Road Bike Racing - Necessity of Rim Tape

Pardon my ignorance, but I thought I would post this here since I have just recently started racing and would like to get some fellow racer's opinions. I just picked myself up a new pair of clincher wheels and got them in the mal today and began to wonder why I really need rim strips. The rims aren't that deep bu there is probably 2-2.5 cm between the nipple and where the rim strip would go. So do I really need strips?

Thanks,
Jonny

Yes or you will get flats.

You could use fiber reinforced packing tape if you are a real weight weenie.

Clinchers use tubes. Tubes are thin rubber. Thin rubber under lots of pressure squeezes into spoke holes and stretches against sharp edges. The next logical step results in a compromised tube.

Thanks

Tip: Try to use a quality rim-tape (such as Velox) which is tacky on one side. This will hold the tape in position and prevent it moving across the rim as the non-tacky tapes tend to do when fitting the tyre & tube. I've been caught out a couple of times by just such an occurence, so nowadays it's Velox all the way.

- Wil

unless... you have rims like ksyriums or fulcrums which don't have spoke holes... then you won't need the rim strips.