Cyccommute, has pretty well summed up what the weather is like in bench cities of the Rockies. Generally there is only a couple of days were studs might be useful unless it is one of those 20 year cold winters where the snow packs to ice and stays frozen on the ground and road for long periods. However, combine the fact that most of the Rocky mountain cities have good snow plows and the sun shines 4-5 days during the week in winter and you get fast snow melt off the roads. At high elevation towns like ski resort towns the snow is more likely to be soft stuff on the road. Big knobby tires work the best in this stuff. I actually use a small knobby easy rolling wide tire as it works pretty well in all conditions. Something like a Hutchinson Python. But these are 26 inch tires. As long as you are on a road or paved bike path and the snow is not more then a couple of inches deep cyclocross knobbies should also work well for 700c applications.
Last edited by Hezz; 10-21-10 at 06:02 PM.