WTB is calling the new Moto tire, the new tire for your all mountain bike. While you’ll have to be the judge of that, the successor to the popular Motoraptor does boast some impressive specs with an aggressive tread pattern to go with it. WTB has taken the Motoraptor’s design and made the Moto with a more open tread design to improve mud shedding and wet performance. The Moto does have fairly tall knobs for great penetration in loose soil, but WTB claims they’re not so tall that the tire becomes squirmy on rock and hardpack surfaces.
Motos will be available in both 26 (2.1 and 2.3) and 29 inch (1.9) sizes, with both tubed and TCS compatible casings. Weight is fairly impressive with a 26 x 2.1 inch TCS tire coming in at 640g, and the 29 x 1.9 TCS weighing 650g. WTB is calling the Moto the ideal go-anywhere do-anything knobby that performs just as well in spring thunderstorms as summer dust.
More from WTB after the break.
From WTB:
EVOLUTION OF THE MOTORAPTOR BRINGS OPEN SPIKED KNOBS, LOWER PROFILE TREAD, DNA RUBBER, INNER PEACE SIDEWALLS AND MORE TO THE WTB TIRE RANGE
WTB’s founder and leading rubber designer Mark Slate has developed the latest evolution of the Moto series tires. WTB is making them available in 26″ and 29″ versions immediately to bicycle dealers worldwide.
“The Motoraptor was a very successful tire for WTB,” says Slate. “With the development of the Tubeless Compatible System (TCS) and the advancement of Dual DNA rubber compound, it was time to modify the design to fit today’s five and six inch travel market. The Moto is the result of tons of testing and feedback from our world-class racers, and is the natural evolution in the WTB line of performance tires.”
The Moto features double center blocks for traction in wetter conditions, spiky knobs to penetrate the trail surface, good transition edge knob placement for control where control is hard to come by, and a more open pitch to get a grip on almost any surface.
The 26″ tires come in 2.1 and 2.3 widths with TCS, All-Mountain TCS, Race (folding) and Comp (steel bead) versions. The 29″ 1.9 model comes in a TCS version that weighs only 650 grams.
