Originally Posted by
dynaryder
I'm no weight weenie,but DC is a very hilly area. My regular route home means twice dropping into the 26 ring and either 2nd or 3rd gear out back(depending on how I'm feeling) to haul my 31lbs bike up a long steep hill. In the OP's case,the difference between the 29x2 folding Supreme(no wire in that size) and the wire Big Apple is 195gr. According to Google,that's about .43lbs,or almost half a pound. That's alot of weight to put around the outer part of your rim where it's going to require extra effort to spin up.
Yeah, but you only spin up as often as you stop. The only situation where I can see caring is if you have a *lot* of stops in the middle of high-speed traffic. So if you're going from 20 to 0 to 20 to 0.... a few times a minute, that might get old. Otherwise, we're talking about 3-4 pedal strokes, no big deal. Believe me, I've got some nice hills on my commute, and I've seen some of the worst hills in N. Va. on a 40+lb bike (like the bike trail from the river up to Reston). Good for your quads.
There's also the fact that he's presumably wanting 2" tires for a reason, and that reason is to run them at lower pressures than 32mm tires will accept without risking a pinch flat. Obviosuly, if his goal is to run at a pressure range that his current 32mm tires will handle, then there's no reason to get new tires at all. But I'm assuming that the OP is making a conscious choice between the comfort and stability of wider/lower pressure 2" tires vs. the slightly higher speed of the 32s.
There are advantages to wider tires; many people like them and don't mind the rather minimal performance impact.