Bikes and Interviews From Des Moines

We had the chance to sit down with professionals Matt Hanson and Andre Lopes before their race this weekend at the Certified Piedmontese IRONMAN North American Championships in Des Monies, Iowa. Here are their bikes and some thoughts on their plans for race day.

Matt Hanson's Quintana Roo V-PR, one of our favorites of the current generation of bikes.

Matt uses the UK Based Custom Drag 2 Zero aerobar.

A zip-tie Garmin holder and a nice little rubber gripped area and he is ready to go

Matt goes deep with The Ron Wheel Aeron V8. It is a 88mm Front Wheel combined with the Schwalbe Pro TT in 25mm.

Matt runs Shimano across his bike: Dura-Ace FC-R9100-P Power Meter Crankset at 170mm length arms and 55/42 rings.

11-28 cassette to finish off the back. Matt will be switching to 12 speed after this race.

The front end is streamlined with QR's integrated hydration option

Matt uses the base section of the Metron TFA Aerobar by Vision for the base of his handlebars.

And now we dive deep into Matt's expectations for race day.

Andre Lopes is trying (and failing) to get out of the photo. Some athletes are better at letting their bikes go for the picture than others.

Andre rides the same powermeter as Matt, but uses a smaller crank arm at 165mm and 52/42 rings.

We have been seeing a lot of the these HiloComp Saddles by Bontrager. Andre said he prefers the non-slide rubber on the front end.

The Tyler Butterfield special: $2 Bolts from McGuckin Hardware in Boulder,Co does the trick for the water bottle front end holder.

A very clean front end with the SpeedShop51 bars.

Andre says that the Ice friction is for the rain. It's the only lube he trusts in really wet conditions.

The TT Mount 2.0 – Race – Computer Mount by 76 Projects is another UK based company we are seeing more and more of these days.

And here's our sit-down chat with Andre.

Tags: