Tubes--And No Tubulars

 Tubeless tires have been one of the most-ballyhooed developments in cycling during the past few years.  I have not used any myself, but I can see the appeal for certain kinds of riding, particularly off-road:  Tires ridden at low pressures are more prone to "pinch" flats than to punctures.  

The debate over whether tubeless tires will displace their more traditional counterparts reminds me of the argument I heard when I first became a dedicated cyclist:  tubulars vs. clinchers.

My first "serious" bike, a Peugeot PX-10, came with tubular tires.  Their casings wrapped around the tube and were sewn together (hence the nickname, "sew-ups).  They were then attached with a cement with the consistency of applesauce (until it dried) to a rim with a crescent-shaped surface.

The fully-enclosed tube made for a more buoyant (not for nothing do the French call these tires "pneus boyeaux") and lively ride.  They also were lighter than any clinchers available at the time, which accentuated their performance advantage over "clinchers," the tires 99 percent of us ride.

Clincher (top) and tubular tire.

Tubed (left) and tubeless clincher tires

Getting a flat on any tire is not fun, but fixing one on a tubular is an ordeal.  We usually carried a spare with us and, if we flatted, we changed the tire, letting the cement dry to about the consistency of bubble gum.  Then we'd cross our fingers for the ride home. Professional racing teams are trailed by cars, which usually carried spare wheels with tires glued solidly onto them.

That is why, for my first tour-- which I did on the PX-10--I had a set of clincher wheels built.  In those days, some riders toured (with loaded panniers!) on tubulars, but I was not going to do any such thing, especially when I ventured into the countryside of a foreign land.  Those wheels--my first custom-built set--and tires, together, weighed about two kilograms (a pound and a quarter) more than the tubulars, even though they were among the lightest of their kind available.  The tires were less prone to flats and much easier to fix.

Over time, companies like Michelin, Continental, Panaracer and IRC developed lighter clincher tires with improved durability, and Mavic created  rims--the "E" series--that adapted the weight-to-strength ratio of tubular rims to clinchers and added a "hook" bead that made it possible to use high-pressure folding clincher tires.  (Any rim made today with even a pretense of quality, in whatever diameter or width, is based on the “E” rims’ design.) Thus, the gap in speed and road feel between tubulars and clinchers narrowed to the point to the point that whatever benefits tubulars offered no longer offset their fragility, at least for most riders.

After my brief foray into racing, I kept one set of tubular wheels for fast rides.  But, as I developed other ineterests (and relationships), I decided that I'd rather spend my time riding than fixing flats.  Also, tire-making companies were offering fewer options in tubulars, or stopped offering them altogether.  So, about twenty years ago, I rode tubulars for the last time.  I'd own my last set of such wheels and tires, briefly, when I bought "Zebbie," my 1984 Mercian King of Mercia, just over a year ago.  Hal Ruzal built me a nice set of clinchers (with classic Campagnolo hubs and Mavic Open Pro rims) and I sold the tubulars that came with "Zebbie" about a month after she came into my life.

I mention all of this to provide context for a story I came across yesterday.  It seems that the tubular vs. clincher, and not the tubeless vs. tubed, question has once again reared its head.

For the 2021 racing season (assuming, of course, there is one), both of Specialized Bike's  World Tour men's teams--Bora Hansgrohe and Deceuninck-Quick Step--have committed to abandoning tubulars for all races except the early-season classics.  Both teams plan, eventually, to get away from sew-ups altogether.

Roval Rapide CLX wheel

What might surprise some people, though, is that they are not casting their lot with tubeless tires.  While both teams used tubeless, as well as tubular, wheels and wheelsets during the shortened 2020 season, their decision to go with clinchers might have been inspired by Julian Alaphilippe's Tour de France stage win on them.  Also, Roval, the wheel-maker of choice for many in the peloton, is making two of its lightest road wheelsets for use only with tubed clincher tires. "When it's possible to create tubeless wheel/tyre systems that outperform tube-type clincher systems, that's what we'll recommend to riders," read a statement from the company that, for the past couple of years, looked ready to go all-in on tubeless clincher tires.

