The first tire patch kit I ever owned came in a big green box, had several patches of various sizes which were possibly made of old truck tires. It also came with a sheet of 60 grit sandpaper. The mild high offered from sniffing the glue while applying the patch almost made you stop caring you’d gotten a flat in the first place. Stoned on glue and hypoxic from the V is no way to mend a tire, and most times the patch would start to come off even before I pumped it up and I’d have to start over. Don’t even start me on peeling the clear cellophane off the patch.
The telephone capability of my iPhone is the least-used feature on the device; I email, schedule, text, voxer, browse, twitface, photograph, drop, forget, lose, and find my phone much more than I ever use it to place a call. It has replaced my wristwatch, alarm clock, and flashlight. For some of you, it has even replaced the cyclometer. All this is to say that in today’s view of the world, the value of a product is directly proportional to how useless its original function is.
By that measure, the Park Super Patch kit earns its place in the pantheon of the Reverence series by being more useful as a frame protector than it is as a inner tube patch. They are phenomenal tire patches – much better than the old orange-trimmed slabs of tire I used growing up, but who wants to use a tire patch, much less love one? Therein lies the answer; even as the world of Cycling irrevocably makes its departure from the tire and tube with one faction moving back to the tubular tire and another to the tubeless tire, these patches will continue to feature on frames around the world, dutifully keeping cables from scuffing paint.
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@scaler911
Isn't co-enabling great!
@Bigthumpa
One word: titanium.
I patch the shit out of the tubes for my training bike, but avoid racing on patched inner tubes - it's just not the done thing. I'm more likely to pour on the heat and plow through shit (potholes, debris) in a race than in a training ride or club ride, when I'll be more delicate and try to avoid stuff, and I don't want a patched tube to start leaking if I hit something.
Gatorskins are training tyres, not racing tyres, and one of the properties that makes them a better training tyre is a harder tread compound. Less grip, more durability. Expecting it to ride like a soft Michelin is like grabbing the wrong end of the donkey for a ride at the fairground.
@Teocalli
I'm with @frank on this but as we only live a few miles apart I'm going to need to keep my eyes open for this disgraceful behaviour. Dont like the thought of verbally abusing another cyclist, but like you said, these tossers clearly aren't on the path.
@Mike_P
Mike - there are a very small minority of sportive riders who seem to do it, which is where I see it mostly and as I regularly cycle sportive routes around here I see them left over afterwards. Doubtless hell bent on a Strava time and can't be bothered to take their trash home. It's not huge numbers but enough to be sad about the attitude of people who do it.
@scaler911
Many years ago I bought my father a Birthday Card which rather backfired on me. It went something like, on the front "Dad, I listen to every piece of advice you give me" then inside it said "I ignore most of it, but I do listen. Happy Birthday".
@Teocalli I hear you. I rode my first Italian gran fondo last year and the organisers were very clear, if you're reported as a litterer you're banned from the next year's entry. The route was virtually spotless other than around the bins at feed zones. I fear the explosion of events in the UK, many of which are poorly organised and simply jumping on the bandwagon of popularity, influence this shoddy behaviour. Plus UK society in general seems to be moving towards complete acceptance of the basest levels of antisocial behaviour. Time I got off my soap box. Rant over.
On the etape caledonia the number of tubes, bottles and wrappers strewn around was disappointing. After all its not a race so you can take a few more seconds to put stuff back in your pocket surely. It was the number of bottles I found amazing, obviously a lot of people get them FOC?
@norm I agree, up to a point; I was just servicing my well used CX and noticed that there was some cable rub around the head tube - the metal shining through the dark gray paint adds character, likewise the scrapes from stacking it. If this was on the #1 carbon I would have been distruaght.
Battle scars on an MTB or CX may be fine and I guess even on an older ride, but on a shiney new #1? no.
There is no excuse for breakig Rule #65 - pantina from use is one thing, neglect is something quite different.
@revchuck
I big part of that can be how he weighted his bike, not the tires.
But to that point, I do prefer GP4000 All Weather's over the gatorskin, which seems to give up a lot of road feel for not much more protection.