Originally Posted by
MichaelW
Ive ridden lots of gravel in Denmark/Norway (full touring load) with 32mm Marathon. The tyre performed well but the size was too narrow. It should work just fine in a 35-38mm size.
I only experienced one flat from a flint shard (not a rock you find in Iceland). I was able to ride up some very steep gravel trails and control the descent (with care).
The Marathon Plus will be more resistance BUT I'm not sure it is necessary and it is a notoriously tight fit to most rims and quite a bit heavier.
Tread on bike tyres is only of use on a loose surface such as gravel roads.
I did some research on the dirt roads in East Iceland and they are well maintained. So as I won't be going too far into the interior and on tarmac 90% of the time I went with 700x35 Marathon Duremes. They look like a good choice as they are quite light (550g) and are claimed to be very tough and roll well on roads while having enough tread to give grip on gravel. When they arrived in the mail I found that the store had send me Extremes, but they immediately sent out some replacement Duremes, but it gave me a good chance to compare the tires.
The Extreme has twice the tread depth of the Duremes ad I wouldn't like to ride them for too long on the road. The Dureme's tread is definitely deeper and chunkier than that on Panaracer Tour Guards and the sidewalls are far tougher. The center of the Dureme looks good for roads and the side tread will work well on dirt.
