Ironman triathlete's £15,000 TT bike and kit lost by British Airways — cyclist waiting to be reunited two weeks later

Similar thing happened to me, flying Manchester, via Heathrow, to Arizona on BA (both flights), last November, enroute to Ironman Arizona.

I arrived with only hand luggage, including 3 sachets of energy drink as my only kit, everything else (all tri kit & nutrition) was in my bikebox & suitcase. Luckily, I had already done a few ironman races & I flew out with a group from my local tri club (all of their 8 bikes, were on same flights & were checked by US customs, arrived as usual). Day before Ironman Arizona race, I had to hire bike + helmet, wetsuit, bought goggles, bike shoes & trainers, borrowed a trisuit (mate's wife), bib shorts, run-visor, race belt ...  Not the best race prep & a massive drain on my usual optimism, but a finish is a finish, even though it was much slower than I had trained for. The popping of blisters on the IM marathon, from brand new trainers, took my mind off things.

Other Details: My luggage was not automatically checked thru by BA (recent policy change) from BA internal (arrived late into Manchester, departed even later) to BA international flights, as it was 2 bookings & same airline. At boarding gate BA staff showed me both luggage items were booked on flight under my name. Luggage never arrived during week I was in the USA. It eventually arrived back in Manchester 3 weeks after I had returned to the UK. I believe it arrived on the next day's BA flight (was given the BA luggage container number), but was detained/lost by US customs for 16+ days. Once it was rejected (correctly) by the Arizona hotel, it was flown back to the UK & onto Manchester, then delivered to my home.

So there is some hope for lost items ...

However, I'm still fighting the insurance claim of "reasonable & necessary" items totalling $1500+. They say it was delayed .... I'm arguing that it was lost for the period of insurance. I got travel insurance with a major cycling insurance ('bright colour cycling top') specifically for the medical coverage in a competitive cycling event. But they off-loaded my claim to a claims settlement agency in the UK, with whom I'm still disputing things with.

£20 apple airtag in box or even better hidden on the bike and you can at least let the airline know where the bike is.

Great event Ironman Austria. I'd much rather do that than Bolton.

Gee. I wonder where all of this CO2 comes from? Yours obliviously, G7 Amateur Athlete

It always seems to be BA losing bikes, a party in Mallorca when I was there all had their bikes fail to turn up, didn't Dan Martin also have BA fail to deliver his bike?

A friend's bike went missing en route to IM Hamburg and while he got it the day before the race it made me very nervous on the way to the Etape du Tour the other week. Thankfully BA got my bike and all other bikes on the plane safely to Geneva, and I got it safely back afterwards, but I was definitely nervous what with all the horror stories.

I hate to say this but if BA lost or damaged some of your kit and doesnt seem very helpful in replacing said lost or damage kit let alone wanting to talk to you about it. Just send a them a recorded/signed for letter to their CEO detailing that you will give them two weeks to either find or replace said goods or they will be speaking to your lawyer instead of you directly in the near future.

Give them a window of time to right their wrongs then get lawyers involved. They will settle it out of court quite quickly as it doesnt benefit them to fight it and drag the case out.

I feel for this athlete, it frightens me everytime I travel with my bike. More so when I'm flying to the intended destination; at least then I can ride once there. Coming home, at least Im not massively  dependendant on the bike. That said this year I used an Apple AirTag with my bike bag. Popped it inside and had a piece of mind. Thankfully I had no issues. When I arrive in Lanzarote I could see my bike on a map when the aircraft parked. Likewise on the journay home. Is accurate enough that you can see where in the airport the AirTag is so if you do have an issue with a lost bike you can tell staff where you think the bike is.

To be honest - BA is a joke!  Whilst its great that they let you take a bike box without oversized luggage fees they ask you to call ahead "to ensure that your bike can be booked a space on your flight".  All good - I did this a few weeks before and was assured that I had a space on my plane to Switzerland.

Now I put an air tag in my bike box for good measure and as we're sat on the plane I see that whilst my luggage has made it on my bike is still sat in the terminal - all the while the captain is suggesting that the doors are closing and being pushed back.

I make the point to the air stewardess that my bike isn't on here so WTF?  She does some checking and apparently they've punted it to the next flight - no explanation why, no nothing, just "tough shit, you can hang around in Zurich for a couple of hours (or flight was landing at 6pm and we had a drive of c. 1hr 45) or it will probably be delivered the next day".... 

Fortunately we were flying on Thursday so with IM Switzerland on the Sunday, there was still time for bike to arrive on Friday (which it did around 5pm) and ensure I was good to go - but its just ridiculous that you do everything to avoid precisely that eventuality and the outcome is basically DGAF - we'll screw you anyway!