So, for the time being, some of today's young racers on high-tech carbon-fiber bikes have returned to the choice many of us made two or three decades ago:  clincher tires.  With inner tubes.

My First "Real" Bike: Peugeot PX-10

The other day, I wrote about my Peugeot U0-8, which became my first "fixie."  Now I'm going to write about another Peugeot I owned, which I didn't alter nearly as drastically.

When I bought my Schwinn Continental, I saw a Peugeot PX-10 in the shop.  I looked at its price tag:  $250 seemed like sheer insanity for a bike to someone who'd saved the $96 cost of the Schwinn from a year of delivering newspapers in the hinterlands of New Jersey.

Somehow, though, I knew I was going to end up with that bike.  As I wheeled my Continental out of the showroom of Michael's Bicycle Company (located next to a drive-in theater on Route 35 in Hazlet, NJ),  I could feel the bike bug embedding its tentacles into my shins.

Well, about three years later, I got a PX-10 for $250--used.  And it was three years older than the one I saw in the showroom.

It seems that almost everyone who came of age during the '70's Bike Boom rode a PX-10 at some point or another.  For many of us, it was our first real racing bike:  Bernard Thevenet won the 1975 and 1977 Tours de France on PX-10s that differed from the ones we bought only in that the stems and handlebars were changed to fit his physique.

Also, the great Eddy Merckx began his professional career astride a PX-10 for the BP-Peugeot team in the mid-1960's.

Although $250 seemed like a lot of money for a bike in 1972 (and was probably even more so in 1969, when the PX-10 I bought was built), it was actually quite a good value.  First of all, the frame was built from Reynolds 531 tubing with Nervex lugs.  While the level of finesse in the lugwork and paint wasn't up to what one would find on a bike from a French constructeur or a classic British builder, it was nothing to be ashamed of.   

The chainstays, clearances and fork rake were all considerably longer than what would be found on later racing bikes.  However, racing bikes at that time had to be more versatile, as roads, particularly in small towns and rural areas of Europe, were rougher:  Some still hadn't been repaired after the bombings and shellings of World War II.  Also, racers and trainers at the time believed that a rider should spend as much time as possible on the bike he plans to use in upcoming races.  They also believed that, at least for road racing, outdoor training was superior to indoor, so the bikes were ridden all year long.  They--yes, even Merckx himself--rode with fenders and wider tires during the winter.

The longer geometry and rather thin stays meant that while the frame gave a lively ride, it could be "whippy," especially for a heavy rider, in the rear.  The flip-side of that, of course, was that the PX-10 gave a stable and comfortable ride in a variety of conditions.  This is one reason why many PX-10s were re-purposed as light touring bikes, or even outfitted (as Sheldon Brown's was) with an internally-geared hub and used for commuting.

The components that came with the bike were not top-shelf, but were at least good for their time.  The best of them, aside from the Brooks Professional saddle (Yes, it was original equipment on mine, though some PX-10s came with Ideale 90 saddles.) was probably the Stronglight 93 (63 on some earlier models) crankset.  It was beautifully polished and could be outfitted with chainrings from 37 to 57 teeth.  Mine came with 45 and 52, like most PX-10s of the era.  The 93 was a light, stiff crankset:  When I later got a Campagnolo Record for another bike, I couldn't detect any difference in rigidity.  The only problem with the 93 or 63 was that it had a proprietary bolt circle diameter that wasn't compatible with Campagnolo or other high-end cranksets of the time. These days, if you need to replace a chainring on your 93 or 63, you have to go to a swap meet--or eBay.

The wheels were also of very good quality:  Normandy Luxe Competition hubs with Mavic tubular rims (Some PX-10s came with Super Champion tubulars, which were equal in quality.) laced with Robergel spokes, the best available at the time.  Of course, I would build another set of wheels--clinchers--on which I would do the majority of my riding.



I rode many happy hours and kilometers (Hey, it was a French bike!) on my PX-10.  Like many other cyclists, I "graduated" to a more modern racing bike, and a touring bike and sold the PX-10.  Still, it holds a special place in my cycling life as my first high-performance bike.