Tubulars: Hutchinson the forgetten gem?
 

Been pondering the tire thing, thanks to the recent Veloflex thread. Survey says most of the Pro Tour teams are on Vittoria or rebranded Vittoria. Hutchinson, somewhat surprisingly, would appear to be the second most used tubular, then Conti, then Schwalbe.

Try to find Hutchinson tubulars, at least here in the US, and it's pretty limited, far less that most other brands. And their market profile/penetration is pretty miniscule.

Anybody ride them? Opinions?

I haven't used their tubulars, but FWIW they make some amazing light/fast/puncture resistant MTB clinchers.

Veloflex makes the Hutchison Tubulars acording to a 2005 Velonews article :)


*De Gioannini works for Vittoria*

De Gioannini: “We officially sponsor six Pro Tour teams (CSC, Bianchi, Euskaltel, Cofidis, Française des Jeux, and Rabobank), and they all race on tubulars. We also know that Fassa Bortolo is using tubulars (very often ours, although they’re officially on Dedatre). Quick Step is on Veloflex-made Hutchinson tubulars. Those are the teams I’ve direct info on. I don’t know what the Discovery guys are using (I assume Hutchinson tubulars) but the only big team testing tubeless this year is Lampre-Caffita, due to the partnership with Mavic, and not all the racers use it. Michelin is pushing very hard on its team to impose clinchers, but we know that every year they have tubulars made for their top guys. Judging based on this information and on gut feeling (I’m not at the Tour to verify it), 80 percent of the Tour racers still rely on the cushioning and low rolling resistance of sew-ups, the rest are on clinchers and a few bikes are testing tubeless. As for the inner tubes, since our teams use clinchers mostly for training, they mount quite basic butyl tubes. We didn’t provide latex tubes to our teams in the past few years.”

Yes, they are Veloflex SC with a Hutchinson hot stamp on them.

This is one of the few things I've learned from Bicycling. In 2006 they had a breakdown of Popo's (?) Madone and there was a quote from a mechanic along the lines of "We only use the best Italian tubulars" implying that the Hutchinsons were Velofelx

their clinchers cut like butter

Their real tubulars suck. Who makes tubulars with non-removable valve cores? Its a major suck, i had to throw away two hutchinson tubulars because I broke off the valve nut and couldn't replace the core