18 DT 14/17g bladed spokes hold the front wheel together, while 24 spokes grace the rear wheel with stacked drive side lacing for increased stiffness and power transfer. Like other high end Bontrager wheels, the Bontrager designed hubs on the RXLs feature DT Swiss 240 star ratchet internals, with straight pull nail head spokes. The whole idea seems to be as close as you can get to a best-of-both-worlds type situation. However, throw in the Bontrager TLR upgrade kit (more on that later), and all of a sudden you have a tubeless road set up. Thanks to the design of the TLR rim strips, when you are using these wheels for tubes, there is very little weight penalty, or difficulty in installing regular tires – they’re just like regular road wheels. You see, many of Trek’s bikes for 2013 include these very wheels with regular tubes and tires for their stock specifications. All of the wheels can be run with standard tube tires, or tubeless with the TLR system – though this is a bit different than some of the other tubeless road wheels on the market. We were sent the US-assembled Race X Lite wheels to review which retail for $1000, but it’s exciting to know that much of the same is available all the way down to the Race Lite and Race wheels which are quite a bit less expensive at $650 and $500 respectively. Using Bontrager’s excellent TLR system (which happens to be one of my favorites), the tubeless ready connotation means these tires must be run with sealant in order to be tubeless – for which Bontrager conveniently has an all new amonia free TLR sealant to replace Super Juice.Īt first glance the new TLR road system looks like it could be a big step forward in the world of road tubeless. Built as a system, Bontrager now offers tubeless read wheels in Race, Race Lite, and Race X Lite trims, as well as R2 and R3 level Tubeless Ready road tires in 23 and 25mm that are all up to Bontrager’s standards for quality and performance. It turns out that the tires were built with another company’s licensed tubeless technology, and after a string of quality issues that plagued the tires, Bontrager pulled the plug until they could design a tubeless tire and wheel system that lived up to their standards.Įnter the new Bontrager TLR road wheel system that was introduced last summer. It remained that way for awhile, and all of a sudden the tires disappeared with little explanation. At the time, I was working at a Trek dealer, and the tires were very hard to come by – really the only way we were able to get a pair was on a Project One model that was built with Ultegra tubeless wheels. You may remember Bontrager first unveiled their own branded tubeless road tire back in 2010. Support us! BikeRumor may earn a small commission from affiliate links in this article.
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