From left: Cameron Dye, Angela Naeth, Jesse Thomas, Caitlin Snow, Flora Duffy, Tim De Boom/Photos by Tim De Frisco Photography

This week in San Diego, Pearl Izumi gave a few of their pros a valentine that would last much longer than chocolate: a date—for many a first—with the San Diego low speed wind tunnel. In town for the 2012 Pearl Izumi Tri Team Camp, Cameron Dye, Angela Naeth, Caitlin Snow, and Jesse Thomas each got an hour or two with Retul fitter Matt Steinmetz and the engineering geeks behind the glass. (ITU athlete Flora Duffy and veteran triathlete Tim DeBoom were also present, though not tunnel-bound on this particular visit.)

By the time we arrive, Steinmetz has already swapped Olympic non-drafting specialist Dye’s stem and added some spacers. “The thing we’re focusing on is getting his arms narrow and high,” said Steinmetz.

“How’s Cameron looking?” asks Geoff Shaffer, PI’s Global Marketing Director. “We’ve still got a lot of work to do,” DeBoom replies with a grin.

Just another day in the tunnel.

It’s an interesting concept for a triathlon team—one that seems tight-knit and familial, yet incredibly diverse. DeBoom is a two-time Ironman World Champion with a new taste for the sport’s more extreme end, pursuing races like Norseman and the Leadville 100 mountain bike race. He serves as the steady captain of the team, and serves as an advisor to many of the athletes.

“We reached out to Tim,” says Shaffer, who met DeBoom through his wife Nicole. Now in its fourth year, Shaffer says the team was founded on getting athletes to help develop new products, as well as for better brand exposure. “We’re not the New York Yankees,” he says. “We haven’t gone out and signed the biggest names in our sport. With Tim’s help we’ve been able to find some good up-and-coming-triathletes. It’s small enough that all the product managers know the athletes by name.”

Up-and-coming, sure, but also accomplished: Newbie Thomas stunned the field last year at Wildflower, spunky Naeth just won the high-profile Panama 70.3, and Snow’s incredible run has made her the top American woman in Kona for the past few years.

Despite the obviously bonus of having these types of athletes on board, Shaffer says the team is quite simply a fun project. “Our product managers sit down and interview the athletes first. We’re looking for people who have something to say. It doesn’t help when an athlete says ‘this sucks’ or ‘this rocks.’ We want specifics.”

“It shows what Pearl Izumi is about and to be part of that is awesome,” says Naeth. “If we have issues or ideas we come up with, they’re very open to anything and everything. We have the ability to talk to the developers, and to try new things and experiment.”

Naeth is an independent thinker who understands the grey relationship between aerodynamics and comfort. She’s just come out of the tunnel, and says that the changes made today are the same ones Steinmetz had done to her bike in previous fittings. She says for her it’s not about forcing herself into those changes, but racing in the position she’s comfortable in. “I usually give any new tweaks five or six rides before I decide,” she says. And since she’s racing Abu Dhabi in a few short weeks, she’ll likely stick with what worked for her in Panama.

Move over, carbon

Tuesday, the day before the athletes arrived, PI’s head apparel haunchos geeked out in the tunnel over something different from velocity and drag coefficient. They’re in town not only for helping dial in the athletes’ bikes, but to test apparel materials.

“Triathletes are willing to pay a grand for wheels that they think will make them that much faster. What they don’t realize is that a jersey can offer similar benefits,” says Shaffer.

This is where Ted Barber—Director of Innovation and Advanced Development, and Ron Rod—Speed Shop Product Developer, come in.

Barber unveils a huge metal case of cylinders and pipes he’d used for testing new materials in the tunnel the day before. Who knew Lycra and polyester could be aerodynamic test subjects?

In another room adjacent to the tunnel, Ron Rod is doling out carefully-marked plastic bags stuffed with clothing. For these guys, kits and jerseys aren’t just for sponsor shout-outs and pretty colors.

“We’ve built a custom pattern for each of their bodies,” says Rod, who thinks the number of athletes on the team is just perfect. “There are lots of brands that have much bigger teams, but we just couldn’t customize apparel to that scale. And we don’t need much more input on the product side for this year, so this is a good number.”

He says each athlete has custom pocket styles: Dye has no pockets, Thomas has two on a one piece, Naeth has one, DeBoom has two. They get to pick and choose what works best for them.

Rod’s along for the trip to make sure everything fits just right, a factor tied directly to the athletes’ current body composition. This is the first time, for example, that he’s seen Naeth in about five months. “Some of these guys just keep losing and losing…eventually there will be nothing left!” he says. “We want to get rid of as many wrinkles as possible, with zero chafing. We basically want them to not notice the product while they’re racing.”

As in the caes of Dye’s bright orange plaid, it will be hard not to. At least for us along the sidelines.

After lunch and a few more hours of fittings, the crew heads back to their North County homebase for a swim session, dinner, and more team bonding. It’s a short stop in triathlon’s heartland, before they scatter all over the planet to do what they do: train and race like the animals one of the PI ads says they are. Naeth is off to Abu Dhabi, Snow is gearing up for Galveston 70.3, and Duffy, at least, will be back here in May for the WCS race.

It’s a diverse group—in age, experience, and focus—brought together by a brand that celebrates individuality, performance, and good design. Slip on one of their jackets or a pair of their running shoes, and know that a triathlete probably had a hand in bringing it to perfection. Because while the body inside might not be perfect, the stuff this company covers it in comes pretty darn close.

Don’t miss our photo gallery of the day.