triathlon (replace swimming with XC skiing) in April. I am hoping to make the top of the bottom third.
a biatholon is a reduced version of the swim-bike-run triatholon, obviously the swimming is the hardest part to organise so biatholons are easier to organise and train for, and cost less.
cool, over here a biathlon is XC ski and shoot. I have a few friends who used to compete but I was never fast enough on skis. We have running and shooting biathlons in summer but they are much less popular.
edit: just looked it up on wicki, apparently you mean duathalon.
If they would let you enter a uni it would be cool to try it anyway. Winning aint the only thang. It would be one thing if the bike was 60 or 100 miles, but if it’s a shorty why not? That would be a cool goal. Training hard is a lot easier if it’s goal oriented and if you set your mind on competing on a unicycle, the only draw back would be not finishing in the front. The benefit would be becoming a good distance rider on one wheel. Go for it.
biathlon is the shooting thing. duathlon is running and biking.
hehehe… unrelated post (take no offence)
Hey Boo radley, hows Nathen, along with scout and jem. I heard jem broke his arm. And i also hear you dont get out of your house too often. Hows miss maudie? and its sad to hear about Tom… I hope hellen is getting along well.
didn’t miss maudie die?
i dont know, im like on page 250 of the book. I’m like a little ways from the ending still. so… dont rip on me. Bob Ewell is a bad bad man. He beat mayella up.
oh dang, I would know what you were describing as a winter biatholon, but apparently that’s not the common usage.
Biking and shooting is reserved for inner city thugs who are too young to steal a car doing drive-bys.
Anyway if the bike section is fairly short uni it, you were never going to win anyway. Aslong as your not going to be so slow that you come way last and are a nusiance to organisers I’d say do it.
I say buy a geared hub and put it in a 36er, go around asking for sponsors which you can use to pay for the uni. You would then have a totaly awsome, super fast uni that you could kick all the bikers asses on and win the biathalon 
So in other words, you could have a “TOP SECRET” unicycle. 
I think saying that unicycles “don’t stand a chance” against bikes kinda misses the point of these types of events. A good majority of the contestants don’t stand a chance of winning. Instead they go for a personal best time. On the last MS bike tour I did, my goal was to simply not come in last, or to finish in the allowed time window, which is definitely possible on a unicycle.
Yeah, quite a lot of fat people do triathlon /duathlon, it’s the classic mid life crisis sport.
Having said that, I’m not that fit or good at biking, and haven’t done any rides over 30 miles recently, and I just did a 100 miler in 7 hours 10, and even on the coker with short cranks or the Schlumpf I’ve never got under 9 hours 45 for that kind of distance.
I’d say if it’s only a 5k or something short then why not, if it’s a charity event, then it’s worth a try too, anything longer or more serious, no point bothering.
Also, depends if drafting is allowed, if drafting is allowed even a fat lazy biker will totally beat you.
Joe