Stay Faster: 5 Road Bike Tires for Your Winter Rides
For the best winter riding experience, choose the right tire for your road bike. In this article, we present five tire options that are ideal for winter road cycling. These tires have been specifically designed to give you confidence and reliability, so you can ride comfortably on winter roads.
Stay Faster is a short practical guide series by Faster Bike Blog. Check out the blog for in-depth coverage of all things performance cycling equipment.
You can follow us here on Medium, Threads, Instagram and Strava. We also offer a podcast.
It is all about puncture resistance in winter
As winter blankets the roads with snow, ice, and slush in the Northern Hemisphere, road race cyclists face the daunting task of maintaining their training regimen without compromising on safety and performance. During these colder months, the priority for selecting bike tires changes significantly. We likely do not aim for the two fastest tires available for road racing.
Instead of focusing on rolling resistance and speed, the emphasis turns to grip and puncture resistance. After all, we want to do our Long Slow Distance (LSD) or Zone 2 (Z2) rides outdoors in the fresh air instead of staring at a wall or screen for hours on end. And we’d rather not have to stand by the roadside, freezing and trying to change a tire with frozen fingers.
Therefore, we recommend selecting tires with high puncture resistance and wet grip that are still fast enough to achieve your Strava goals. Here are our top five tire recommendations for winter cycling:
- Most robust: Continental Hardshell & Pirelli Cinturato Velo TLR
- Fastest: Continental Grand Prix 5000 All Season TR
- Cheapest: Tufo Comtura 4 TR
The tires with the highest puncture resistance and wet grip
One helpful website for exploring bike tires is www.bicyclerollingresistance.com. With a Pro account, you can sort and select tires based on specific criteria. We used this feature to find the tires with the most puncture resistance and wet grip for road cycling.
Based on our selection all tires had the highest test values in the wet grip test, with a slight advantage of the Continental Grand Prix 5000 All Season TR.
The Pirelli Cinturato Velo TLR and the Continental Gator Hardshell were at the top of the list in terms of puncture resistance.
A special sealant for lower temperatures is advisable for tubeless setups in winter
When choosing between Pirelli and Continental tires, it’s important to note that the former is tubeless while the latter uses a traditional clincher tube system. The choice ultimately depends on your personal preference. If you plan to ride tubeless during winter conditions, it’s recommended to opt for a sealant that can withstand low temperatures, such as the Orange Seal Subzero Sealant. In general, endurance-type sealants tend to perform better in colder temperatures.
Not surprisingly, the higher puncture resistance is achieved by adding more material to the tire. But of course this comes with a penalty in rolling resistance, as the physics would suggest.
How much speed are you trading for puncture resistance?
Finally, we’re still a little obsessed with speed, and this ultimate chart allows you to choose how important a fast set-up is to you. Of the safest options, the Pirelli Cinturato Velo TLR appears slightly faster and offers similar puncture protection compared to the Continental Gator Hardshell.
If you still want to go fast and maybe not ride in all weathers, the Continental Grand Prix All Season seems a good choice and may even last you through the spring group rides before the races start.
Last but not least, the Tufo Comtura 4 TR is a lesser known brand with an attractive price tag, which could be the perfect compromise for many of you.
This concludes our recommendations and we wish you all the best for a great winter season. Don’t forget to do some strength training. Cross-training, for example on cross-country skis, is never a bad idea!
If you are curious about the physics of the rolling resistance of bicycle tyres, we have a long-form article on the subject prepared for you over at the Faster Bike Blog.
Stay Faster is a short practical guide series by Faster Bike Blog. Check out the blog for in-depth coverage of all things performance cycling equipment.
You can follow us here on Medium, Threads, Instagram and Strava. We also offer a podcast.
