he women\u2019s race in Kailua-Kona, Hawaii, come October<\/a>).<\/p>\nRead on for the results of hours of hard work from members of the triathlon industry on the ground in Nice, France, and contextual analysis based on years of carefully archived bike count data history. Also, a big thank you to\u00a0Slowtwitch\u00a0for coordinating this year\u2019s bike count!<\/p>\n
Men\u2019s 2025 Ironman world championship bike count results<\/p>\n
Note: This year, counters only recorded data across categories on brands that are currently in business. Visual graphs below only display selected data above a meaningful threshold; tables beneath each section give greater detail.<\/p>\n
In many instances we do not show all data recorded if brands didn\u2019t meet a specific count threshold.<\/p>\n
Most popular bikes seen at Nice check-in<\/p>\n
We saw the tide turning in 2023 and 2024, but the numbers from the 2025 Ironman World Championship bike count confirm that among top male age-group long-course triathletes, Canyon is now king.<\/p>\n
Back in 2023, when the men raced the Ironman World Championship for the first time ever in Europe, Canyon overtook Cervelo (also for the first time ever), but even then it was unclear if that was \u201ca Europe thing\u201d or something different entirely. This \u201cEurope thing\u201d hypothesis was further suspected because Canyon wasn\u2019t even in second place that same year when the women raced in Kona in 2023 \u2013 they were a distant fourth.<\/p>\n
But then when the men raced in Kona in 2024, Canyon was on top again \u2013 it wasn\u2019t \u201ca Europe thing\u201d after all. In 2024, Canyon was ahead of Cervelo by about 3% among bikes counted (roughly 70 bikes total) for the men in Kona. And yet Canyon still trailed Cervelo substantially among women in 2024 in Nice.<\/p>\n
And now with the 2025 Ironman World Championship bike count numbers in, Canyon has actually stretched its lead ahead of Cervelo, who is moving backwards on the list, inching closer to third place than first. This year, the margin between Canyon and Cervelo is over 5% (roughly 120 bikes), while the gap between Cervelo and Trek (in third) is shrinking to less than 2% (33 bikes) \u2013 something literally unthinkable before the COVID pandemic began.<\/p>\n
Beyond that reasonably \u201ctight\u201d podium battle, however, we see a huge gap to fourth-place Specialized (6% of the bikes counted), Quintana Roo in fifth (5%), and Giant in sixth (4%). In the top 10, the only truly notable mover among men versus last year\u2019s Kona and 2023 in Nice is Cube, who has dramatically increased its share.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Most popular drivetrains seen at the Nice bike count check-in<\/p>\n
Though drivetrains don\u2019t seem to change much year-over-year, in some ways the data from the 2025 count shows a stabilization between longtime leader Shimano and Sram. Sram made a pretty significant leap suddenly in Kona in 2024, rising from its usual spot trailing Shimano by about 50 percentage points to closer to a 40% gap.<\/p>\n
The 2025 Nice data confirms that Sram\u2019s increase was no fluke, showing 30% of share to Shimano\u2019s approximately 70%. But it also doesn\u2019t indicate a continuing trajectory to upend Shimano, though the numbers in Kona in October will be interesting as well.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
Most popular aerobar brands sported at the men\u2019s 2025 Ironman World Championship<\/p>\n
Similar to drivetrain, aerobars is another category where we don\u2019t typically see too much movement up top. Profile Design still rules the roost with nearly a quarter of all aerobars counted, roughly the same share as we saw in 2024 \u2013 both Nice and Kona \u2013 and even in 2023.<\/p>\n
The more interesting movement, then, happens further down the list: Zipp and Bontrager are starting to lose a tiny bit of ground \u2013 as is Vision and 3T \u2013 while the more \u201cboutique\u201d brands like Aero Coach and 51 Speed Shop are now appearing in the top 12. What does this mean? Most likely triathletes are not satisfied with the stock aerobar setups or the more traditional brands (like Zipp) and are adopting a more bespoke mindset that follows what we\u2019ve seen from the pros in the last four years.<\/p>\n
Unsurprisingly the Nice course also maintains an extremely high number of drop bar users (7%), but fewer racers are using them than they did in 2024 (13%). It goes without saying that drop bar use in Kona is virtually nonexistent.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
The wheels that carried more than 2,500 men to the 2025 Ironman World Championship<\/p>\n
