Show notes
Talking gravel tires this week with Jan Heine of Rene Herse Cycles. Drawing on decades of experience and very specific testing, Jan walk us through all the tire considerations from size to pressure to knob patterns. This episode is a must-listen for any gravel cyclist. Episode sponsor: PNW Components (use code 'thegravelride' for 15% off) Support the podcast Rene Herse Cycles Website Rene Herse Cycles Instagram Rene Herse Cycles - Jan Heine takes us on a gravel tire deep dive 00:00:00 - 00:05:00 Hello and welcome to another edition of the gravel ride podcast. I'm your host Craig. Dalton. This week's episode is brought to you our friends at P. N. W. Components. I got to sit down with Erin Kershaw and one of the CO founders of peon w a couple episodes ago, and it was great to learn the back story of the company I've always been impressed as a customer from way back when as. To their customer service and I've been even more impressed by their products. I spoke a little bit more about the coast handlebar. I've been riding a few episodes ago but I wanted to add on the coast dropper post the suspended version. That's right. Not only am I in the dropper camp but I'm writing suspended post and I've been really excited about how it's been performing. I've had a bit of a bad. And while I keep the pressure quite high because I don't want a lot of movement in it when it does move I realized that I've probably taken a pretty substantial hit on the back of my bike, and this is really saving my body. I'm a big advocate of configuring your bike to support you for longer and longer journeys and I think taking the edge off really. Falls into that camp. So I've been super jazzed by the coast dropper suspended post. So head on over to pin W components, dot com, and check out the product line that they're offering and see if anything they're offering helps you get where you need to go with your current bike set-up gravel ride listeners can use the code the gravel ride for fifteen percent off their order. So guys you to click in and grab those handlebars because we're on for an awesome ride today. got. Yon. Haina from Rene air cycles coming to talk to us about tires. I don't think there's a single episode IV recorded that I've learned more than in this conversation with John It. All kicked off in episode for of in the dirt where we discussed an article yon had posted on the Rene our website blog entitled wise seven hundred c wheels don't roll faster Randall and I, both had our own takes on the article but suffice it to say it was extremely thought provoking I got a ton of emails and a ton. Of comments on facebook about our conclusions and it was a natural place for me to go to talk to Yon and say, Hey, why don't you come on the podcast and talk us through all the different things that went into that blog post and all the different things you've kind of accumulated in terms of tire knowledge over the last decade, we touch on rim sizes we talk about tire casings we talk about tire tread patterns, and we talk about tire inflation I'm going to warn you. I think this is one of those. Ads that you might need to listen to more than once in order to take it all in I know for me tires of been this journey of understanding and nailing down my tire pressure numbers has been something I've played around a ton with to try to get the personality of the bike that I'm looking for as Yon Concludes the conversation he highlights something I believe as well that the. Tire and wheel combination is very unique and important area of any gravel rig and it can dramatically change the performance personality and characteristics of your ride. So it's something don't be afraid to play around with try things that are radically different, try higher and lower tire pressures to figure out what the sweet spot is. Well, that's probably enough preamble. Let's dive right into this week's episode. Welcome to the show. Hi. Thank you for having me. I'm excited to talk to you too. DAD LOVES TO START OFF BY JUST getting a little bit about your background as a cyclist before we jump into learning a little bit more about your. Company. G. Yeah. Since liking on my life pretty much I grew up in Germany and there were eye I lived on the very popular route for for braces to train. So every weekend, there were these groups of five, six, seven people on the beautiful bikes you know flying by the House and it just seems so so we're learning. Mountain racing inside the racing, but they'll also. Always was thinking about what sort of behind the horizon always wanted to explore for the so Back in Germany I rode to visit friends all over Germany on weekends sort of taking off You know after after Joshua's in college and writing all day and You know exploring new places and that. So from that became yeah. The the long distance is just so appealing to see how far you could go and what you could see. 00:05:02 - 00:10:03 Amazing and that eventually transition to you becoming professional in the bike industry. How did that come about and? Rene was not your first company. I know the brand predates all of us. Yeah so What happened? Here in in in