The website http://w3.iac.net/~curta/bp/velocityMetric/velocity.html calculates predicted speed based on a number of input factors. I noticed that tubulars are approximately 0.6 km/h faster than clinchers. Is this actually true? If so, that’s a pretty damn good reason to go with tubulars. For instance, if it takes a person 5.5 hours to complete the bike leg in an IM with clinchers then it would take the same individual 5’24’ to complete the bike with tubulars - A 6 minute saving from doing nothing at all!
Thats news to me
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Impossible for me to believe. However, I’m glad that I’ve always raced on tubulars. My reason is that flats can be changed out in a minute or so. I can’t do that with clinchers.
I find this conclusion highly doubtful. For one thing, past tests have showed tubulars to have generally higher rolling resistance than high-quality clinchers, not lower. (In any event, the difference in rolling resistance would have to be very substantial to account for .6 km difference.) The tubular tire/wheel combination is lighter, but this is only a factor when climbing.
As for the faster change for flats that one poster mentioned, even this is exaggerated. I noticed one poster on this site recently mentioned it took him 5 minutes to change a sew up during a race. With practice, it is quite feasible to change tubes on a clincher in less than two minutes. And you won’t have to take it easy on the turns for the rest of the race, either.
It seems a bit much, to me. However, I am no technical expert.
I do know that from my experience tubulars:
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Make for a lighter overall wheel
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Have a better feel of the road.
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Are faster/easier to change in a race.
Wow… I always knew tubulars were lighter and faster to change but didn’t know they were actually faster… seems like Tufo tubular clincher tires are now in top of my list 
I’ve been a tubular cheerleader for years and years, but not becasue of any perceived speed advantage. My reasons for racing on tubulars are:
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Lighter tires and rims.
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I’ve had much less flats on them- they seem to be much more flat resistant.
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I think they ride a little nicer.
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I think they corner better, especially on wet surfaces.
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I can change a flat tubular tire in under 2 minutes in a race (although the spare is not glued on) and it takes me four minutes at least to change a clincher.
I’d be even more mpressed if there were a big speed difference.
Thanks for the posts. Always nice hearing from others with experience.
Just so that everyone understands this…
There is no free speed. I don’t care what wheels or frameset or skinsuit or whatever you think you must have this coming season.
I’m not saying that certain products don’t have an aero advantage but unless you are capable of riding 5.5 hour leg anyway, the tires are not going to get you there. These advantages are incremental.
Chances are real good that if you gave the infamous Bjorn any bike, he’d done real well right? It’s the rider, not the bike.
There is way too much data tossed about from marketeers. Guess what? They want you to buy their stuff, not the competitors. They have to tell you theirs is best and try to give you some bit of data to cling to. All this math is done from extrapolation from data gathered in an artificial wind. Sometimes the data comes from complete bikes, sometimes a wheel only , sometimes a wheel and fork mounted, sometimes the complete bike will have a rider, sometimes not. Sometimes it’s just a fork with nothing else or a frameset with nothing else. The data is useful and can help to make better equipment choices.
By the by, I race tubulars and love them. There is some solid math that indicates the glue can squirm under the tire and increase rolling resistence. There are a lot of numbers beside the decimal point so how much, who knows.
If you really want to save 6 minutes for free? Go train hard. Go work with a coach and get fitted well to your bike for the riding mission. Also, train really really hard. You could also train. I’ve also heard that training can make a difference.
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Lighter tires and rims. Agreed.
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I’ve had much less flats on them- they seem to be much more flat resistant. But tubular tires in and of themselves are not more puncture resistant than clinchers. Either you are getting pinch flats (need to increase the pressure) or you are using clinchers that are overly fragile for the conditions you encounter. I average one flat per 3000 miles riding on lousy New England roads, riding 230 gram clinchers.
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I think they ride a little nicer. Agreed.
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I think they corner better, especially on wet surfaces. I can’t speak to this.
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I can change a flat tubular tire in under 2 minutes in a race (although the spare is not glued on) and it takes me four minutes at least to change a clincher. It’s a question of practice. You don’t race on clinchers, so you don’t practice fast changes. If you race on clinchers you should practice fast tube changes, just the way you should practice transitions, or selecting the right gear for TT starts, etc. The only reason it should take more than a couple of minutes is if the cause of the flat is not immediately apparent, or you need to boot the tire, etc.
I’d be even more mpressed if there were a big speed difference. But there isn’t. The lighter weight of tubulars is a small advantage for climbing. Large differences in performance mainly come from aerodynamic factors, which has relatively little to do with clinchers/vs tubulars. I just would hate to see folks that race on clinchers thinking they need to spend large amounts of money to switch to sew ups, when there really is not much difference in objective performance between the two. In fact, I’d wager that a sew-up that is very out of round or out of true, whether due to poor gluing or manufacturing, will give significantly worse performance than a good clincher.
It’s almost as unbelievable as some of your past and current comments regarding rotorcranks.
- I’ve had much less flats on them- they seem to be much more flat resistant. But tubular tires in and of themselves are not more puncture resistant than clinchers. Either you are getting pinch flats (need to increase the pressure) or you are using clinchers that are overly fragile for the conditions you encounter. I average one flat per 3000 miles riding on lousy New England roads, riding 230 gram clinchers.
Flats are flats whether a puncture or a pinch. For the same weight (tire plus tube) a tubuler will tend to be more puncture resistant, mainly because they can have more material under the tread. Also in some cases its nice to be able to ride at a low pressure, say on crappy torn up roads. I have a pair of fat 28mm tubulars. Run on bad roads at about 80 psi ah, sweet.
Styrrell
All this math is done from extrapolation from data gathered in an artificial wind.
Do you really believe that the objects in the wind tunnel can tell that the wind is “artificial”?
No I don’t. A wind tunnel is however very stable and blows only one direction while the operator moves the object in the tunnel to find new angles. The wind is also very steady in that gusts and the impact of same is not taken into account. I have never ridden in a wind or on a course that was constant over the whole ride. Sometimes I have a tailwind, sometimes a head wind, or a quartering wind. How does the data gathered in the tunnel correlate to real world riding? What happens to all those calculations when I reach down and get a drink or push my sun glasses up or pull my shorts out of a$$
The long and short of it is, data from a tunnel has some value but I don’t believe for a second that test data can point to 1 set of wheels as being superior or any other component or bike or frame either. Too many variables with riders, rider styles, terrain and wind. For those who can put themselves and their bike into the tunnel, they can fine tune that bike and their position to find a good powerful aero position (for a dead on wind or no wind) but I’d say we don’t know that that means with a side wind.