Hey all, I’m riding a Felt Breed with Reynolds carbon wheels and typically run 55mm or 2.1" XC tires since I live on beautiful gravel roads in Kansas and spend 98% of my time on gravel. However, I’m going to be participating in a relay ride for charity across the state of Kansas this September that is entirely on pavement. I don’t have a road bike, so will be looking to put smooth road tires on and I want to spend some time training on pavement as well leading up to this event.
What’s the best size road tire for me to go towards? I’m generally a fan of more tire volume at lower pressure - moving to 55mm+ gravel tires made a transformative difference in my speed over gravel. But I’m not sure if the same thought process holds true on pavement, or where the sweet spot would be. Currently thinking something in the 38mm range might be a good fit.
For additional context, I’m a big guy, at 6’3" and 230 lbs, so I feel like a little more tire underneath me tends to be beneficial. For the event, I will be riding about 100-120 miles total, split into four shifts of 25ish miles at a time. I expect to ride at a pace of 18-20mph.
I’m assuming you’re looking to use your same wheels? In that case, if they are wider internal width then that will give you a minimum tire size you can run (but you can still go pretty small unless they’re like 30mm IW).
In general, yes the same is true.
This is a real ‘it depends’ question. If it’s reasonably smooth pavement then for absolute speed then I’d say 28-30 is probably the ‘fastest’. However, if you want to err on the side of comfort while keeping a bit of speed then I’d say 32-35 is probably a good place to be. Part of the problem with going too much bigger is that the better road tires aren’t made in sizes above 35 (most not over 32, though Pirelli recently made their P Zero in a 40). But more comfort means going bigger, rougher pavement means bigger, faster means a bit smaller.
The other thing to consider is that going from a 55+ to something like a 32 will dramatically change the handling of your bike. For example, I have a giant revolt and with a 45 it’s pretty sluggish steering with a decently slack head angle (comparing to my Tarmac with 28s). But if I put my road wheels straight onto the Revolt then it closes the handling gap between the two by like 80%. So if you prefer the slower steering of a gravel tire then maybe stick to the 35-40 range but if you’d like more ‘road-like’ handling then 32-35 will get you some of that.
Thanks for your thoughtful and thorough reply. Yes, I will be using same wheels. They’re Reynolds G700s, 25mm internal width.
Pavement quality will vary. County roads in very rural areas in Kansas don’t always have the best maintenance.
Your thoughts on handling relative to changes in tire size are really helpful. In this case, handling shouldn’t be too much of a factor, since the structure of the event is effectively that I’ll be time-trialing on pretty straight, flat roads. No drafting or riding in groups, probably a lot of time in the aero bars, so slower/steadier handling is probably a benefit more than a drawback, if anything.
Seems like something between 35-40 is probably my best bet.
Not sure what your budget would be but check out these links:
More ‘training tires’ (More durable, less speed)
‘Racing Tires’ (Less Durable, More Speed)
I’m not familiar with all of them but I run the Pirelli Pzero Race TLRs for road racing and they’ve been good. Durable enough for road and fast. GP5000 S TRs are fast but they (and their more durable sibling the AS TR) were wayyy too tight on my rims so I don’t run them. I also used to run the Enve SES tires in the past and liked them and they’re a bit cheaper than the rest. (Those all top out at 35 except for Pzero Race).
The bigger tires on that site were the Pzero Race (40) and the Challenge Strada Biancha (36 and 40 though I think this is kinda closer to an ‘all road’ or gravel slick than an out and out road tire). No idea how the Pirelli’s scale to the bigger size but I like the 28s and 30s.