Continental Touring Plus Reflex Road Tire

I'm thoroughly impressed with these tires. I purchased them for my rainy day steel bike (an old Panasonic) and so far I've done several training rides, one MS150 ride (in the rain) one ride last week with some slush/snow on the road and now just yesterday a gravel grinder where we got in over our heads and they've done fantastic in all conditions. I just washed all the mud off them from the ride yesterday and I'm very surprised to see no damage & felt compelled to write this review and attach some pictures. What was supposed to be an easy gravel grinder on dirt roads turned into a 4wd/Jeep path "road" that not only crossed a healthy sized stream about 10 times but also followed it & a dry stream bed as well. Everyone on the ride was impressed I didn't flat. I feel confidant they'll continue to give me many trouble-free (s)miles. Note, I installed these on some old Araya non-box section rims and I didn't have any difficulty mounting them at all.

I purchased these tires to replace the stock tires that came with my bike. With the stock tires I was constantly losing air pressure and getting flats practically every other week. These tires were advertised as puncture resistant. So far this held up to be true.I notice the tires are thicker than my stock tires and they are much stiffer. I ride over pot holes, speed bumps, the curb and even glass; I haven't lost air pressure or experienced major blowouts. These tires also seem to be better able to handle the extra weight I carry on my bike when I'm out shopping or just commuting to work. The stock tires whenever I put any weight on my touring rack the back tire would start to lose air pressure and it felt like my back tire was dragging the ground when I would ride up hill on my way home. I do not have this problem with the new tires.My stock tires were listed as 700x32c. These tires are supposed to be the same size but they are a little bit more narrow than my stock tires. At first I thought they sent me the wrong size but on the tires themselves they are listed as having the same dimensions as my stock tires. Because they are smaller than my stock tires, this makes installing them on my rims very difficult to do with my bare hands. I manage to get them on with a little effort and patiences. However, getting them off without tools is impossible because the tires are so stiff. And, even with tools, it can be difficult.The drawback to these tires, because they are so stiff, whenever I ride over rough road surfaces - which is practically everywhere in South East Cleveland - I feel every bump and this can be jarring. My stock tires had more aggressive treads for some off road riding and they were softer to give me a smoother ride over rough road surfaces but they were also more prone to punctures. The new tires were clearly not designed to give me a smooth ride over rough road surfaces but, I'll take that trade-off for better puncture resistance.As for the performance of these tires when I'm just out riding and having fun, I am noticing that I'm achieving much fasters speeds than I did with my stock tires. For the first time in my life I was able to go over 30mph. Now, each time I go out riding at 4:00 in the morning, I keep pushing myself to go even faster to try to beat my fastest recorded speed. Also like that the sides of the tires are highly reflective - another level of safety for when I'm out riding before dawn.Update:Wow, these tires can really take some abuse. I just add two more photos showing damage to my rims when I went over a really deep pot hole at 27 miles per hour. I get home and I didn't even lose air pressure to my tires.

I've had good luck, great performance from Continental Touring tires in the past.1) Taking it as 'my duty' to share the observation that these tires are very difficult to mount on the 700c rim & nearly impossible to remove. I did both jobs in my garage, with the advantage of tire levers. Honestly couldn't imagine doing it on the side of the road. In fact, it was so hard to remove that I considered cutting it off the rim.2) Possible quality control issue. Once mounted, I got a wobbly ride out of this tire. Didn't have the wobble with my old 'Conti' tire. Don't know how my wheel would have gotten out of round in the process of replacing the tire & new Conti tube. Visually inspected the tire & wheel. The tire & wheel were out of round vertically, while on the bike, not side-to-side.. Removed the tire, checked just the wheel, not bad. [I took the wheel to the local shop to be re-trued. He said it wasn't actually bad, but he's going to fine-tune it.] The tire was worn very unevenly, 'like new' in some sections, very worn (almost no tread left) in others... after only a few hundred miles. That tire is in the trash. Ordered a different model Conti. Hoping for the best. I guess I could have done something wrong, but I've had this bike for 25K+ miles, changed more than a few tires, never had this issue.

Put these on my wife's bike and she liked them so well I put them on my commuter too.I have been very pleased so far. Better wet performance and fewer punctures compared to what I was using before. Didn't notice any difference in rolling resistance.The reflective sidewall on these things is BRIGHT - highly visible whenever light hits them.As other reviewers have noticed, they are a bit tight putting on to the rims. One thing I noticed when mounting mine; I had two different size tubes. One was something like 32-38 and the other was something like 35-42 - ie, for both tubes, these tires were within the specified size range, but in one case the tube was on the small side of the range and the other tube was on the large side. Putting the tire on over the smaller tube, I could not figure out what all the complaining reviews were about - slightly tight, maybe, but no big deal. Putting the other tire on over the larger tube, it was more of a struggle although it did eventually go on. Not sure if this was just coincidence, but if you're ordering new tubes with these you might want to go on the smaller end of the range than the larger end.One other thing: these tires seem to run smaller than the designated size. I got 37s which appear to be thinner and have a smaller contact patch than the 35s I was replacing. I put 28s on a different bike, which appeared smaller than Schwalbe and Vittoria 25s. If in doubt between two sizes, you might want to think about ordering the larger of the two.