As I commented earlier, I thought I'd update here.
My Scwalbe Pro One 25mm got a really thick puncture. It sealed and after having put as much pressure in as my mini-pump allowed, the ride continued unabated. Result. However, over the following week, it wouldn't hold more than about 70psi without spewing goo everywhere, so I admitted defeat and slung a tube in. To my surprise, I noticed the ride had got immediately harsher. The transition from having taken the tubes out in the first place was less notable, but having gone back[wards] the A/B comparison was more obvious.
Now, having realised that this was a puncture too far (as I wished to remain tubeless) I started hunting down more of the same. Only Bike-discount.de had the Pro Ones in stock (when I was looking) but here's where I made a leap of faith - I pressed buy on the 28mm.
About this difference, I am in no doubt - If you can go larger, do. At 90psi rear/80psi front (I'm 16st) which is 10psi down on what I was running on the 25mm, the difference is a revelation. For starters, I've ridden over a few familiar raised manhole covers and whilst I know they are there, I'd no longer bother to avoid them. Road buzz is considerably more muted - Not just a bit, but a lot. I've also had zero punctures and this being rural farming country, that's good going over the 300 miles since the 28mm were fitted. There's not even any cut marks. Weird.
For me and this is the clincher (pun intended) it's just so much easier to keep speed up. I've ridden with the same chaps week in, week out throughout the winter, but suddenly I'm finding I'm in the lead for a lot longer AND my Strava PBs are dropping regularly. Now, I try to do no more than keep cadence above 80rpm and HR above 145BPM for 1-1.5hrs. I don't care how fast I'm going, because it's work that matters and on The Fen Edge, wind is the leveller. However, there haven't been any 'lucky' tail winds recently* and we had a few of those last year, but I'm being honest when I say, that overnight I'm faster on the 28mm. I've done the same routes in opposing directions, but I can correlate the extra 'gold' to when the 28mm Pro Ones were fitted.
There isn't a cat in hells chance I tell my ride mates that stat, but none-the-less, it is so and anyway; I'm still riding to the same cadence/HR I always do, so I'm not kidding myself. Looking at the KTM, I see I've easily got room for 30mm tyres in there and I'm wondering....
Russell
*During one such lucky tail wind last year, a mate set a KOM over a particular, long bridge. We don't have many climbs on The Fen Edge, so bridges are important, capiche? It wasn't a short arsed bridge (50sec from one end to the other) , so GPS accuracy wasn't as much of an issue, as it would be over those 10 second segments you see. Some burk protested it (he had the KOM) and said mates time was removed. Foul! I cry, because the KOM was almost certainly (given the holders lack of other KOMs) set with just such a lucky tail wind. I'm not about to get anywhere near these times, so it's a non-issue personally, but given all of the moped riders out there, it does seem a little harsh that such an achievement can be repealed on the say-so of one individual. Still, Strava is a handy training tool for me.
