Final thoughts on Tannus for Long Rides
Let's see, it's been 4 months since I've started using Tannus tires on my weekly rides and so far I have experienced some bad and mostly good reviews in which I can say that If you plan to start using airless tires for your biking, please bear in mind these important reminders that will help you prepare for the "adventure":
1. If you have an extra wheel set /rim that you are not using anymore, it will be perfect for Tannus.
2. Once you have the tires installed, it will be so difficult to have it removed and may damage the rubber
3. You will feel the rolling resistance and may slow you down to an estimated 1-2kph
4. Using these tires may tend to vibrate stronger than regular tires, soreness of the arms can be felt initially
5. You can feel the stiffness of the tires especially when on humps, so the proper adjustment is not to sit down on humps to prevent butt shock
6. I believe that the tires need some break-in periods estimated 150kms to 200kms of riding to have your body get use to the stiff tires
7. Before break-in period, your average speed might reach 10-11kph, after break-in, the average person may experience 18-20kph which is still not enough speed for time based events such as audax.210kms.
But amidst all these precautions, the Tannus tires are built to last and may provide stress free ride. Another important reminder is that these tires might not be suitable for long rides especially more than 100kms. Since the tires have a stiff compound, it will take at least effort to start pedaling up to your 150th kms you will still be exerting the same effort thou your body may tend to worn out. This becomes important that you might need to take another look at before purchasing.
Tannus tires are great for training, bike trainers and long rides w/o time constraint. I experienced some of the pains that the product initially may show but it made me stronger and I have had not a single complain on the tires even in the start of this experiment.
I have been testing these for over 4 months already logging up to 826kms on regular and long rides all because I have this theory that using Tannus may really save up on additional bike costs and that I can last the Audax 210kms road cycling race. BUT I have to re-think and based on my training, the normal huge active athlete may use these tires for training/practice purposes. Your strength might technically last up to a century or 100kms ride only. After that your body will tire down (cramping) and may not be able to perform the same effort as it was in the beginning unless you are a mutant!
Therefore based on the above mentioned experiences, i can finally say that the Tannus tires is effective, efficient and stress free for non-time based long run events. You can use them heavily for training then switch back to pneumatic tires on race day also.
Ride safe everyone!
P.S. I still love Tannus & will go back to using it after my race event this December.
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Update as of Nov 4, 2018
This morning's ride was kinda different since I went back to using Pneumatic tires on a final long training ride. Fortunately my trusty Gatorskin was still intact and raring to go! To my surprise, I was really comfortable during the start of the ride up to the last km... not to mention giving only 80% effort as I do not want to tire myself today since this week have been all cycling. I finished 60kms in barely 3 hours time ...not bad for a fat rider like me eh.
Again, Tannus tires are great for training purposes especially if there is a big race coming in, then switch to using regular tires. The result is great evident!
Comparing my 50km time using Tannus and Regular tires:
