Thomas De Gendt suffered a hard blow on Friday in the UAE Tour. The 37-year-old Belgian from Lotto Dstny escaped without too much damage, but his front wheel did explode, something that worries the CPA riders' association.
"If you look at the images of Thomas de Gendt's bike, you see that his tire came off, the safety foam on the inside got stuck in the fork and the front wheel locked up," said CPA chairman Adam Hansen to Velo.
"Some teams race with rims without hooks. This crash is the reason why the CPA is one hundred percent against hookless rims. Tires simply shouldn't come off a rim. The maximum tire pressure these hookless tires can hold is 73 and if you hit something you will definitely exceed that maximum tire pressure. That's why they come loose."
"We've heard from some teams that they've put the tires on the bikes, left them out in the sun and their tires just pop off," Hansen continued. "The problem is that the manufacturers really love it because it is much easier to produce the rim. You need fewer molds, the rims are much lighter and it is easier to produce. Hence the manufacturers insist on using hookless rims. There are many people who want to ban this in the peloton, because you can literally take down other riders. One day there will be a massive crash."
Paulo, they are called guinea pigs but I doubt their contract says they’re obliged to use untested life-endangering new technology. Next they’ll maybe consider testing asbestos brake pads because it’s always ok to exploit people as long as the accounts add up? Tell me your job and I’ll find something you might get paid to use you wouldn’t agree with, like the camera on a home office computer being turned on anytime your boss wants?
Sorry Paolo, I misunderstood, seems you were talking about teams and not riders. Last month an elite woman had an exploding tire crash mid-race too, anyone know details of her rims?
Hookless are a pathetic invention that just need to die off, yes tyre tech is a good thing BUT not at the expense of safety. Any other type of tyre tech is safer than this, tube/tub just not hookless - those with sealant can work, just not with these pathetic idea of a rim design
A single incident is not a trend, so until we know how often this happens, any claims of elevated risk are speculative at best. Hookless rims have been out for some years now, and many people (including me) use them. I am not aware of any pattern of this kind of incident, and its worth nothing that the big problem in this case wasn't the rim or tire, but the foam liner. Hopefully the manufacturers or the UCI or some other group with access to good data weighs in with more information.
Worryingly dangerous, but his team said they where happy with the system. "Lotto-Dstny defend the tyre system despite De Gendt blowout"