Chiming in.
2013\. Another Bike Shop in Santa Cruz, CA, gets the Specialized E29 in. Chris, the owner, rides a L and so do most of the dudes I was riding with. He starts sending us out on his personal S Works E29. It was amazing how much faster people could go on that bike! We all pretty much went from 26 straight to 29 cuz of the E29 and a smart shop owner who is also a nice guy and fast rider himself.
Being a tire nerd, I was on a mission to find the holy grail for the E29 and the rowdy riding we were doing. I landed on the WTB Vigilante 29 x 2.35 tough casing/fast rubber front and rear. A high profile, large volume (for a 2.35), meaty, 1100gm tire with an aramid bead insert that had a stiff sidewall that was not only very flat resistant but also supportive enough to run relatively low psi on a 22 or 23mm ID rim. They had a lot more volume than the Maxxis 2.35 tires available at the same time.
I rode the Vig for years. Then Maxxis came out with the WT, rims got wider, and the Vig became outdated.
The E29 was the real story though. It was one of the first, or maybe the first, long travel 29 bikes that you could really smash on that still handled well enough to rip corners. That bike was way ahead of its time. A massive step forward compared to the Ibis Mojo HD I waa riding in 2013. A whole bunch of us skipped 27.5 all together in the name of speed and not getting dropped by your homies on Sunday morning and the E29 was what took us there.
Tires are perhaps my favorite piece of the MTB equipment puzzle. There is always a trade off between weight, rolling resistance, volume, tread compound, casing construction, rim width, tire width... such a fun puzzle and a relatively easy way to massively change how your bike rides.
March 15, 2022, 7:24 p.m. - Speeder1
Chiming in. 2013\. Another Bike Shop in Santa Cruz, CA, gets the Specialized E29 in. Chris, the owner, rides a L and so do most of the dudes I was riding with. He starts sending us out on his personal S Works E29. It was amazing how much faster people could go on that bike! We all pretty much went from 26 straight to 29 cuz of the E29 and a smart shop owner who is also a nice guy and fast rider himself. Being a tire nerd, I was on a mission to find the holy grail for the E29 and the rowdy riding we were doing. I landed on the WTB Vigilante 29 x 2.35 tough casing/fast rubber front and rear. A high profile, large volume (for a 2.35), meaty, 1100gm tire with an aramid bead insert that had a stiff sidewall that was not only very flat resistant but also supportive enough to run relatively low psi on a 22 or 23mm ID rim. They had a lot more volume than the Maxxis 2.35 tires available at the same time. I rode the Vig for years. Then Maxxis came out with the WT, rims got wider, and the Vig became outdated. The E29 was the real story though. It was one of the first, or maybe the first, long travel 29 bikes that you could really smash on that still handled well enough to rip corners. That bike was way ahead of its time. A massive step forward compared to the Ibis Mojo HD I waa riding in 2013. A whole bunch of us skipped 27.5 all together in the name of speed and not getting dropped by your homies on Sunday morning and the E29 was what took us there. Tires are perhaps my favorite piece of the MTB equipment puzzle. There is always a trade off between weight, rolling resistance, volume, tread compound, casing construction, rim width, tire width... such a fun puzzle and a relatively easy way to massively change how your bike rides.