way back, a very long time ago...
It was a big fast flat sharp cornered crit. I was working the race in Neutral Support. A guy in the P/1/2 race was about my height, but had 20-30 pounds of muscle on me. A big dude.
He was riding a cannondale (I was too at the time). And he had absurdly fat tires. 28 contis.
I asked him about that, why such fat tires.
"So I can corner with the little light guys."
Light bulb.
Of course there were plenty of reasons why i sucked at cornering, and probably by most estimation and comparison to many of my peers I still stuck at it.
But putting fatter tires on changed my riding forever. I've been given a handful of skinny tires since then, and have ridden them, but all they do is remind me: "Big tall guys need fat tires."
It is very much en vogue right now to talk about running fatter tires. OMG 25s ARE SO MUCH BIGGER! I'M SCARED. Pusses.
23s suck. Always have, always will. They might be fine for a 150 pound roadie on a perfect surface, but when you push the envelope in height or weight, dynamics change quite a bit.
This is one of those things where I can point to one person in particular. Who was it? Not a clue. But his comment was so matter of fact, and said with such little pretense that it had a huge impact.
Why aren't we racing CX on 28c tires anymore? Skinny higher pressure is better right? Mt bikes, 1.95s RULED and everyone ran them pretty damn hard yo. Why is the road bike so different? (rhetorical purely).
with all the fat tire talk i felt compelled to get this out there. stupid bike makers that won't let you put a 28-30c tire on a road bike... dumb
heddwch
G
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