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Myths in cycling: wider tires are slower

renehersecycles.com

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Re: Myths in cycling: wider tires are slower

#301

Post by KozmoNau7 »

taneq wrote: post #185
dharmab wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Similarly in the motorcycle world, dual sport and adventure models originally designed for on road/off road mix are now quite popular as commuter machines. Their long suspension makes them quite comfortable over potholes, cracks, curbs and generally poor road surfaces. And many models are narrow enough to filter between lanes with ease.

I see those dual sports all the time and I don't see the attraction other than image. They're less agile on-road which is where they spend their time. At least they're not as silly as the trend of sticking knobbly tyres on road bikes for that "scrambler" look. If anything the opposite trend makes more sense, the motard / supermotard style where a competent off-road bike is retrofitted with road tyres and suspension t…

I had an absolute blast on my Yamaha XT660X, which was sort of a motard version of a dual-sport. Small and light for an adventure bike, but a bit too large and heavy to be a true supermoto.

660cc single-cylinder that you could just beat on all day without breaking the law too much, plus super long suspension travel and fat sticky road tires made for a bike that just ate up speed bumps and rough roads. I pulled some gnarly wheelies over bumps and cresting hills, so much fun.

And it was obnoxiously orange, I loved that bike. It was a shame someone else decided that he liked it more and cut though a massive Kryptonite chain to get it.

Re: Myths in cycling: wider tires are slower

#302

Post by pverghese »

usrusr wrote: post #189
idoubtit wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cycling teams spend tens of millions each year, with Ineos going over € 50m some time ago. Are they conservative? They benchmark their material in wind tunnels. Sometimes they bend the rules with high-tech material[^1]. There's no way a team competing in Tour de France would choose fashion over performance. [^1]: https://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2017/jul/03/vortex-su...

And quite a bit of the money they spend comes from companies trying to sell gear to hobbyists. It's a rather wild mix between ride what makes you fast and ride to pretend that it makes you fast.

Not sure what gear Inoes grenadiers is selling to hobbyists.

Re: Myths in cycling: wider tires are slower

#303

Post by taneq »

deviation wrote: post #225
Sleepytime wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dual sports can usually withstand a few drops with nothing more than new levers, parts are cheap, and maintenance is usually easier than street bikes. I almost always recommend a small dual sport as a first bike. If you get a used one for a decent price you can almost always sell it for what you paid for it even if it takes a couple of tumbles, and you can see if you like off-road too. >At least they're not as silly…

Would like to jump on this comment to agree with you. A buddy of mine dropped his s1000rr coming out of a right turn at a traffic light and was up for around $8k in damages... He was only going ~10mph. I envy those who can fix their bikes after dropping them for $20 when they didn't even have frame sliders etc.

Yeah, I ride a semi-naked and as my first 'big bike' (I've had it nearly a decade, though) it's been dropped a couple of times, with only a couple of scuffs on the crankcase to show for it. Definitely a big consideration!

Re: Myths in cycling: wider tires are slower

#304

Post by globular-toast »

wolrah wrote: post #244
haswell wrote: post #12

This is one of the reasons I love the emergence of the "Gravel" category of bikes. They look and have geometry similar to a road bike, but they have enough clearance for nice fat gravel tires. I ride in Chicago (shitty roads, potholes & construction are everywhere), and love that I can put nice 38mm+ GravelKing Slick tires on the bike, and still have no problem keeping up with most road bikes. I've gotten funny looks…

The second most annoying thing to me about cyclists are the number of them who complain about the quality of the road or path while riding what is more or less a race bike. Shockingly, road race vehicles of any variety generally are not built for comfort or ability to handle less than ideal conditions. Stop acting like you think you're in the TdF and get a bike that makes sense for where you ride.

It's OK to complain about the quality of the road or path if you pay for it. Heavy vehicles are what make the surface bad and fat tyres or not, riding on a smooth surface is way more enjoyable.

Re: Myths in cycling: wider tires are slower

#305

Post by jamil7 »

haswell wrote: post #12

This is one of the reasons I love the emergence of the "Gravel" category of bikes. They look and have geometry similar to a road bike, but they have enough clearance for nice fat gravel tires. I ride in Chicago (shitty roads, potholes & construction are everywhere), and love that I can put nice 38mm+ GravelKing Slick tires on the bike, and still have no problem keeping up with most road bikes. I've gotten funny looks…

This, plus my group and solo rides are now mostly on forest paths, single track and dirt paths, away from traffic and cars and the stress that brings. The riding is slower but more enjoyable and technical than road riding for me. It seems to wear me out quicker though, I think because of so much vibration and stabilizing of the bike.

Re: Myths in cycling: wider tires are slower

#306

Post by discreteevent »

rorykoehler wrote: post #294
vladvasiliu wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Weren't those new bikes heavier? My own road bike is nothing particularly fancy, but it's very light. Just because those bikes may be made to take more of a beating than a road-bike, they may be heavier. I'm thinking in particular tougher wheels and front work, possibly the whole frame.

We were riding on mostly flat terrain so it wouldn't be a big differentiator.

Were they using tires without any tread?

Re: Myths in cycling: wider tires are slower

#307

Post by slms »

rorykoehler wrote: post #250
plorkyeran wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, when I first got my gravel bike I thought I'd be sacrificing some road performance for better flexibility and comfort, but that didn't happen. The actual result was that my times on smooth segments were unchanged and I've beaten many of my personal bests on rougher roads (and obviously it's much better on dirt). It's not a perfectly fair comparison because I did upgrade to a nicer bike in the process, but my pr…

Don't gravel bikes have much smaller gear ratios? There is no way a strong road cyclist would have the same times on a gravel bike as a road bike purely due to the size of the front chain ring. I run a semi-compact up front on my road bike and I can't go faster than 53kmh on the flat without my cadence getting too high to sustain for longer periods of time.

Serious gravel racers definitely run more "road-like" ratios

Re: Myths in cycling: wider tires are slower

#309

Post by nxpnsv »

haswell wrote: post #12

This is one of the reasons I love the emergence of the "Gravel" category of bikes. They look and have geometry similar to a road bike, but they have enough clearance for nice fat gravel tires. I ride in Chicago (shitty roads, potholes & construction are everywhere), and love that I can put nice 38mm+ GravelKing Slick tires on the bike, and still have no problem keeping up with most road bikes. I've gotten funny looks…

Ditching my hardtail mtb for a gravel bike was life changing. I was mostly riding gravel paths anyway, combining roads and gravel my range increased a lot, and commutes are much more fun. In retrospect, it could be that the 4x more expensive gravel bike just is a better bike :)

Re: Myths in cycling: wider tires are slower

#310

Post by nchi3 »

wolrah wrote: post #244
haswell wrote: post #12

This is one of the reasons I love the emergence of the "Gravel" category of bikes. They look and have geometry similar to a road bike, but they have enough clearance for nice fat gravel tires. I ride in Chicago (shitty roads, potholes & construction are everywhere), and love that I can put nice 38mm+ GravelKing Slick tires on the bike, and still have no problem keeping up with most road bikes. I've gotten funny looks…

The second most annoying thing to me about cyclists are the number of them who complain about the quality of the road or path while riding what is more or less a race bike. Shockingly, road race vehicles of any variety generally are not built for comfort or ability to handle less than ideal conditions. Stop acting like you think you're in the TdF and get a bike that makes sense for where you ride.

Bad as in not-smooth or bad as in pot holes? I hope not the latter, because that's dangerous no matter the type of bike, and I haven't heard/read many people complain about the former.
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