For quite some time, I have been scheming on how to get one. A Zipp, while nice, has always been out of the question for no other reason than its price tag. Surely they spend a lot of time and money in the wind tunnel, but I wouldn't be surprised if a very large fraction of their budget is spent on marketing. Yes, they have dimples. I have yet to see that dimples actually translate into real-world results. Yes, they have the sub-9, a wheel that is capable of achieving negative drag; that's right, propulsion. But I've read plenty of articles by people who know what they're talking about who question both the integrity of the results and the testing protocol that was used. According to the Hed website, their Jet Disc and Stinger Disc models are both faster than the sub-9, so who is right? Until an independent third party ponies up the cash for a study of their own, we'll never know.
And speaking of Hed, I've always been a big fan and have been drooling over their Jet Disc for some time. It's relatively light, manufactured around the same "bulge" principle as Zipp's Sub-9 and Clincher discs and nearly half the price, probably thanks to a lot less of a budget for marketing. I also like Hed's development of their wide-rim, C2 technology. Of all the crazy technologies that have recently come out regarding wheels, this one seems to make the most basic sense to me. Despite playing second fiddle in the number of magazine ads to Zipp, I doubt they perform any worse. Steve Hed has been an aero pioneer for such a long time. Although they don't have near the amount of pros riding their stuff, I only have two words: Lance Armstrong. If him and his Postal/Disco/Astana squads have been running an H3 since the dawn of time, I'm sure it's for the simple fact that they perform.
Even so, nearly a thousand dollars is hard to plunk down for anything, let alone a single wheel. Dirty Harry's would be able to get a Jet Disc in for me, no problem, but since they're not a Hed dealer, I would probably only be saving around $200 off of the $1100 MSRP.
So what's on the super-cheap side? Wheelbuilder.com sells wheel covers that go over a standard spoked wheel to make it perform like a disc for just south of a hundred bucks. Great deal until you realize that the covers weight 500 grams. I know that it's a disc wheel in a triathlon so it's not about the weight, but I think that's only so true. It's true when something weighs just under 1200 grams, but not so much for me when you're talking of a figure more like 1500g.
Enter Renn Multisport. They are a company based out of Tennessee that has been making disc wheels for the better part of 25 years or so. Actually, using the phrase, "they are a company" is a little misleading, as it is actually really only one person making all of the wheels by hand in his workshop. They are as light as the Jet Disc that I was drooling over at literally half the price. One look at the company website and you can tell why he can get away with charging so little compared to those other companies. It's certainly not a pretty website, but I'm sure if he had a polished one like Zipp, the product would be more costly. Likewise, I have never seen a Renn advertisement. But once again, I'm sure that if I had, the product would be more expensive. What I have seen through my extensive research or Renn wheels over the past few months is an overwhelming amount of positive feedback. Sure all of it is basically anecdotal, but as we have already gone over, you can't really expect Renn to pay for wind tunnel time. Also, this is feedback from people who have been in the sport longer than I have been alive and have ridden more bikes and different wheels than I have pairs of underwear, so I trust it. Everyone seems to love them. Everyone seems to love the customer service. Lots and lots of people have bought more than one throughout their careers. Absolutely nobody whose opinion I've read had said negative things about the product.
When you combine all of this information with the simple fact that the difference between different disc shapes (lenticular like Hed and Zipp, versus flat like Renn) and dimples or no dimples is really splitting hairs. Essentially, once you have a disc, you have the fastest wheel option available. Playing around with the other specifics barely means anything. The five seconds I might gain over a 40k TT with a Zipp Sub-9 as opposed to a Renn 575 pale in comparison to the minute and a half that I just gained from having a disc in the first place. In other words, the only importance that these differences have are realized when you TT against Fabian Cancellara and I would need a lot more than a better wheel racing against him.
All this to say, I ordered a Renn 575 last night. I'm not sure what the turn around time will be on it, but hopefully I'll have it soon. A few weeks ago, I emailed the man behind the wheels to ask him how long of a wait there was due to other orders. He said about a week. Hopefully that hasn't changed much. Either way, I'm excited.
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