race tyres

The Giant P-SLR1s are lightweight and grippy clinchers for fast road riding.

These tyres are built around 120tpi casings and they're unusual in that they're front and rear specific. They're both dual-compound, the front one designed to be stickier for extra grip while the rear one is designed to be fast and durable. As you'll doubtless know, your rear tyre generally wears faster than the front one so the idea seems sound to us.

Bontrager's road 'R' tyres come in a range of four options - top of the tree being the R4 with these R3s a notch below.

Out on the road the low weight of 185g per tyre makes them easy to whip up to speed while the 120tpi casing has enough suppleness to iron out small road imperfections, even pumped up to their 125psi maximum.

Vittoria's Open Pave EVO CGs ride like tubulars with the convenience of a wire on and should satisfy the most demanding of four seasons racers thanks to ultra high density 320 tpi casing, puncture resistant Kevlar belt and very modest weight. However, ours initially demanded the mighty “Speed Lever” to persuade the ultra supple casings aboard a common or garden Mavic wheelset so resist the desire to mount them in the heat of competition unless you have a finely honed knack for seating stubborn tyres in seconds.