The first thing I did was buy a strap-on bottle cage mount, which let me carry 2 bottles of water (how novel of an idea to put more than one set of mounts on a bike). The new drivetrain gives me a lower climbing gear for all the dirt roads and trails around here. I also went to 32mm slicks for the road and light dirt/gravel, which added some comfort and durability without really slowing things down. But on the dirt, I had stuck with 33mm race tires, more specifically the clement/donnelly MXP. They are great tires, providing excellent traction and low rolling resistance, but they are really more suited toward racing. They have a thin casing, wear pretty quickly, and for gravel and general off road riding they are a little skinny.
Outside of the fall, I don't really ride that bike too often. If I'm riding on the road, well, duh, ride the road bike, and if I'm off-road a mountain bike on trails tends to be a lot more fun. But a few weeks ago I was headed to Lethbridge and needed to choose one bike to bring for a week. Both the road and mtb riding are fairly limited in the area, although you can ride in a straight line on a flat road pretty much forever. So I figured the cross bike would add some variety and let me go to a few new places off-pavement while still being efficient on the road.
As there are a lot of roads where the pavement ends that worked out pretty well and I did a good amount of "gravel grinding" over the course of the week. But, like I mentioned the CX tires are a little skinny for that and as they were pretty worn down I decided to look around a bit for different tires, with the hope I could fit something a little bigger. There isn't much room in the chainstays but it seemed like a 35-38mm wide tire would work.
There isn't a lot of selection up in Lethbridge but I found a specialized tracer 38mm gravel tire and a kenda happy medium. I figured that the file tread rear would pair well with the light full tread up front, but the tracer has pretty low profile tread knobs and not as much cornering grip. I much prefer to have a little more bite up front while the rear can be lower profile for the improvement in rolling resistance.
The tracer:
and the happy medium
I think a pair of the tracers would work well on gravel and dirt roads, or the tracer could be used as a rear with a more aggressive front tire, but it was not quite was I was looking for, and not a great match with the happy medium. So that left me looking for different front tire, and I went with the old standby- the WTB nano
The nano is labeled 40mm and claims to be a fast rolling race tire for XC, cross, gravel, the tour divide, etc. It has a nearly continuous center rib and pretty chunky knobs. So far, so good, but I've only been out on them a few times.
Initial impressions are that they are a little heavier and sluggish compared to the 33mm clements, which, yeah, they are heavier tires. Grip is fine, but doesn't seem any better than the MXPs. So for racing, I will likely go back to those. But that wasn't the point of buying these. The extra volume provides some nice cushion, and by proxy I assume better flat protection. Stability at higher speeds on gravel is much better. So for a general riding around combo, it seems to be a good setup so far. Really the only thing I'm [still] missing is the tubeless setup. The nano is compatible as is the specialized, but I don't think I have the tubeless version of the kenda. My plan is to buy a set of tuebless wheels for this race season, and clement, I mean Donnelly MXPs will likely be going straight on those, but I expect to try to setup the "gravel" tires later on.
As far as clearance goes, these measure on the small side and I don't have much more room. Up front the nano comes in at 38.5mm on my mavic, and fork does have some room to spare
The happy medium casing measures 36.5mm but the side knobs stick out a bit more making it an even 40mm:
Very little room to spare. The nano cornering knobs basically don't stick out at all, so it should fit fine in the back too despite being a bigger tire. Wider wheels, like the tubeless hed ardennes + I would really like, might cause a clearance issue, however.
Followup review:
I now have a few rides on these tires over a variety of surfaces and think I can make some comments now. First thing, bigger tires are nice. I still have tubes and am setting them at 29psi front and 36 rear, which seems about right. I went down some rocky stuff pretty fast and didn't pinch flat although I did hear some dings so I don't think I want to try lower without tubeless wheels.
Second thing, yeah there isn't a lot of traction from the semi-slick rear on loose/steep stuff. Which was not a surprise. I found myself getting tire lockup pretty easily descending singletrack but the side knobs bite once you get some lean angle and I was able to control the sliding pretty well. Going down a steep, loose trail I did really have to depend on the front tire to do all the hraking while getting me around the corners but it handled it well.
A concern I have about the nano is that the side knobs don't stick out very far. But it's a cross bike with a high seat post so it seems pretty unlikely I could ever get "past" the cornering knobs. The center rib is nearly continuous so it rolls well, and I suppose I could go with a second one out back and not really lose anything. Once you get any lean angle, it has good grip because the tread is fairly continuous all the way across with no open intermediate space. I've found that with a CX or high-posted XC bike it's hard to get over to big cornering knobs and instead you spend time in that middle zone, so if there are no tread blocks.. no grip. For me that hurts confidence in the front tire and it seems like it's always on the verge of washing out. On the other hand a tire with more defined side knobs should have more outright grip, once you are over there. So if you have a dropper post and can really get the bike leaned over and rail corners go with that style of a tread over something like the nano.
So, pretty good so far. Comfy, seems durable, rolls well, good grip. Main thing I'm not sure about is whether I should have bothered with the semi-slick rear over just a pair of nanos. And I still probably won't race on these due to the extra weight.
Follow up 2:
The happy medium was way too on/off as far as grip went. stood up in a straight line, it was easy to get to slip or slide. I would actually lean the bike over while braking in a straight line to get better bite. And then it seemed like the tire had more cornering grip than the nano, which, looking at the knobs, makes sense. So I took it off and put that tracer on the rear. The light center treading gives better traction, and it might actually roll a touch faster because those side knobs would still touch the ground a little, especially in softer stuff. It doesn't have the cornering bite, but it's still ok and matches the nano front pretty well. Overall, a solid tire combo for general riding, dirt, and gravel.
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