Originally Posted by
burnthesheep
Donnelly MXP PDX combo and air liner coming in mail. Amazon sending air compressor presta chuck.
I'm tired of my cross tire setup being kinda gravel use centered. Going to toss that stuff on the Velocity A23's and leave the gravel tires on the other set.
Train gravel/other on the old setup, do training cross laps and races on the new setup.
That combo came suggested by several teammates and other folks. Worth a shot. Needed it anyway as that 38 gravel-ish tire was only kosher in one series. Not the others.
Every area is different but in the Chicago area almost everyone has been on PDX for all conditions. There are a few who swear by the MXP but tbh in all of the years I have been selling and gluing and maintaining all of the hundreds of wheels for cross that I do - I have probably only sold about 30-40 mxp when compared to over 1000 PDX.
For tubeless - PDX WC is nice but tbh I am not a huge fan of tubeless for cross. I did a lot of back room interviewing of pros and not many are actually in favor of running tubeless. I get it though - everyone is afraid of tubulars nowadays (except for that tier of people who race at the top of their local areas that I still find beating a path to my door). BUT... Michelin just reintroduced the Green compound and they did it on the MUD tread. They offer it in a tubular and a tubeless setup.
The MUD was the best tire we ever ran around here for cross. I got way better control out of using it as a clincher with tubes than I did out of tubular challenge grifo's back in the day but they only offered it in a 30mm and possibly a 32.
I bought a ton of them this season. Reflecting the typical "cobbler has no shoes" thing this year I approached the first race of the year here and realized I didn't have anything glued up for myself and I wasn't about to race a cross race of wide Panaracer Gravel Kings. So I grabbed a set of Michelin Mud's and set them up tubeless and raced on them. f'n bliss. I was able to run higher pressure and still have grip and hookup. That's important for a fat guy.
I have no desire to run super low on tubeless but these will handle most of our season if we luck out and have a dry year. If we start getting wet like we did a few years back - then no...tubulars and probably PDX all the way.
Also - back during the clement team days I used to watch tread choices. Ben berden would run LAS (file tread) on the rear and PDX on the front. for dry conditions and PDX/PDX for others. Mani would run MXP/PDX in almost all conditions. IIRC Trebon (felt/Cannondale) would run PDX/PDX a whole lot until they switched tires.
Also FWIW - I have a pile of "Pro Team Only" Challenge red wall tires I got off the Cannondale team last year. If anyone wants any - give me a call.