Why upgrade wheelset

When you are presented with the choice of a lighter frame or lighter wheels, the latter is always a superior option. The anchor reason for this is simple: rotational weight. Any component on your road bike which turns wheels, cranksets, chainrings and cassettes has a rotational weight coefficient because you are actively working against its mass by expending energy to keep it in motion. You never have to overcome inertia with a bike frame, or keeping it rotating in motion, and hence it has no rotational mass to fatigue you on a longer ride.

Keeping this logic of reducing rotating mass in mind, it is logical to notice that your wheels are the largest single rotating components on any road bike. And therefore, they offer the greatest lightweight gains.

Saving wheelset weight will make a huge difference to your sense of acceleration and overall energy efficiency and endurance while out riding. Whether you opt for a lightweight wheelset - perhaps aluminium - or transition to carbon-fibre, lowering the weight of your wheels yield the most instantly noticeable improvements in performance.

Beyond rotational mass, another aspect of road bike wheel design where you gain by upgrading to more exotic materials is ride quality. A carbon-fibre rim can be designed and constructed to have its fibres orientated in a multitude of directions.

Unlike aluminium, the composite structure of a carbon-fibre rim allows engineers to produce wheels with an unrivalled combination of lateral stiffness and radial compliance. The result is that a carbon wheel steers with tremendous accuracy and always remains true, requiring negligible spoke tensioning to remain perfectly dished over time, compared to aluminium — which can easily be knocked out of alignment by a pothole or manhole cover strike. Perhaps the most underappreciated advantage of upgrading your road bike wheelset is leveraging the latest trends in rim width.

Road cyclists have finally realised that wider rims and squared-off tyre profiles have superior aerodynamic properties, compared to extremely narrow rims with a bulbous tyre profile. Despite being quite remarkably cheap, they nevertheless include high quality sealed bearings throughout along with a fast engaging aluminium freehub body.

Gravel riding is big business now and DT Swiss was quick to capitalise on market demand by producing its G series wheelsets, all of which are designed to meet the demands of the emerging discipline. By happy coincidence though their features also suit road use rather well too.

The G wheels come with tubeless tape already installed, and feature a whopping 24mm internal rim width meaning 30mm road tyres and above will match perfectly, adding heaps of comfort to your bike while reducing rolling resistance to boot. If you are after a budget wheelset that has provisions for the latest trends in rim technology and riding requirements built in, the DT Swiss G 25 should be worthy of serious consideration.

After something more traditionally road-going? Check out four of the best other options. After time in a wind tunnel, Hunt says it has shown that the 34 Aero Wide wheels are the fastest aluminium set in the world, even comparing favourably against carbon rim designs.

This is thanks to the shape of the rim, which starts at 24mm wide at the bead hook, before bulging to 26mm at its widest. Hunt says this helps smooth airflow over the tyre and rim. Despite its aero credentials, the 34 Aero Wide wheels remain lightweight, at a claimed g.

Hunt says this is down to the use of T6 aluminium, which is stronger than conventional alloys used in rims. The brand claims this alloy is lighter and stiffer than the ones used in conventional rims.

It creates a wheelset that is competitive in weight at this price point — the Ksyrium Disc S weigh g. The rear hub also uses the firm's Instant Drive freewheel system which provides a matched 40 points of engagement. Much like Mavic in its Ksyrium wheel range, Fulcrum has reimagined its popular Racing 4 wheelset in a disc-brake format. The aluminium rim keeps the same notable 35mm depth, which should help aerodynamic efficiency, although it is a little narrow with a 22mm external diameter so is unlikely to support tyres wider than 28mm optimally.

We used to have two options as roadies: the expensive and hard to replace tubulars, or the classic clincher with its inner tube. The current generation of tyres and latex inner tubes gets pretty close to tubulars when it comes to performance, and they allow most of us to race around on them quickly and happily.

Mountain biking has brought over a new system however: tubeless tyres. Though not all rims are suitable for tubeless tyres, we do see more and more manufacturers are starting to offer tubeless-compatible wheels. Brands such as Zipp , Fulcrum , and DT Swiss have started to produce tubeless versions of their most popular wheelsets.

This allows you to try out some new tech without having to buy a completely new bike. This makes relatively new systems such as this one available to the masses more easily. More information on converting to run tubeless tyres can be found in this blog. Our 10 reasons to upgrade your wheels. Have we forgotten something, or do you have more great reasons to change your wheels? Let us know in the comments below.

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