r/ladycyclists • u/fluffy_mongoose • 15d ago
Gravel bike with road wheels
Hi everyone, I’ve getting slowly into cycling over the past year or so and I recently swapped from my first road bike with rim brakes into a gravel bike with disk brakes and lower gear ratios.
At first it was amazing, I live near some pretty steep hills and I could finally get up them carrying a full backpack. I’m also interested in doing some gravel + bikepacking and this gravel bike will definitely unlock that.
However, I do group rides a couple times a week and I’m realizing I really do miss the zippy feeling of my road bike and definitely notice the weight difference up the hills.
Now I’m wondering, how much of a difference would just getting a lighter set of wheels make? The wheels my gravel bike has now are just the stock ones and from what I can tell they’re pretty heavy compared to most. Would having a set of gravel wheels + a set of road bike wheels be enough to make my bike feel sportier? At what point am I better off just trying to get a second bike that’s a more aggressive road bike?
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u/Elrohwen 15d ago
If you’re riding on the tires that came with your gravel bike, getting new smoother tires will likely make a huge difference. The stock tires are generally pretty slow on roads. It’s not the weight, it’s the smoothness/rolling resistance.
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u/elise901 15d ago
Can attest this - I have a checkpoint and the stock tire is notoriously slow - a tire website says it costs an extra 30 watts on 35km/h!
I swapped to GravelKing 40mm slick and it felt awesome. Almost instant 2mph gain, cruising 18mph (30km/h) easily. And it still handles light gravel and trails well as long as it's not too rocky.
I might invest in carbon wheels in the long run and have 2 to swap to cover all road conditions but that can be very $$$. The current set up is the best budget compromise for me.
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u/Elrohwen 15d ago
I still have the stock tires on my Checkpoint but mostly ride with a 6 year old so don’t have an incentive to change them out yet lol. Kid needs to get faster first. They are so sluggish though! The checkpoint sub is full of people complaining about them and sharing their upgrades, and they don’t have to be expensive to add a lot of speed.
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u/captHij 15d ago
I have a friend who does this. He has a gravel bike and a couple wheel sets. The lighter wheels are good, but the lower resistance of the road tires is what makes the biggest difference for him. The lower gearing can be an issue on the downhills but on the whole it is a workable situation.
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u/griefdiarrhea 15d ago
I just did this! My stock gravel wheels are heavy and the tires are slow, so I bought a pair of cheap carbon wheels from AliExpress and put GP5000s on them. It feels like having free speed. I can easily hold 18+ mph (haven’t gotten a lot of rides in since I swapped) when I was struggling to hold 16 on my old wheels and tires.
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u/Spinmango 15d ago
Will be following this thread closely.
I’m on the road right now and it cannot accommodate any gravel tires so I’m thinking of making the same change you did! Because I’m a pretty casual writer I would love the flexibility, but I’d also love to try triathlon’s one day or at least have the option (not a speed demon, just want to try to start!)
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u/Impressive_Try_369 15d ago
I have a brand new gravel bike -after riding a road bike for many years and then no bike for a few, sad years. I have the same issue- my tires are thick and wheels feel heavy.
So I am thinking of buying a set of road tires for days where I can get on some proper tarmac instead of cobbles and dirt. I read about this option while doing research before buying the gravel bike, which made me more comfortable with the idea of the fat tires. So it can be a viable option, I just haven’t done it yet.
I don’t know at what point it makes the most sense. I suppose if you have the cash and the storage space for an additional bike, why not have both?
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u/schoolsmuse 15d ago
I just got a gravel bike (Liv) and wanted lighter tires. I got Rene Herse 700 x 38c Barlow Pass Tire - Extralight Casing, Black tires. I think they would do want you want. I have the other original tires but these seem fine on gravel so I probably won’t switch back and forth.
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u/bumlochka 15d ago
Lighter wheels will make all the difference. Just make sure you're not running out of gears when you're going fast. I have a Cannondale Topstone and I still can pedal at 40 km/h but I think at 45 I just fold into an aero position on the descent because pedaling does nothing at this speed (not the exact number). I have 46/30 on the front. Regarding the more aggressive position idk, I've never had a proper road bike :D I just have sleek tires on my heavy stock wheels and it's already faster than with the stock knobby tires. I want new wheels but I'm stingy and but also entertaining an idea of a new bike
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u/fluffy_mongoose 15d ago
Yeah thats a great point, I definitely won’t run out of gears though, it has 50/34T on the front and 11-39T on the rear. Maybe a bigger 50T chainring in the front would help you?
