Self-inflating tyre expertise had a hiatus from the Paris-Roubaix and Classics peloton through the 2024 season after its preliminary landmark first use in 2023, nevertheless, after the success of Marianne Vos utilizing the expertise en path to Gravel World Championships victory, are they set to return subsequent spring?
It’s Vos’s commerce workforce Visma-Lease a Bike who’ve been noticed utilizing the Dutch model Gravaa’s KAPS system throughout a current coaching session on the cobbled roads of Flanders, after they first trialled the adjustable tyre strain system in a race there at Dwars door Vlaanderen in 2023.
The system was accepted in April of 2022 by the UCI after Staff DSM had additionally been engaged on the same on-the-go tyre strain administration system with the Scope Atmoz.
Key Classics leaders Wout van Aert, Matteo Jorgenson, Dylan van Baarle and Tiesj Benoot, who additionally used the wheelset at Gravel Worlds, might all be seen on their Cervélo S5 highway bikes sporting a bigger entrance hub that homes the expertise.
Contained in the wheel hubs lies a mini compressor and clutch which can be utilized to inflate the strain of the tyre on the fly whereas on stable terrain, earlier than lowering strain to accommodate rougher terrain the place decrease strain might optimise rolling resistance.
Vos confirmed to Cyclingnews at Gravel Worlds that she had regularly used the system through the race to nice impact, “with larger strain on the end” the place she pipped Lotte Kopecky to victory in a two-up dash, “but additionally with decreasing the strain on rougher observe” to get away within the lead group.
The Gravaa working system was housed in the appropriate bar finish on Vos’s gravel setup for straightforward entry through the race.
Whereas Van Aert was utilizing the Gravaa wheelset made with Visma’s wheel sponsor Reserve in coaching, he was one of many Visma riders who didn’t use the adjustable tyre strain set at Roubaix in 2023. He in the end completed that race in third after a late puncture noticed his nice rival Mathieu van der Poel trip solo to the win.
Gravaa’s proprietor, Gertjan van Ginderen, defined on the Gravel World Championships that the system has been developed significantly since its preliminary launch in 2022 and first race makes use of in 2023.
“So we improved the electronics lots, I have to say,” he advised Cyclingnews. “So there’s a PCB [printed circuit board] inside every hub, and that is very susceptible for moisture grime, so we’ve really made a change contained in the expertise to have it utterly potted.
“So it’s utterly potted the electronics within the epoxy. We’ve modified the antenna, we’ve modified the disc brakes, together with the interface of the disc brakes, additionally to be suitable with different spoke configurations.”
The system makes use of a kinetic pump, pushed by the rotation of the wheel which suggests it doesn’t should be charged and doesn’t use an inner CO2 canister as seen on a number of the beforehand examined self-inflation methods. Which means the tyre may be deflated and inflated as a rider requires.
“This principally is a really small compressor clutch mechanism and digital printed circuit board, and the hubs discuss with one another,” Van Ginderen defined. “So the entrance hub is the grasp, whereas the rear up is a slave. And to the entrance up, you possibly can join both your smartphone or your bicycle laptop, so long as it’s Bluetooth suitable.”
Following the success of Vos in Leuven, might 2025 be the 12 months self-inflating tyres actually grow to be the brand new pattern in highway racing? Visma’s males’s workforce are definitely getting used to the system early in case they do go for their leaders to make use of it come The Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix in April.
With the updates and upgrades to the technical system and Gravaa’s broader enterprise growth, Visma working this method within the cobbled races would run true with Van Ginderen’s assured that the expertise would grow to be extra of a mainstay within the Dutch workforce’s tools setup on the Classics.