So far we\u2019ve seen a pretty undeniable trend since the first Ironman World Championship in Nice back in 2023: DT Swiss has overtaken longtime leader Zipp when the race happens in Europe. In Kona? We saw both in 2023 and 2023 that Zipp still rules stateside. And Zipp doesn\u2019t seem to be losing much ground on the Swiss brand either, as it\u2019s down by 6% in 2025, exactly the gap in 2024 in Nice.<\/p>\n
If I had to pick one surprise in the top 10, it would be that Swiss Side \u2013 who is seen in large numbers on pro bikes in our galleries this year \u2013 took a big leap forward back in 2024 but hasn\u2019t moved much since then. That said, overall not much has changed in the top 10 from this year to last \u2013 regardless of a racer\u2019s gender.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
The pedals the fastest athletes in the full distance are using in 2025<\/p>\n
Below we see the pedals that top long-course triathletes are using in 2025, and there\u2019s not too much surprising. Shimano still reigns, with a 5% gap over Look, as power-based pedals Assioma and Garmin sit in third and fourth respectively.<\/p>\n
In fifth, we see that Speedplay is far behind that top group \u2013 which is interestingly a pattern among Ironman World Championship racers racing in Europe versus the U.S.: In Kona 2024 and Kona 2023, we saw almost double the Speedplay users, while both in Nice 2024 and 2025, Speedplay substantially smaller share of users.<\/p>\n
Also, over the course of years, Assioma continues to gain more and more market share, while Garmin has stayed steady or even slipped slightly.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
Top saddle choices by men at the 2025 Ironman World Championship<\/p>\n
As opposed to other components, saddles seem to have changed the most when looking at previous years\u2019 bike counts. ISM is still on top, but they\u2019re losing ground as Selle Italia, Fizik, and Bontrager creep closer and closer. It wouldn\u2019t be too much of a surprise at this rate to see Selle Italia on top in 2026.<\/p>\n
Further back, Cobb continues to struggle in Europe (though it does well in Kona), while Gebiomized has lost a huge amount of share, versus 2024, in both race locations\/genders.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
The front hydration systems athletes are using at the men\u2019s 2025 Ironman World Championship<\/p>\n
The biggest story in front hydration in 2024 was the huge increase in male Kona racers who were using integrated hydration systems (37%), but it looks like in Nice, the men still prefer a more traditional setup (also can be attributed to the prevalence of road bikes with no integrated hydration). Profile Design is still the top brand, though it\u2019s becoming less and less dominant from year to year \u2013 dipping before 30% for the first time ever. Xlab is also losing share, likely due to more integrated and \u201cOther\u201d hydration solutions.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
The rear hydration systems athletes are using at the men\u2019s 2025 Ironman World Championship<\/p>\n
The picture of the most popular rear hydration systems for racers at the 2025 Ironman World Championhip is interesting, to say the least. Xlab is still on top \u2013 which lines up with what we\u2019ve seen on pros using standard rear hydrations systems, but Xlab is losing huge chunks of market share year over year, as this is the first year its been on less than 40% of the field\u2019s bikes. Profile Design\u2019s setups have stayed far steadier, but of course integrated and \u201cother\u201d systems are taking up more space in transition area.<\/p>\n
Further back, both Bontrager and Specialized virtually disappearing on the back of top-level triathletes\u2019 bikes (when they race in Europe), while Elite\u2019s systems are becoming more commonplace, regardless of world championship location.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"More than 2,500 of the fastest men in the world at the full distance will race tomorrow in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":142257,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[64,63,784,96822,85,96823,96824,96825,96826,96827,67883],"class_list":["post-142256","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cycling","tag-parent_category-culture","tag-sports","tag-tag-age-group","tag-tag-bike","tag-tag-bike-count","tag-tag-imwc-nice","tag-tag-industry-news","tag-type-article"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/142256","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=142256"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/142256\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/142257"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=142256"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=142256"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=142256"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"2025](\"https:\/\/www.triathlete.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/5P5A2828.jpg\")
<\/p>\n