Pirelli Cinturato Evo TLR

The Pirelli Cinturato Evo TLR tyre offers an impressive blend of grip, durability and reasonable speed that works well on road and is surprisingly capable for light off-road use. It’s not a cheap tyre, but its performance and durability make it one that’s well worth considering for year-round use.

Pirelli’s newest endurance tyre made headlines when it was launched because it promised sizes up to a whopping 55mm. Luckily Pirelli sent us more modest 32mm tyres to test, as I don’t own a bike which could accommodate 700×55 tyres.

A few months after launch, I can’t find the 55mm variant available anywhere for sale in the UK and it’s not listed on Pirelli’s UK website in anything over a rather-more-conventional 40mm, so perhaps the demand wasn’t really there. Although tyre sizes – like cassettes – have been getting gradually wider for years, so maybe we’ll see them one day.

Pirelli told us that the Cinturato Evo wasn’t just a new tyre – it was a ‘Whole New Category’ of tyres: road enduro. What’s that, then? Well, it’s a tyre that blends road efficiency, light-gravel grip and enhanced durability. And no-one else has made tyres aimed at doing that before, you say?

I think the claim of a whole new category is something that most other bike tyre manufacturers would probably take issue with – we’ve tested plenty of tyres here which cover those bases in recent years, so we might park that piece of marketing, and let’s get on with finding out if the tyres are any good.

You can often get an idea of what tyres will be like before you’ve even fitted them to your bike. Out of the box here, the Cinturato Evos felt fairly substantial, reasonably tacky and had a smell exactly like a car tyre shop. This is unusual – in my experience, bike tyres tend to smell different to car tyres, presumably because the constituents differ from what goes into a car tyre. It’s not an unpleasant smell anyway.

It didn’t feel like a lightweight tyre, and we weighed one at 423g in the tested 32mm tubeless size, which is a little more (c3.1%) than the claimed 410g – you can stop reading if you’re a weight weeny. They certainly feel more like an endurance tyre than a supple race tyre when you take them out the box.

We’ve often found that Pirelli tyres can be a tight fit, and sure enough, these were a bit of a pig to get onto my wheels. Warmer tyres tend to go on more easily, and it was up in the 30s when I fitted them, but it still involved words best uttered behind closed garage doors out of earshot of the kids. Once on, though, and they inflated easily with just a track pump. Pirelli doesn’t explicitly say whether these are suitable for use on hookless rims, but I had no issues with my hookless rims.

I measured them when pumped to 60psi and they were were only 30.5mm across (fitted to a rim with an internal width of 21.3mm). This made them no wider than the 30mm Schwalbe tyres which they replaced. This – together with the effectively near-slick tread – made me wonder how effective these tyres would be on less than perfect surfaces.

At this point, let’s talk about the compound that Pirelli has used for these tyres. Pirelli says that Smart Evo AS is its top compound for tyres where grip, comfort and endurance are the priority. You’ll notice outright speed is not in that list, and Pirelli’s P-Zero range of race tyres use a different formulation to prioritise low rolling resistance. As far as I can see, these are the only tyres using this specific compound at present.

Smart Evo AS uses over 50% material that is either recycled or ‘bio-based’. The latter includes natural rubber, biochemicals and vegetable oils. The natural rubber is certified as being sourced wholly from sustainable forestry. Sustainability has become a valuable marketing buzzword, of course, and other tyre companies are also increasingly touting the improvements they’re making in this area.

The result, says Pirelli, is tyres ‘which excel in all weather and road conditions’. For the first few weeks of testing, I primarily used them on the road and the weather was consistently good. Grip, as you’d hope, was plentiful in those conditions, giving great confidence even when riding fast. We don’t have a lab to measure rolling resistance at road.cc, but my subjective impression was of a tyre that was neither especially racy nor sluggish – not as quick as something like the Cadex Classic 28 but much more sprightly than some of the heavy-duty endurance tyres on the market that can feel really wooden and draggy.

The surprise for me was how capable the Cinturato Evo tyres were in less than perfect conditions. When you’re climbing a 20% gradient on a grotty lane, out of the saddle, in teeming rain – that sort of thing. And you know what? They’re excellent. And not just on roads – I used them on tow paths and fire roads where they handled and gripped better than I’d have expected any slick tyre to do.

The press release had some stuff about how the tread pattern is inspired by its Scorpion Trail III motorbike tyre, and that’s why it works well on tarmac as well as on looser surfaces. Call me a cynic, but I think the tread pattern here is mostly intended to make it look a bit like a motorbike tyre, and probably makes minimal difference to how well it grips on the rough stuff. I’d assign the credit for their grippiness down to the compound.

Of course, there are limits. Once it gets muddy then you’d definitely want some more tread on your tyre, and some shoulder knobs too. But for rides that include bad tarmac, wet roads and some light gravel, these do a super job.

One of the other selling points Pirelli is keen to emphasise is durability. I’d expect these to be strong performers in this regard, and they’ve shown almost no visible wear during testing. Pirelli claims the Cinturato Evo will last 40% longer than the Cinturato Velo, which is a big jump. At this sort of price, longevity is obviously very desirable!

My test tyres have also shrugged off lanes strewn with fresh hedge-trimmings and I’ve seen no sign that anything has managed to get through them during testing. Pirelli’s description of its TechWall+ casing sounds much like what’s in plenty of other tyres (60tpi fabric, a protective layer that runs from bead to bead, and a further nylon breaker layer in the middle) but it seems to work well.

Value

The list price of these tyres is £74.99, so they’re a fiver more than the Vittoria Corsa N.EXT and £15 less than Conti’s top all-season tubeless offering, the GP5000 AS TR.

We really rated both of those tyres, and I have a set of the Vittorias. I am a big fan of the feel of Vittoria tyres and I’d say the Pirelli tyres have a bit less of a lively feel to them, but probably grip a little better in suboptimal conditions.

Check out our best road bike tyres buyer’s guide for more options.

Conclusion

I don’t really think these tyres represent a whole new category, as Pirelli would have it, but in the category of tyres for year-round use across crappy tarmac and mild off-road, they are an excellent option. I wouldn’t race on them, but I’d be happy training, commuting or touring on them.

Verdict

Strong contender for year-round riding, with impressive grip and durability

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