Hutchinson rolls top ElevenStorm rubber into full road race & training tire range

Written by Cory Benson Mar 09, 2018 7:30 a.m. ET

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First announced last summer, Hutchinson’s newest ElevenStorm rubber compound was said to at once improve grip, puncture resistance, and lower rolling resistance. Originally only available in a select few tires, now the new rubber comes in road tubeless, tubeless-ready & tubed tire options for road racing, daily riding, and training.

Fusion 5 Galactik 11Storm road race tires

Hutchinson makes a lot of bold performance claims about ElevenStorm, so it’s good to see that the new top-level compound won’t see limited application. The claim a 6% reduction in rolling resistance, 14% longer wearing, 6% improved wet surface grip, and 2% better dry grip against what was already their top Fusion 5 Galactik road race tire.

Those tires now come in three casing types – a 240g, 25mm version of the newest & highest performance Road Tubeless Ready, designed to be used with sealant; 23 & 25mm Road Tubeless tires that have a butyl-sealed casing and don’t require sealant (285g in a 25); and the lightest 23 & 25mm Tubetype versions for use with regular inner tubes (190g in 25).

Fusion 5 Performance 11Storm road race tires

The Performance tires for all around competition and recreational riding on the road make even bigger performance gains versus their prior version, with 14% lower rolling resistance & 19% longer wear.

They also come in the full three casing range – a 255g, 25mm Road Tubeless Ready version; 23 & 25mm Road Tubeless versions (315g for 25); and 23, 25 & 28mm Tubetype versions (205g in 25). Performance Road Tubeless Ready tires in 28mm are expected this spring.

Fusion 5 All Season 11Storm road race & training tires

Focusing primarily on longer wear (improved 22%), the All Season is a training and racing tire to put on your bike and forget about. It still drops rolling resistance by 11% and improves grip by 6%/3% on wet/dry surfaces, making it a solid all-around tire. All Seasons are available in the same sizes & options as the Performance tires, with the 25mm Road Tubeless Ready tire at 260g, the 25mm Road Tubeless tire at 295g, and 25mm Tubetype at 210g. All Season Road Tubeless Ready tires in 28mm are also coming soon.

HutchinsonTires.com

Cory Benson

4,163 articles

Cory Benson is the EU Tech Editor of Bikerumor.com.

Cory has been writing about mountain bikes, enduro, cyclocross, all-road, gravel bikes & bikepacking for over 25 years, even before the industry created some of these names. Prior to Bikerumor, Cory was a practicing Architect specializing in environmental sustainability, has designed bike shops & bike components, and worked as a bike shop mechanic.

Based in the Czech Republic for 15+ years, he is a technical mountain biker, adventurous gravel rider, and short & medium-haul bikepacker. Cory travels extensively across Europe riding bikes, meeting with key European product developers, industry experts & tastemakers for an in-depth review of what’s new, and what’s coming next.

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Not_a_Luddite

6 years ago

Well, I was really looking for a tire with a 4% increase in dry traction and 17-18% better wear, so I guess I’ll just keep riding on bare steel rims.

6 years ago

What is a Road “Tubeless Ready” tire versus a Road Tubeless tire? Does “Tubeless Ready” tire just have regular tubeless tire bead construction methods utilized?

Gary

6 years ago

Reply to DJ

From the article ” Road Tubeless Ready, designed to be used with sealant”…”Road Tubeless tires have a butyl-sealed casing and don’t require sealant” The latter are heavier.

Rod Diaz

6 years ago

Reply to DJ

If I remember correctly, Road Tubeless actually conforms to a “standard” (UST – uniform system tubeless or similar that includes rim specifications – for a while only Shimano rims complied and were widely available, then I think Fulcrum and now Mavic released a large number of rims to this spec), doesn’t need sealant, and the tire has an extra impermeable layer in lieu of he aforementioned sealant.

Tubeless Ready in general need tape – have a bad seal? Add tape. Still leaking? Add more tape.And so on. But there are lots more tire options, including my favourite and (generally) easy to fit Schwalbes.

TobinRidesYou (@TobinHatesYou)

6 years ago

Reply to Rod Diaz

Ever since switching to powdercoat masking tape, I have not had an issue with leaking on initial seating with TLR tires. I do not see the point in buying the “Tubeless” version of these tires because the primary benefit of tubeless is the ability to seal a casing puncture. On top of that the difference in actual weights between the TLR and Tubeless versions of each tire is MASSIVE. My 25mm TLR Galactiks weigh 219g. The Tubeless version of the same tire weighs 294g…a 75g difference. I run about 30g worth of sealant in each tire, so the difference is more than double the weight of sealant.

Furthermore, there really seems to be no real-world difference in puncture resistance between the TLR and Tubeless version. Each of the Fusion 5s has good enough puncture resistance. If I need something with more puncture resistance than Galactiks, I just use the Performance tire instead. I weighed a 28mm Performance TLR at 277g.

In terms of mounting ease. Hutchinsons are extremely easy to mount…much easier than mounting Pro Ones. I can even unmount them without levers. Other comparisons to Pro Ones…Galactik tread life is worse, but puncture resistance is better. Galactik wet grip is better, dry grip about the same. Galactiks are close to claimed size. On wide rims with 21mm internal width they only measured 27mm. 25mm Pro Ones I measured at 29mm on the same rims. The Micro-Skin on the inside of the Pro Ones seems to absorb more sealant, so it requires more initially. I would constantly get small punctures with Pro Ones, maybe once every 2 weeks, but Orange Seal always managed to seal them up. I just wasn’t happy with getting sprayed in the butt by sealant that often. I pretty much never puncture at all with Fusion 5s on suburban/urban SF Bay Area roads.

Rodrigo Diaz

6 years ago

Reply to TobinRidesYou (@TobinHatesYou)

Interesting – I had a much harder time having the Sector 28 (Hutchinson) sealing and mounting/dismounting than the Schwalbes – both in HED and Stan’s Alpha rims. Maybe it’s really a crapshoot of a given rim/tire batch. And yeah, the Pro One get really big on wide rims, I could only fit 23’s on my old Argon Gallium (measured close to 26 on HED+).

I also see no point in going with the Tubeless – I would add sealant for puncture protection anyway so there goes even more weight on top of the stiffer casings.

Greg

6 years ago

Hard to trust their metrics when the Vittoria tests lower than Continentals in comfort but higher in puncture resistance

DRC

6 years ago

Was waiting for the Fusion 5 performance tubeless 28s until I tested the 32mm Sectors I had on my cross bike and found they fit perfectly on my new Aeroad disc. The wheels are 17mm inside width and the tires came out to measure 30mm wide. And they are cake to put on any wheels.