Vittoria

Great grip and feel, plus long lasting and stops punctures

This tire has more side-knob than you would imagine. In deep sand/scree/dirt, don't expect it to do much until you lean into the side knobs for bite. This is certainly a purpose built XC tire that would be perfect on big days with lots of gravel connectors. I raced this for 50 miles in Lake City, Colorado and had no issues with flats. Sidewall looks very thin, but I consider this very much a race tire.

Putting this tire on a lightweight hardtail feels the most appropriate. Something that you can take to a gravel race or hit singletrack with. Definitely much faster than the Maxxis offerings I have tested/used/raced.

I bought this tire for my gravel bike. I have been using the Goodyear Contender tire (40mm) which has been great, but wanted something a little smoother as my tread would wear out anyway. Since I use my bike 90% of the time for commuting on mostly paved roads and bumpy bike trails, it didn't make sense to have a tire with treads. This has been a great choice, as it can run over anything but also picks up the speed of my bike and has less rolling resistance (almost as quick as my road bike with 28mm tires). I have also used it on gravel roads during weekends and it does a good job and you can fly on the roads. However, I wouldn't recommend it for climbing steep terrain on loose material. That said I did climb some steeper gradients on gravel and it was fine. Works great in the rain. Good tire!

I was running Vittoria Corsas for three years, but after a particularly nasty run of punctures, was ready to give up what is an exceptional ride for the joy of 'flatless' rides. What a surprise that after mounting my new Rubinos (admittedly, something of a struggle) and using Vittoria's tire pressure app, I found the ride quite similar to the Corsa. And while I lost approximately up to 12 seconds per mile, the loss of speed is well worth the very sizeable increase in reliability.