My Team Cofidis De Rosa Merak came equipped with 700×28 Vittoria Rubino Pro tires. Bike-room.com set up the tires with tubes. (The wheels are Fulcrum Airbeat 400 DB, an OEM wheel that is similar (but heavier) to the Fulcrum Wind 42)
The rear tire started showing wear through the tread at 2050 miles and I retired it 30 miles later. I attribute the wear to my weight (~211 lbs – 97.7 kg).
The front tire, after almost 3300 miles seems to have a lot of tread left. In the center of the tire, there is still a trace of the flash.
I replaced the rear tire with a 700×28 Continental Grand Prix 5000 S TR and went tubeless. The Continental tire has a little over 1200 miles on it and the wear indicators are still showing. I did get a puncture, a 1.5 mm long cut in the tire (probably from a glass shard), that the Orange Seal Endurance sealant sealed.
For safety’s sake (see this video of my descent down Conzelman Road in the Marin Headlands), I decided to patch the tire from the inside. I removed the tire, cleaned out the sealant and put a round Rema patch over the hole. I’m wondering what other high performance tubeless road tires there are that are slightly more puncture and cut resistant.
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