The trail is cheeky. I don’t know if it was mud due to rain – it looked more like maybe someone had been digging or something, or a small landslide? Just a little muddy patch – but enough to make these tyres (2.35s by the way – apols, senior moment with the 2.2) lose any grip whatsoever.
Pressure – previously I’ve run them at about 40-50 PSI but recently I’ve started running them much softer, more like 25-30. But the pressure doesn’t seem to change anything. I ran them rock hard in the Alps a few weeks ago and softer yesterday and had the exact same problem I’m describing on both days.
I’ve ridden a few sets of tires (Michelin Comps, Panaracer Fires, Tioga DH) and only on the High Rollers have I found myself sliding down pretty gentle trails I normally hammer down, utterly out of control, as if on an ice rink, wondering how the **** this situation materialised!
I too saw how dry the whole area was, so I’m even more surprised that these tyres couldn’t take what little mud there was.
They were the folding ones – I wonder if that affected things? I can’t see how it would.
nb I tried accelerating to knock the crap out of the tyres but you just couldn’t safely, you couldn’t control the bike’s direction at all.
On a more positive note, I’ve actually been well impressed by Specialized’s Eskar tyres this summer (the ones their Enduros are kitted out with). This is doubly surprising because their hubs and shocks are crap!