One might say there are two kinds of people; those plagued with flats, and those who seldom get them. The flat is a symptom, though. The disease is goatheads. There are those who ride among goathead thorns, and those who seldom pass by them.

Those who live near goathead thorn infestations will get puncture flats from them, unless they ride bullet proof tires and/or employ slime or some other sealant.

I've had as many as five flats on one ride with Gatorskins, from riding through a goathead-infested MUP. Last summer I had flats approximately every couple of weeks, so every 200-275 miles, riding GP 4000sII tires. This year I replaced my rear GP4000sII with a GP5000 on my road bike (the front GP4000sII is still too new to toss out). I've got a few hundred flat-free miles on that bike, but it's probably just luck and the fact that it's still too early for goatheads to be mature enough to puncture tires. Later in the season, we'll get there.

On my hybrid I have GP4Season tires. 400 miles in on those tires this year and still no flats. I'm sure they will be sturdier than the 4000 and 5000 tires, but I'm also sure that when goathead season gets underway they will be no match for such a formidable opponent.

It would be nice to have a world campaign to eradicate goathead / puncture plants. But if humanity ever pulled that off we would surely discover the puncture plant is vital to the planet's survival in some way we hadn't anticipated. Maybe they keep the bigfoot population in check, and without them we'll be overrun by that shy but powerful creature.