The continentals were better for puncture protgection than the (old) regular marathon 308's, I had only one puncture after 5000km with my tour contacts, and there was loads of rubber left. That trip was across SE Asia, Central China and Xinjiang with all kinds of road surfaces. I like the slick tread much better too, fast and bits don't get stuck in it. The only problem was with the side walls. From memory this wasn't the best of the tour contacts. Also, this was before I discovered pressure guages, so I was probably running them below spec.

Continental were claiming their walls have improved recently. Can anybody varify this? I'm fairly keen to use them for a "rogue entry" to the Darwin-Adelaide solar challenge (car race) in two years.

Thanks

Olly