Originally Posted by
canam73
Curious, what were you just calling "rims" that had an internal width of 17mm or more?
Before the new crop you speak of, most (all?) of the popular AL clincher road race rims had an internal width of ~14mm. Mavic Open Pro and CXP series, Velocity Aerohead, early Kinlins, Sun M13. Until the HED C2 and Zipp 101 stuff pretty much all factory wheels were in that boat, too. Anything wider than that was thought of as a touring or, for the love of god, a "sport" rim.
I'm not saying that was a good thing. It's just that anyone who came into the sport since the late 80's (this would include you, no?) would have caught the line of thinking of "thinner is more aero". I myself was unlucky enough that my first new road bike came with 21mm Avocet tires on 13mm internal width Araya rims. They had to be rock hard to not get pinch flats and road like crap always.
Nope...I started riding and dabbling in racing in 1987-1988. I never cared about the width of my rims and could run any road tire I ever wanted. Sure wider rims feel nice but you can run wide tires on just about any rim under the sun.
OP - ride whatever tire will fit that you like. Your rim width will not limit your tire selections nearly as much as the frame will.