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Because road cycling enthusiasts are just as susceptible as enthusiasts with other hobbies to take the obsession with gear to silly levels. Grill/barbecue back

Because road cycling enthusiasts are just as susceptible as enthusiasts with other hobbies to take the obsession with gear to silly levels. Grill/barbecue backyard dads obsessing about charcoal vs. briquettes vs. gas, BTUs and so on. Motorcyclists and their endless discussions about motor oil and chain lubrication. Amateur DIYers with tool collections that be excessive even for hardcore professional craftsmen. PC gamers with their obsession over performance tests of the latest CPUs and GPUs, mechanical keyboards and ultra-high CPI mouses. In the end, it's all just a dick measuring contest. If you have fancier gear or you have fancier-looking graphs than your neighbor, you are better at your shared hobby, because the numbers say so. At least the cyclists are finally realizing that super skinny ultra high-pressure tires are actually counterproductive, and that a wider tire with lower pressure performs better on the uneven surfaces of the real world. But because the super skinny rock hard tires performed best in tests on perfectly smooth rollers, everyone had convinced themselves for decades that more flexible tires were bad, because the numbers said so.

JNRowe 6y ago
I feel like the increase in wheel width may have had the biggest effect on the tyre shift. It was hard to buy a road wheel that wasn't a 15mm bead width a few years ago, and it is becoming difficult to buy wheels that are not >20mm now. I can realistically choose a 28-622 and run it at 5bar today, that wasn't an option a few years ago. In fact, five years ago my everyday bike didn't even have frame clearance for a 25-622. There is a different argument to be had if the point is "don't buy frames with road/tri geometry". I guess my point is: some of us aren't just choosing shiniest shiny, we're choosing an option from the list that only includes shiny.

JNRowe 6y ago

I feel like the increase in wheel width may have had the biggest effect on the tyre shift. It was hard to buy a road wheel that wasn't a 15mm bead width a few years ago, and it is becoming difficult to buy wheels that are not >20mm now. I can realistically choose a 28-622 and run it at 5bar today, that wasn't an option a few years ago. In fact, five years ago my everyday bike didn't even have frame clearance for a 25-622. There is a different argument to be had if the point is "don't buy frames with road/tri geometry". I guess my point is: some of us aren't just choosing shiniest shiny, we're choosing an option from the list that only includes shiny.