Bike for the Alps

[NorthDave]

mcelliott said:

I'm not denying the rim gets hot under braking, but I've risen thousands of km in the Alps and never once ever experienced anything like that before. It's a needless worry.

I had two blowouts on the Etap caused by overheating. I think it was because I was on a temporary bike with crap brakes so didn't have the confidence to let it fly and slow for the corners. I really wished I had my road bike with discs.

I'm speccing up a new bike at the moment and will be going discs again. I've never had a problem in the UK but some of the descents in the Alps are mental - 16km long and an average of 10% with 110kg on the bike really tests things out.

[Amateurish]

mcelliott said:

I'm not denying the rim gets hot under braking, but I've risen thousands of km in the Alps and never once ever experienced anything like that before. It's a needless worry.

It happened to lots of people on the Etape - hot descent with heavy braking and overinflated tyres(?)

My partner also had a blowout at the end of the descent from the Joux Plane last year and we could not work out why. She was using the brakes for the entire descent.

[Soop Dogg]

mcelliott said:

I'm not denying the rim gets hot under braking, but I've risen thousands of km in the Alps and never once ever experienced anything like that before. It's a needless worry.

I've seen it happen, although like you, I've done many many km of Alpine descending and never experienced it myself. Not everyone is happy at speed on a twisty descent, and it's those people for whom it is a worry.

At the extreme end of things, I rode L'Eroica a couple of years ago. At one point was a very long and very steep descent on a muddy track with railway sleepers every 20 yards or so to stop landslip. You had to be on your brakes almost constantly because of the surface and the railway sleepers and I saw 3 front tyres blow out due to heat just while I was descending this one hill myself! Goodness knows how many others had the same thing happen before and after the 3 I saw! At the end of the descent I couldn't touch the front rim and the tyre was getting pretty hot too.

[weedram]

Thanks for all the advice guys.

Decision made.

I have the road bike with me. Having ridden it today for the first time in a couple of weeks (been riding the Grade to get used to it on the road) while following my son's race in Belgium,it is definitely the right decision. I love the Grade, but riding the Colnago again was a revelation, just more responsive, so will absolutely be the best bike on the climbs.

I'll let you know how it goes - wish me luck.

Edited by weedram on Thursday 28th July 21:26