Search Results for: byway

While bottles for your bicycle are not one of those things you might think about as being important – They are ‘just water bottles’, after all- These utilitarian devices for cyclists are a detail that could be a key part of a successful run at your next event.

This tire is kind of an oddball in WTB’s line up. The other SG2 cut protected tires I’ve tried are good, but this Vulpine is so much nicer riding

Oddly, the Vulpine isn’t as fast a rolling tire on gravel which is loose, chunky, and deep as other tires with similar width. However; once you get out of situations where the terrain is loose and deep, the Vulpine begins to show up as a fast, controllable tire.

What we have here is a new tire from WTB with an old name that has a new mission: Be fast on gravel.

There have been a lot of recent reports and discussions on how much of a difference ‘better’ wheels make on a bicycle and if they are worth the cost of the upgrade. Do lighter wheels actually matter? Is aero everything? Are red hubs really faster?

One of the first real rides I did on the Trailblazer wheels was a 50 mile mixed surface loop running the Touareg tires. Now I got a bit suckered into this one. You know that friend that says that “it’s a 30 mile ride with a couple of hills” and it never is? Yeah. That friend. I have one of those.

ABOUT EPISODE #67 Get 10% off from Andy’s Bike Shop – Use code RidingGravel After a couple weeks off, the guys are back on a…

WTB has some really good non-puncture protected gravel/all road tires in their line, but there was no puncture protected version, until now. The SG2 gravel tires seem to be a good addition to the range as long as you understand that the width indicated on the side wall may not match the width of the tire in reality.

Spinergy has been famous for using an alternative to stainless steel spokes for years. Their spoke is based upon a use of a special fiber. Specifically a spoke with “over 30,000 strands of polyphenylene bensobisoxazole fiber”. These fibers are then coated with a chemical, water, and UV resistant material which can be colored. The PBO spokes also have three times the strength of stainless steel, according to Spinergy, at half the weight of stainless steel spokes.

This tire isn’t a ‘bad’ tire, but for the MidWest it isn’t a tire that lights a fire underneath me when I ride it. It does the job well enough, sure, but with its slightly harsher ride quality and lack of volume, it isn’t on the same plane as the Resolute or the Byway, both of which we are testing in this series of SG2 reviews.