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Something for the weekend: Mavic Ksyrium Pro UST tubeless wheelset

Mavic promise the easiest and safest tubeless wheels on the market

Mavic has something of a reputation for a cautious approach to product development. It wasn’t until 2016 that the French firm launched its first full carbon clincher wheelsets, long after carbon wheels became lusted after by riders worldwide, while road tubeless has also been another slow burner for the Annecy-based brand.

That, in part, has been down to safety fears, when it comes to both carbon clinchers and tubeless. While Mavic was quick to develop a tubeless line-up for the mountain bike world back in 1999, only 18 years later has the road equivalent arrived. Admittedly, road tubeless has only emerged as a genuine trend in the past five years, but Mavic’s relatively slow adoption has been due to concerns about compatibility (the ease with which the tyre can be fitted to the rim) and the quality of the seal, given the high pressures road tyres run at compared to off-road rubber.

Mavic says the UST wheel-tyre system, launched last month, solves those problems and we’ve just received the Ksyrium Pro UST wheelset to test.

Just in at RCUK: the Mavic Ksyrium Pro UST wheelset

You can check back on our report from the UST launch to find out the full tech story but, in brief, by developing a tubeless tyre and rim setup to specifically work in conjunction with one another, Mavic says its tubeless wheels are the easiest and safest to use on the market.

Mavic has sold its hoops as a ‘wheel-tyre system’ in the traditional clincher format for some time now, but while some riders may not have been overly fussed about having Mavic tyres when buying a set of the company’s regular wheels in the past, designing the tubeless setup as one makes more sense.

The Mavic Ksyrium Pro UST wheels sit roughly in the middle of a wide UST range which includes everything from the fabled Open Pro rim to the 1,390g Ksyrium Pro Carbon SL hoops. If you want a set of tubeless Mavic wheels, chances are you’ll find something in the 15-strong line-up.

For now, let’s focus on the Ksyrium Pro UST wheels we have in to test. As an aluminium wheelset with a claimed weight of 1,420g and a retail price of £829.00 (including tyres and sealant), these are the kind of wheels many riders will look to when upgrading the often heavy setup on a stock bike.

With one spoke in yellow, you know these are Mavic wheels

When launching the UST system, Mavic also introduced the Yksion Pro UST tyre and they are pre-installed on the wheels (without sealant; you have to add that yourself upon purchasing and Mavic provide instructions). Having had a play with our wheels, the tyres inflate very easily with a normal track pump and during testing we’ll find out how easy they are to get on and off of the rim.

The tyres, by the way, are Mavic-branded but made by another French company, Hutchinson, and are based on a new compound called Storm 11, said to give the ‘best balance of grip and low rolling resistance’. We’ve had mixed feelings about Mavic tyres in the past so look forward to seeing how these fare, also bearing in mind the potential to run them at lower pressures thanks to the lack of an inner tube.

Mavic Ksyrium Pro UST wheelset (Pic: George Scott/Factory Media)
Mavic Ksyrium Pro UST wheelset (Pic: George Scott/Factory Media)
Tubeless has also emerged in recent years and most carbon wheels are compatible with the tube-free technology

The tyres weigh a claimed 260g each in the supplied 25c size and we weighed the complete wheel-tyre system at 1,950g, which is pretty much what you’d expect given the 1,420g claimed weight of the wheels alone.

There you have it, Mavic’s new Ksyrium Pro UST wheelset. We’ll be hitting the road this weekend to kick-start the test period. Watch out for a full review on RoadCyclingUK in due course.

Website: Mavic

Something for the weekend showcases our pick of the latest tech to arrive at RoadCyclingUK. You can see more here.

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