What road tires would you use in an IM?

Triathlon Forum
1

My first Ironman is this July in Lake Placid. While I feel that I’m starting to know a lot about certain aspects of bikes, high-quality road tires are an area where I’m totally ignorant.

I’d like to purchase a set of 650x23 tires for racing that have the following qualities (if such a thing is possible):

  1. Flat-resistant;

  2. Actually possible to remove from rim in event that I do have a flat! I have small hands and thumbs and when I was a bike mechanic for a few months (admittedly a novice one) there were some tires I literally could not remove from rims for lack of leverage, I guess.

Any suggestions? I’d spend up to $50 per tire for peace of mind…

2

tubie or clincher?

3

Tubular, Tufo Jet Pro 650X22

Clincher, Michelin Pro Race 650X23

The courses will be pretty clean for the ironman.

jaretj

4

Oops! Clincher

5

if tufo makes a clincher version in 650 I’d go with it…seconding the above reply plugging Michelins…Continental makes nice tires but any in the 650 line up are expensive and not all that good for wear or flat protection
.

6

tufo makes the 650’s in a couple of weights as tubular clenchers and they are very nice and durable.

7

there ya have it striver…TUFO is the way to go…now go get shopping (and don’t forget to try the bane of the LBS…Ebay)
.

8

Michelin Ironman’s. I used them in Kona this year, and they worked great! Very smooth, fast feel to them.

9

Tubualrs only, TUFO’s with the gooey flat proofer stuff in them. No need to carry a spare, save a lot of weight on your bike. Make sure your tires are new and have the flat-proofer in them and you are all set.

Not much point in having a light bike if you are attaching 1/4 pound of spare parts to it…

11

I have the Ritchey Race Slick Open WCS (the name is too long) on my Zipps. I’ve been racing on these tires for several years now and they are the best tires I have ever ridden.

-Colin

12

Tubualrs only, TUFO’s with the gooey flat proofer stuff in them. No need to carry a spare, save a lot of weight on your bike.

Not much point in having a light bike if you are attaching 1/4 pound of spare parts to it…

but would it not be better to carry 1/4 pound of STATIC weight rather than the extra ROTATING weight the Tufo ‘gooey flat proofer’ adds to a pair of tires?

14 
 For the past three years I've been loving Verdstein Fortenza's. I don't want to put the curse on myself but they seem almost flat proof, reasonably light and wear like iron, and in 700C, I can pull them off and put them on without any tools. These are the tires that Hed warns against using with their wheels, so they must have a looser fit, but over three years with Mavic, Rolf, Velocity and Zipp wheels between my wife and me, we have never had a problem. I don't know about 650, but it's worth checking out.  

 Oh yeah, I almost forgot.  Good Luck in Lake Placid!
15

The directions say use about 20 grammes of sealant per tire for preventative use.

I use it but don’t know if it works .(never had a flat with it )

Dirt
PS I use the s33 hi carbon all the time