Continental Country Ride 26 x 1.75 Black Tyre

Advantages: Make an MTB better on road
Disadvantages: Can be hard to find. No good off road

...Continental have produced the Grand Prix tyre in mtb size. 26" x 1" It has the same tread pattern as the road tyre and is very light (c.200g) Foldable too - with a kevlar bead I rode them on my Specialised mtb over the summer on a commute (8 miles each way) and they are superb for use on the road. It is the closest to a road bike tyre that I have ever seen, is very responsive and feels fast! If you ride an mtb mostly on the road and can feel the energy sapping from your legs with big knobbly tyres, you could do far worse than get a pair of these! They seem very durable too and can be inflated to decent pressures too - I ran them at close to 100 psi They are quite rare in shops and I had to search through a few on line stores to find one that listed them and had them in stock.... Read review

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Advantages: Lightweight and fast, should be hard wearing...
Disadvantages: Expensive, but worth it !

.../Force combination, but these won - primarily on price - but also I don't think I really need the super-high performance of those all-out race tyres, at the cost of a reduced puncture protection... The GP4000 has a patented "Vectran" anti-puncture layer to prevent punctures - certainly none this morning ! It supposedly has more cut resistance than aramid, and is five times as strong as steel ! Vectran fibers are used by NASA for space mission airbags and tow ropes, so should stop those little glass slivers, pins & flints that can ruin a morning's ride ! The GP4000 is available in 650x23 size (ERTRO 23-571) in black only (for you time trialists), 700x23 (ERTRO 23-622) in Black, Gold, Silver, Bronze, Metallic Blue, Blue, Conti yellow, Red(my choice) & Lemon yellow, plus a slightly wider 700x25 (ERTRO 25-622) in Black, Black Reflective, Blue, Red & Lemon... Read review

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Advantages: Light weight, durable well made tyres
Disadvantages: A little pricey

..., and the tread pattern is very similar to the Comp 24. They have Michelin's Silica Compound which helps decrease rolling resistance, and also have a 127 Tpi (threads per inch) cord casing that is found on all other Michelin top of the range tyres. Even though these are sized at 26 x 2.2 (52 x 559), they are a smaller in width than the 2.2 size you would find on the Michelin DH tyres (54 x 559). The size of these is more comparable to a set of Maxxis 2.1 XC tyres. Installation was pretty straight forward, with the only serious effort needed when mounting the tyre to my rims, as like other Michelin tyres, the beading can be a tight fit when put on for the first time. My first impressions on using them were that they felt incredibly grippy. They are stable when cornering hard, and braking heavily. If you choose to use the directional tread pattern... Read review

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