Washington we We have only limited on the roads because it's the mountains and valleys. We have some really really beautiful roads, but there's more and more traffic and we started wondering about the lines on the map that we had seen that Nobody was overwriting on we found these gravel roads and we. Started, exploring them and part of it was the bikes that we had back. Then we're not so useful for that. I started out with a touring bike with specialized try cross knobby tires thirty five millimeter seems huge at the time when we were racing on nineteen on the road. But. It wasn't quite the same feeling as writing on the road. The bike didn't perform the same tires to perform the same. It's we didn't have that. Feeling of almost effortless. You know gliding along that. They enjoyed so much. So the where if you fall starts starts and we finally realize that we need to. Basically racing bike for gravel. And the touring bike nothing bike and renita racing tires for gravel. And that was a consequence through the interest in long distance cycling random during I had done pears pairs. Famous, right. In France, one of the oldest bike races that became an amateur events at seven hundred, fifty miles. And has a long history and all the old riders and racers and Randall nurse. Telling me about these wonderful handmade made tires that they had the nineteen forty that rolled so fast and there were you know thirty five or even forty two movies as wide and. And nothing like that anymore and what a shame. So we started looking into making stuff like that. Again, I imported some very obscure tires from Japan called Mitsubushi Trim lines that We're very good start but we realized that could be improved and we started testing different tires figured out. What makes it? Realize that high pressure weren't necessary to roll past this time when we all wrote that like one, hundred, twenty, five years AJana twenty millimeter tires and we something realize that that's actually was slower than eighty PSI and the twenty millimeters what's lower than twenty five and that sort of set in motion. The whole revolution we publish the findings we talked to some guys were advising professional teams, and then suddenly you saw Servando and others experimenting with Wider Tyres, they went from twenty three to twenty five pressure's lower that was on the road side but we really want to do the gravel, and so you know twenty five didn't do it back. Then even the we called gravel grinders where twenty eight millimeter tires which is. We laugh about it. Now that we were riding other people were writing eighty PSI twenty, twenty, eight millimeter tires on gravel and. So we were you know we looked into the forty two we looked into the smaller wheeled sixty and all that. and. All those roads sort of led to to the trench spikes because back then in the mountains of the Alps. In France of course, most roads were gravel. So they didn't think of gravel writing. There was this writing and if she wants to do go up the DA or something like that you went on Garoppolo growth. And so the bikes without existed and there were quite sophisticated because. The, how to say the technology hasn't changed that much apart from carbon titanium but otherwise. Human bodies. Sort of are still the same now where fifty eight years ago. and the technology was really well developed by nineteen thirty. And filter pretty quickly down to bicycles like and that's where renting come in who was an airplane builder who worked on prototype aircraft. including the first thing to fly across the Atlantic compares to New York which. A few years after Charles. Lindbergh. But was against the win. So it was a lot harder. They took thirty six hours of non of flying and. Anyway the reindeer started making bikes because he was an avid cyclist and Vice. Where sort of the gravel bikes that we need with the big tires very lightweight basically racing bikes for gravel road, racing bikes, fenders, and racks for bringing a few things lights who riding at night. But still high-performance bikes touring bikes ranks. That's sort of opened our eyes of what was audible. 00:10:04 - 00:15:02 That's an amazing origin story. Can I ask you to describe sort of random nearing as a aspect of the sport because I think some of my listeners imagine many of them aren't familiar with what that term actually refers to. Well. Originally, it's a French term that basically just made heike and it was. Transferred, to bicycle. As going long distances on the bike Really you know high pay and the light load. So not carrying a tent and you know your kitchen sink but carrying a small bag and. Yeah. Pushing the boundaries software you could go there was Oregon the Nineties magazine Sevilla's you put all the challenge for hours. How far can you get in forty hours and all these reader it's and said, I went to the mall to from Leon back and all kinds of adventures. So it's sort of took off from there. It's really interesting to me looking at it because I clearly, it's the same. Spirit as what we associate with growl riding today and in many ways even more. So with these multi-day, super long events that Renner's