Originally Posted by
SquidPuppet
Huh? I can tell you from personal experience that two exact same tires, one in 35mm and the other in 50mm ride nothing alike. The 50mm is far more comfortable. If narrower tires rode better, eveyone would be running around on 23s...Why would anyone do that in the real world though? A 50mm tire will achieve ~15% deformation at a much lower pressure than a 35mm. And that's the whole point. The 35mm MUST be inflated to a harder state in order to offer the same deformation/rolling resistance as the 50mm.
Is it more comfortable at the same rolling resistance though? When they say wider tires can have less rolling resistance, how wide do they mean? You can't just extrapolate.
There are tires with Kevlar beads in 50mm 559 too. We are talking about a single speed coaster brake bike here, intended for cruising.
A bike will feel faster and more responsive with light tires unless the wheels are heavy.