20 Years Ago: Start of Wide-Tire Revolution
{% quote(link_text=“Read here”) %} Our finding—that high pressure wasn’t needed for speed—changed everything. Before, tires were either wide or fast. If you wanted to go fast, you put on narrow tires and inflated them to max pressure. Here’s why: With tires, you have to choose two of the following three:
- high pressure
- supple casing
- wide tire
Out article [in the Bicycle Quarterly 17, the Autumn 2006 edition] concluded: “Our findings point to a new direction for performance bicycles. For most cyclists, wide, supple tires at low pressures offer more speed, better comfort, increased versatility and improved safety than the currently favored narrow high-pressure tires. However, this type of wide, fast tire is not currently available. Hopefully, our results will persuade manufacturers to produce the ‘ultimate’ tires.”
That was a big statement from two young guys who weren’t even part of the bike industry. {% end %}