MTB as Winter bike?

ian_s

I am considering setting up my Marin non-suspension mountain bike as a winter road trainer.

I will obviously need to change the tyres from nobblies at least to semi slicks.

Anyone else do this and any recommendations for tyres? (the wheels are 26 x 1.5 - does that mean I can fit 26x1.5" tyres? my nobblies are 1.75").

I need to be able to average 15 mph to keep up with my Sunday club ride. I would struggle to do that on the mtb at the moment. How much difference would tyres and clipless pedals make?

Cheers,
Ian

Onan

You can run any 26" tyres. I don't know how narrow they go. I've seen 26 x 1.25.

I know I couldn't average anywhere near 15 mph on my mtb (no suspension, 1.5 slicks). I think you'd be limited by gearing, weight, and catching all that wind.

lastwords

you might be able to get average 15mph with slicks but it will be hard work. Its not just tyres it the bikes geometry and also rider position putting drop bars on the mtb may help it depends if you have cable brakes though.

Used to commute on mtb with slicks was pretty quick but when i got the road bike the difference was huge.

Slow Downcp

Depends how long the club run is, but 15mph on a slicked up MTB is possible but will be hard work.

mattward1979

lastwords wrote:

you might be able to get average 15mph with slicks but it will be hard work. Its not just tyres it the bikes geometry and also rider position putting drop bars on the mtb may help it depends if you have cable brakes though.

Used to commute on mtb with slicks was pretty quick but when i got the road bike the difference was huge.

Totally agree here...

I jumped on my MTB to do a short jaunt with the wife this week, and my MTB just feels heavy sluggish and very ungraceful =P

for winter im just going with grippier tires and wiping the bike down every 2 days rather than once a week

Dunedin397

I use a very old rigid mtb as my commute bike in the spring, summer and autumn. For the winter it goes on the turbo trainer. My commute is 10 miles (or more on the way home depending on the weather). I use Schwalbe Marathon Kojak 26"x1.35 tyres which are very fast, Shimand M520 SPD pedals, medium sized bar ends and Profile Design Century ti-bars.

I'll push 20mph as an average during the summer and even in the dark it's 19mph+.

Whilst a road bike would be quicker, I do think the 26" wheels soak up the poor road surfaces really well. I'm not so sure I'd take it on the club run though, I'd still rather have the road bike.

Dunedin397

softlad

I have a similar old MTB set up for road use, using Schwalbe speed cruisers - very cheap and very good tyres.

You will struggle to stay with a group on road bikes on a long-ish ride, but it is a very good way to improve.

I knew a chap years ago who decided to ride all of his road club winter runs on his MTB. He got a right good kicking almost every weekend, but he stuck at it. Half way through the next season, he had gone from 3rd cat to 2nd - I think he may even have gone to 1st in the same season..

Anonymous

I started on my club runs on a Scott Scale 70 with slicks and kept up most of the time. Some of the racers in my club train on MTB's on semi slicks through the winter.

lastwords

wasnt there an article on bikeradar about a chap who showed up to a road bike race on a mtb and won it.

Not Another Hill

My MTB now has rigid fork and Vittoria Rubino Pro folding tyres 26 x 1.5". Good tyres. Roll very well. No punctures so far. Use it for commuting every day of the year. I think I'd struggle to keep up on the club run but not tried. Clipless will help but the significant factors are the bike's weight, gearing and the poor aerodynamics.

geoff_ss

I seem to recall that Andy Wilkinson won the National 24hr TT championship riding what was more or less a mountain bike so there's no reason why you shouldn't. Anyway, surely it's better training to use a less than ideal bike off-season.

I use my 20+ year old Mercian as a an all-year run about/shopping bike and for (leisurely) group rides in the Winter. It doesn't even have indexed gearing

Geoff

gkerr4

i'd have thought that the gearing was far too low for road use - certainly most modern MTBs have far too low gearing - triples with 42/32/22 rings seems to be the norm - bloody useless.

My carerra subway commuter bike has this on it's chainset - utterly useless - I took it to the shops the other week and I only used the top few gears (it normally only does 'family' duties with a tag-a-long on the back and riding with the missus on her bike with the child seat on it - so pretty slow!)

redddraggon

gkerr4 wrote:

i'd have thought that the gearing was far too low for road use - certainly most modern MTBs have far too low gearing - triples with 42/32/22 rings seems to be the norm - bloody useless.

44-11 is plenty big enough really.

26" 1.5" slicks @90rpm is 26.6mph. @100rpm it's 29.6mph. You're probably descending at those speeds anyway so you don't even need to pedal.

gkerr4

I think the highest it has is 42x12 - maybe 42x13 I can't tell - defo a 42 up front though.

it didn't feel right - on the flat I don't always want to run 100rpm - i sometimes want a higher gear and just cruise along - I know that I 'could' run at higher cadence - but sometimes I don't want to - especially true of a family / commuter bike
( I appreciate that the guy here is talking about a training bike - which is different and probably wouldn't mind pedalling faster)

redddraggon

Standard MTB gearing is 44/32/22 with 11-34 or 11-32, these days isn't it?

APIII

I had a Cannondale bad boy a few years ago that came with 26x1" slicks. It was impossible to find replacements that size though. It wasn't as fast as a road bike, but easily managed more than 15mph. If you can get a decent position on it, I can't see why you can't keep up on a club run.

nax-ian

Maxxis Detonators 26x1.25 only 15 or 16 quid from crc, an quite light.
Pump em up hard an you'll fly.
But you will need smaller tubes

ian_s

Gearing is 42/32/22 and 12/28. I don't think I have a problem with top gear being too low. As someone rightly pointed out , this is just intended as a training machine anyway.

I know I can do 15mph for an hour with the nobblies on it at the moment but wouldn't be able to maintain that for much longer. Our rides are generally 60 miles with a stop half way.

I'll give some of the tyres here a try - for 25 quid or so its not the end of the world if it doesn't work with the club runs.

It just pains me to ride my shiny road bike through the sh1t that's on the roads around here at the moment and somehow feels even less right to buy a new eg Ribble for the purpose.

geoff_ss

redddraggon wrote:

gkerr4 wrote:

i'd have thought that the gearing was far too low for road use - certainly most modern MTBs have far too low gearing - triples with 42/32/22 rings seems to be the norm - bloody useless.

44-11 is plenty big enough really.

26" 1.5" slicks @90rpm is 26.6mph. @100rpm it's 29.6mph. You're probably descending at those speeds anyway so you don't even need to pedal.

Absolutely. That's top gear on our tandem and we can pedal that at 30mph; we free wheel after that. Different if you're actually racing, of course. Even when I was fit my ride to work gear was 81" tops and I managed the 13 miles in 45 minutes usually, including crossing right across Derby from north to south.

Geoff