Mr. Blurrycam did his best to thwart our coverage of these, but we got ’em. Hutchinson’s new Squale (left) and DZO downhill mountain bike tires bring some giant blocks to the gravity party.
The Squale is a massive 26×2.6 for dry, rocky courses. The DZO is a 2.35 width made for muddy courses and has marks for helping the OCD types trim the treads equally (seriously, pic after the break). Both have their Hardskin, single ply casings. Weights are TBD, U.S. MSRP will be $85 each.
Some of the pros (have their mechanics) trim the tread blocks down to save weight or tweak the ride (or both), so Hutchinson put notches 1/3 of the way down the tread blocks. Why you’d want to whittle down blocks on a mud tire, we’re not sure, but at least you can get them all even.
Their Cobra XC tire gets some growth hormones and jumps to a 29×2.2 with single ply, 66tpi casing and carbon bead. It’s tubeless ready, weight TBD. There should also be a version with some red color in it like a few other of their tires.
The Piranha (left) is a bit of a training tire (340g) and the Toro is the racing tire (350) with a smaller, wider tread spacing. Hutchinson has had these in their queue for a while, what’s new is that they’re now available in a 32c width, making them UCI legal. Both are 127tpi and retail for $50 each.