tend towards. Yeah I mean it's really you know now we have a lot of them gravel tour divide. So mountain race things like that are are sort of going back to the roots of cycling of exploring places that we usually don't go and so on. So, and rendering became a little more established. They organize these events two, hundred, three, hundred, four, hundred, six, hundred, and one, thousand, two, hundred kilometer they called pervades, which means basically you get the diploma you have passed the test or something and how it works is the you check in at certain points to show that you've completed the whole course you get your card stamped and often it's a convenience stores you just you know get the receipt or something. And at the end, you can get the medal So that's the institutional part of the sport and it's also great fun. But more often we just had thousand miles is because we wanted to see where we can go. Once we set ourselves a challenge going from Seattle to the highest roads on Mount Saint Helen then to the highest roads on Mount Rainier and back in twenty four hours. So that was really fun project we finished with twelve minutes to spare and But one of the greatest memories. Of Riding Bikes in the cascade that I think there's a lot of stories out there for people who are interested in understanding Randy nearing a little bit more. It's it's seems like an amazing side of the sport and just a unique way of challenging yourself that doesn't involve necessarily pinning a number on it. It's from listening to you. It seems like it's really about. The adventure and setting a challenge to lower what your world around you. Yeah. Absolutely I mean the one thing that I really enjoy about random dorien. It's much more about teamwork because. I recorded, but it's not there's no winner. So first of all, just the fastest if you're the fastest, but you aren't any better than the others, but taking the for group of people comes in together the times the only report it to the minutes. So there's no sprint. Yeah. You know when I was racing was always you in the breakaway with three other guys and you're working well together and just sort of this feeling of almost loved like everybody's doing their part you're. Does Well oiled machine of of a baseline rotating, and then suddenly they signed a two one kilometer and you turn into end, you need to think about how can I out smart the other guys how can out sprint them and deep down I was always feeling like well, the other guys deserve to win just as much as I do but that's not how you racist. So rendering sort of allows that where you all across the finish line together and you know you like. Related and you did yeah and one of the four that I won other three say I'll shoot you know I should have. Stars in my sprint a little sooner or puts a little more into it or not taking that many pools earlier or stuff like that. You know they're no regret. Yeah and. That's the way I know I feel in the middle of pack of a gravel racism I'm happy to have completed the event and I really love that whether it's the first person in line or the last person at the end of the race. We all had that similar experience. We can enjoy ourselves talking about the roads we just conquered in the trails we just concord. That's really why grabble rating has taken off so much I mean gravel itself I find fascinating because the bike has a little more freedom to move around. So you can play with the bike into the more vs on the roads where if you break traction usually you go down. 00:15:02 - 00:20:11 So it's it's more prescriptive on the broke whereas on gravel. If you go to fast, you get the big slide and he said, well, I should call them slower next time And but I think the main thing is the competition is this but it's much more friendly. It's much more. You know nobody said, well, I can eighty nine I'm better than you because you came only ninety. Yeah absolutely. My brief foray into the sport of triathlon I distinctly remember sort of people wanting to race me for four hundred place at Ironman not even that probably way back of the pack, but you know what? I don't in a gravel race I don't look at the guy next to me on a climate and think, oh, I need to beat you up this climb i. kind of look at him or her and say to myself. We're in a beautiful place we're exploring. We're having an adventure sure and much like mountain biking when you have those skit out moments in a gravel event and your heart races, it's just fun. It's part of the overall experience you kind of pushing the bike and your body to its limits. Absolutely, so let's talk a little bit about tires for the listener. Tie creating tire is a difficult and expensive process. Can you just give us the high notes because I know between like creating a mold and selecting the rubber compound? There's a lot of. Design decisions that go into and expense to get to the tires we see in the market today. Yeah I mean there definitely is I think the biggest revolution was realizing that high pressure aren't necessarily because before you had A. Big Tradeoff and this more n…
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