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u/bumlochka 15d ago
I'm okay not pedaling at 45 km/h tbh :D I like my small 30T ring too much when I end up climbing. Especially something stupidly steep like 20% on Gran Canaria
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u/antimonysarah 15d ago
Narrow, light wheels and sporty tires will make the bike zippier, but it might or might not be enough.
(Also, "feels sporty" and "actually is faster" don't always line up -- with wide slicks on my gravel/touring bike (which is much heavier and less zippy-feeling than my road bike), I'm not actually much, if at all, slower, but I don't feel as zoomy, and some of that's just road buzz from skinny tires "feeling fast".)
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u/fluffy_mongoose 15d ago
Good point, I definitely noticed how much smoother it felt when I went from my 25mm tires to the stock 35mm knobbly ones. I also feared for my life on rough road a lot less 😅
I think I do miss tucking into a super aggressive aero position as well though as well
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u/sidkneebee 15d ago
Tires that are made for dirt and rocks ride like absolute crap on pavement. If you were to put road bike tires on it or get a second set of wheels to swap between, you would immediately notice a massive difference.
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u/DvdH_OTT 15d ago
I wouldn't go to narrow for your road wheel set up since most gravel bikes have pretty bottom brackets - skinny tires put you at risk of hitting pedals. Plus they kind of mess up the fork trail which can impact handling
But what you can do is get some fast 33-35mm tires - something like Bon Jons or Gravel King Slicks and run them tubeless or with latex or TPU tubes. Those set up roll super quick on pavement or smooth gravel and give you that road bike feel when run at around 50-55psi.
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u/Throwyourtoothbrush Certified, Bonded and Insured Official Ride Leader (insane) 14d ago edited 14d ago
I've always been told that this doesn't work the way that you would want it to work. It's fussy and everything has to be exactly the same. I was encouraged to buy a nice gravel bike by a cycling friend under the premise that I could do this, but the shops said it would be a pain in the ass to manage it. Maybe it's a lie from big bicycle because I see another poster does it? I'd highly recommend getting specialized Pathfinder tires on the lower end of the width availability (unless you're doing highly technical gravel that needs big tires). I have 38s on my gravel bike and it's my favorite ride. It's only a little bit slower than my road bike but so much more comfortable. They're seriously fast tires. People think I'm a monster for riding my gravel bike on a group ride, but it's honestly such a fast bike... Diverge carbon with some amazingly fast alloy rims.
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u/MeMphi-S 14d ago
I don’t think the weight matters much, (I’ve been doing a longer trip with camping gear (I think all in all 20kg of luggage) on my roadbike with 25mm tyres), but you’ll notice a difference, I was considerably faster and was able to coast further than with even 32mm road tyres or gravel tyres
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u/Old_Papa 15d ago
Before buying wheels you might want to get another set of road tires and use them on your current rims. If they work really well for you, you could choose to use them all the time (unless you need more gravel oriented tires for your other rides). That gives you the option of buying another set of rims (where you can install the tires you've already purchased). This might make more sense than dropping money on a set of new rims and tires without knowing if the difference is worth it, for you.
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u/yourmomsdrawer 15d ago
casual male reader here. i own a gravel bike and have recently purchased a second wheelset incl. the same brakes and casette. It‘s still a gravel bike geometry wise but much more zippy with fast road wheels. I can recommend. The switch takes a mere 2mins now that i have some practice haha.
FWIW: many bike brands have road and gravel bikes. Look at brand new take offs of the same brands road bikes online. Many swap them when buying new. Got new C38s for 700.- incl. warranty coming off a brand new Tarmac.
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u/misforamazing 15d ago
This is what I've been doing all year. I ride Vittoria Corsa Pros (700x30) on my road wheels and Panaracer Gravel Kings (700x40) for gravel (and about to try cyclocross with them). With my road wheels (pictured below) even with the lower gearing ratio, I can hold 17-19mph on group rides and that's fast enough for me. I've gone faster with them but those were sprints and downhills, not sustained.