I ride for pleasure and leisure rather than having to commute every day. I like to explore the Surrey countryside using the less-well-travelled roads, bridleways and paths and more often than not am accompanied by my 2-year old strapped into a child seat. Although the CityRides which came with my Agattu were fine in the summer, they're not so great now that winter is truly here. The leaves have all fallen from the trees and everything has turned to mulch
To give you some idea of my preferred riding conditions, here's some pics...
I didn't want to loose the low rolling resistance of the CityRides when I'm on-road, but I did want something which was a bit more competent when I'm out exploring on mud and gravel. After quite a lot of umming and ahhing looking at different tyres I decided to give the Continental Travel Contacts a try. I got them from All Terrain cycles as they were the only place I could find that had them in stock at 622-42 sizes. They cost me £21.95 each.
On the roads, they feel almost exactly the same as the CityRides did. I was a bit concerned that they may not corner as well, but I honestly can't tell the difference at all. Off the roads, the difference is amazing. The nobbles on the sides provide a surprising amount of grip in mud, leaves and gravel and that in turn makes the steering a lot more responsive and means that I'm not spinning my back wheel whenever I try to put a bit of power on. With the cityrides I found that the front wheel would follow any ruts in the path, whereas the nobbles on the TravelContacts give enough grip for the wheel to climb out of the ruts. With the cityrides, I lost the backend of the bike a couple of times when climbing very minor obstacles (dropped kerbs etc) but this hasn't happened to me yet with the TravelContacts, again, the nobbles providing enough grip for the back wheel to climb.
The TravelContacts also seem to have one more benefit which I wasn't expecting. They don't pick up leaves. With the Cityrides my mudguards soon became packed full of damp leaves which stuck to the tyre when it rolled over them. I think the side nobbles are once again to thank for this they break the vacuum where the leaf sticks to the tyre leaving the leaves on the ground where they should be.
So... do I like them.... You betcha!!
To give you some idea of my preferred riding conditions, here's some pics...
I didn't want to loose the low rolling resistance of the CityRides when I'm on-road, but I did want something which was a bit more competent when I'm out exploring on mud and gravel. After quite a lot of umming and ahhing looking at different tyres I decided to give the Continental Travel Contacts a try. I got them from All Terrain cycles as they were the only place I could find that had them in stock at 622-42 sizes. They cost me £21.95 each.
On the roads, they feel almost exactly the same as the CityRides did. I was a bit concerned that they may not corner as well, but I honestly can't tell the difference at all. Off the roads, the difference is amazing. The nobbles on the sides provide a surprising amount of grip in mud, leaves and gravel and that in turn makes the steering a lot more responsive and means that I'm not spinning my back wheel whenever I try to put a bit of power on. With the cityrides I found that the front wheel would follow any ruts in the path, whereas the nobbles on the TravelContacts give enough grip for the wheel to climb out of the ruts. With the cityrides, I lost the backend of the bike a couple of times when climbing very minor obstacles (dropped kerbs etc) but this hasn't happened to me yet with the TravelContacts, again, the nobbles providing enough grip for the back wheel to climb.
The TravelContacts also seem to have one more benefit which I wasn't expecting. They don't pick up leaves. With the Cityrides my mudguards soon became packed full of damp leaves which stuck to the tyre when it rolled over them. I think the side nobbles are once again to thank for this they break the vacuum where the leaf sticks to the tyre leaving the leaves on the ground where they should be.
So... do I like them.... You betcha!!
Nigel.
