50mm bike tire recommendations
Hey everyone,
I’m currently running Schwalbe G-One Bite 40mm and I’m thinking about moving up to 50mm for a bit more confidence off-road. Where I ride it’s not groomed gravel or proper official well-kept MTB trails, just typical unmaintained forest trails: holes, roots, loose rocks everywhere, some of them golf-ball sized. On descents, it feels pretty sketchy with the 40s.
The problem is, I don’t have long stretches of continuous/unbroken nature. It’s more like short nature pockets in between civilization so, I still need to transverse a few roads (tarmac and cobbles). So I’m trying to find something that’s still reasonably fast rolling on road. I was hoping to find something up to 20 watts of rolling resistance. I think I saw somewhere that my tires are around 25 watts, so some improvement in this area would also be nice.
I started investigating tires on bicyclerollingresistance.com website and started looking at measured knob height (center and edge), trying to pick something with more bite than what I have now. But the more I read, the more I see people saying knob height alone doesn’t mean much and tread pattern matters more. At this point I’m not even sure what I should be looking for.
These are the ones I’ve selected for the moment:
Alternatives slightly above 20 watts:
- Continental Race King Performance ShieldWall 50
- Pirelli Gravel M (tested in 45mm, but there’s a 50mm version too; hopefully they perform similarly)
Maybe other brands or models I should be considering that aren’t on BRR?
But honestly… I don’t really know what I’m doing. I started by filtering by wattage and knob height, but it seems the tread design or compounds are even more important.
So, in conclusion, what I’m after is:
- More confidence on rough, loose forest descents (I'm not doing jumps. Let's say, more like XC)
- 50mm volume
- Still decent on road sections
- Not feeling like I’m dragging an anchor on pavement
If anyone has experience with these in real, messy forest conditions (not nice smooth gravel), I’d appreciate some advice and recommendations. What should I actually be looking at when choosing?
Thanks in advance!
I think @dynamosunshirt will probably have lots of ideas, but I also just went through this selection process and kind of fucked up. I also ride messy forest conditions, but often do so on my round town commuter - so like you I was optimizing for on and off road. After a similar amount of hemming and hawing, I ended up deciding to flash out on the Rene Herse 44mm Manastash Ridge TC Tire and have been underwhelmed. I really like Lael Wilcox and looked at the Fleecer Ridge before deciding they wouldn't fit (I have a Surly, but on 700c, "fatties decidedly do not fit fine". Full disclosure, I bought them because they seemed competitive with the other top tires and I liked the look. I have changed my mind since throwing them on my bike and now feel like I'm riding around on a little Walmart cruiser. The Manastash Ridge fits ended up leaving plenty of room - they Fleecers would have fit - but after riding on them for like 4 months I feel confident that even my WTB Raddlers were better. It's the last time I'll choose something for aesthetics.
When my friends who ride much more than I do saw them I was given a pretty bad time. One rides the Schwalbe G-One R Pro 50 and threw on a pair of Continental Dubnital - but the latter doesn't really commute around town on that bike. I just texted the last buddy to see what he rides and will let you know what he says. I've been amongst the trees with all of them and obviously the Continentals handle the rough the best, but the mystery tire is a pretty consistently in second. Could be ride ability though. I'll see if any of them have thoughts on their rides.
I'd love to know what you end up going with and how it goes. Keep us in the loop!
Thanks for the summon! Honestly, once wattage comes up in the conversation it's optimized beyond my knowledge... but I do happen to currently absolutely love the 53mm Vittoria Mezcals on my touring/commuter bike. They've held up for years and thousands of miles, almost all of which was at least partially loaded (I have a habit of bringing bocce balls to parks in a pannier, and I often grocery shop and bring our compost to a nearby farm as I pick up our CSA to give you an idea).
Schwalbe has a great rep in the touring community, thanks to the Marathon Plus and somewhat the Marathon Mondials lately. But I know some folks think their quality has slipped as of late. The Schwalbe Big Bens that my bike's previous owner installed treated me well for several years as well, but those are pretty big. But don't be fooled; rolling resistance and tire size are not strongly correlated. I always suggest going bigger because the air basically works as suspension!
Be skeptical if anyone claims to have comprehensive knowledge of lots of different tires. At some level, that's impossible, because it takes YEARS of even heavy use to wear through any decent bike tire. Of course, if someone gets a lot of flats from a certain tire that's a useful data point. But most people can really only experience the longevity of any given tire a handful of times per decade!
Thanks for the comment! Sadly, the Vittoria Mezcals don't have 50mm, only 44mm. But that could be an alternative too, not sure.
My current Schwalbe tires are actually awesome, I never got a puncture in 3 years and they are basically new. I would recommend Schwalbe to my friends, for sure.
Honestly, I don’t really care about watts either since I’m not racing. But I was thinking, if my current 40mm tires are around 25 watts, and I move up to 50mm, they’ll be heavier and higher volume, so, maybe choosing a faster-rolling tire could help balance things out a bit.
I’m just hoping the bigger size won’t make a noticeable difference in rolling resistance. My current tires are actually quite okay, not too slow but also not that fast.
Thanks for the comment! Then, I'll be quite interested to know what your friends recommend! But it is exactly my conundrum, it feels specially hard to find something decent. I guess lab tests maybe don't tell the whole story.
I also came across an interesting recommendation, use a front tire with more grip and a rear tire with a lower-profile tread. This setup provides greater stability and confidence on descents, while reducing rolling resistance on paved roads. Since the rear tire handles most of the power transfer and traction, choosing a faster-rolling tire in the back can noticeably improve overall efficiency. Or so it seems.
I thought choosing a tire would be easier :O
Yeah, I think it's just like going to the grocery store and seeing like 15 versions of the same thing. Honestly they're all probably super similar but it can make it really hard to decide. I waffled for like 2 months before pulling the trigger.
My friend has reported back that he uses the Panarace ks+ 700x50c. He's been a bike shop mechanic for like 15 years so I always trust his opinion. But also I think those are probably just his favorite. Captain Crunch vs Rice Crispies you know?
And the varied grip is really common in mountain biking too. Like the popular Butcher/Purgatory combo.
I'm really excited to hear what you go with!
Thanks to you and your friend! Actually, now I'm not sure if 50mm will fit my frame in the rear. I had to ask the manufacturer and waiting for a reply, so if doesn't fit proably I'll need to go to 45mm.
The SK+ is a cool suggestion, and while searching it seems there's a new "version" to the Panaracer GravelKing, which is the X1 R which provides a bit more or a bit of knob height compared to the SK, but the difference is neglible, like the SK is better 0.5 watts. Does you friend know anything about the X1 R?
This is the one:
https://www.bicyclerollingresistance.com/cx-gravel-reviews/panaracer-gravel-king-x1-r
But yes, when I get to the decision, I think I'll come back and write a comment also to leave a small review of the tires for future readers :)