So far so good. Definitely light and fast rolling / quick which was one of my goals. But, it’s a little hard for me to attribute anything specific to the spokes themselves.
With the same components other than rims, tires, spokes, The wheelset is a whole is a full pound lighter than my DTSwiss XRC1200’s with a narrower ID, narrower Race Kings as opposed to 2.4 Wolfpack Speed’s. I’ve used them at both Lutsen and the Leadville Course, other than that they’ve basically been a glorified fast rolling gravel wheelset for the XC bike.
Thanks for the tag @wfenwick. I do live in Breck and ride most of those trails on a weekly/monthly basis. On my Spark I was running mezcal front and rear for the last two years and have really liked that setup. However, if I were to race the Breck Epic this year, I would at least run a 2.4 front and rear (which is what I typically do or the 2.35 from vittoria) and would 100% run inserts with mezcals The tires are fast but I feel are paper thin.
For a specific tire, that’s a good question. The high alpine descents while not super hairy, they can be technical when you’re in ‘race mode’, on day 4 of racing for 3-5 hours each day, fatigued, monsoons coming in - it can add up. I would lean on a tire with a bit more grip.
If you have the option to swap front tires around, I would at least run a Barzo, Rekon, or Ground Control on Wheeler to Miners and the circumnavigate of Mt Guyot Stage. French pass is a blast and so is the CT down from Georgia pass - both of which I have done with mezcals, friends have done on aspens but are all confident bike handlers/descenders who live up here or ride here a lot. Stage 6: Gold Dust is pretty fun, middle of it has a rock garden that can be odd to navigate - it’s neither up nor down, just flat-ish. But the gravel road climb back up and over Boreas to town can be a drag. I honestly do not think your stage times will be slower by running something with a bit more grip on the front.
Thank you all for feedback. I ended up picking up a set of Barzos and changed out the front tire to it. Still running tubolight inserts front and rear. I have my second Barzo and the take-off Mezcal as spares for the race, as well as a lightly used take-off Syerra.
On the downside, the Barzo is 2.35 instead of 2.4, but I have 25mm internal width rims and find that 2.4’s don’t have an ideal profile regardless, though it’s not terrible.
Overall for this event my descending abilities are going to hold me back more than Crr so arguably the best move would have just been to put full on trail tires on there. I probably should have done that, but swapping in a Barzo for the front tire was super easy so will give that a crack and audible and swap to the Syerra between stages if needed.
According to BicycleRollingResistance, the barzo is only a watt or two slower than the mezcal, but could easily be faster if you can corner faster etc.
Has anyone used orange seal valves with inserts? I am finding the insert is pressing down on the valve hole and blocking it; even with the presta valve core removed hardly any air comes out! My first fix is just pushing a small allan key up there and letting air out. Not really an easy trailside move to pull out a valve core and put an allan key up there. Anyone have any better solutions?
Somewhat related. After having an extremely unpleasant experience getting an insert and new tire installed, I decided to try the Cuchcore bead pro tool for my next install. Just used it and WOW it works incredibly well. Installed a new tire with an insert, and set up tubeless, all with a floor pump, in <10 minutes. And I don’t think I broke a sweat or swore once. Highly recommend.
You can also use Reserve Fillmore valves with inserts. They’re more expensive, but don’t use traditional valve cores to avoid clogging and allow for much higher airflow.
Whether they’re worth it is completely subjective, but I find it much easier to seat tires with them. To be fair, you can always just remove the valve core from a normal valve to get the same effect when you’re trying to seat a tire for the first time.
The Vittoria AirLiner Lights come with valve stems in the box that also work great. I didn’t realize this when I ordered my first pair and was a nice bonus.
I’ve been running the Specialized Fast Trak/Renegade combo on my Epic Evo and I still haven’t felt like the cornering is on par to running Ikons front and rear.
I may can play around a bit more with pressure to see if I can get the confidence in them.
I’ve been using the same setup for the last 8-9 months and I feel like the FT up front corners better than any other XC tire I’ve tried.
When I ran Ikon/Ikon I felt like I washed out way more often. But to be fair, I’m a much better bike handler now.
About to throw another Fast Trak on the rear for the next couple months of racing because I’m running SS and the Renegade loses traction on loose climbs way too easily when standing.
For what it’s worth, here’s my review on conti race kings at leadville this year -
2.2’s on 26mm hookless internal rims, spark RC FS ~24lbs, rider weight ~167lbs. Tubolight insert on rear wheel only, 20psi front and rear.
After spending a couple weeks on the leadville course (including the race), I think the race kings are a solid choice. Based on a bunch of comparative strava segments from past years using Aspen 2.25’s, the conti’s had very similar times on same watts. Any segments that had a lot of fast rolling stretches were a little faster on same watts compared to aspens, so I’d give the nods to the race kings on these sections. On the downhills, the race kings never got me in trouble, just one scary drift on a loose high speed section during pre-ride.
This was my first time running an insert (rear only). I removed it today and I can see 3 spots where there appears to have been rim strikes (no tire damage, but the insert had been punched all the way through in 3 spots which I assume is a pinch/strike). I was descending pretty easy and I can only remember banging a rim coming down powerline one day, no other strikes I noticed. I’m not sure if it would have pinched through the tire if I didn’t have the insert, but I guess the insert must help somewhat. Based on seeing 3 pinch cuts on the inserts, it seems like the tire is still going to take the brunt of a hard rim strike. I’ll probably run this combo again in the future, at least at leadville next year to get another race out of the tires. I’m not 100% sold on the inserts, but at only ~60g, it’s probably worth the insurance again flats in big races even if it’s only marginal protection.
