Ruedas

Ask Jaroslav Kulhavý, and he'll tell you—every gram counts in cross country racing. But with XC tracks becoming more aggressive than ever, just being a flyweight wheel is no longer sufficient. Now, wheels need to be as tough and stiff as they are light, with all of the handling characteristics that seasoned XC riders have come to expect. These days, wheels need to be more like the new Control SL 29 with 148 rear spacing.

When our riders asked us for the ultimate cross country wheels, we knew that they were really asking for some pretty specific features. They had to be light in order to be low in the inertia and weight departments, strong enough to take on rocks and roots on a short-travel race bike, and wide enough so that the tire profile was optimized for both traction and rolling resistance—not an easy feat.

To check all of these design boxes, we started by looking at our Traverse SL rim to see if we could extract the wide-rim benefits while keeping the weight at, or below, the previous Control SL—the existing benchmark. Based on the width we knew was ideal for the desired ride characteristics, we tuned the rim shape to optimize the stiffness, weight, and ride quality of the system as a whole—too tall and the wheel rides too stiff, too shallow and the wheel is too flexy. Our engineers meticulously went through rim shape developments to find the perfect balance and optimal geometry, and after fine-tuning multiple layup iterations and schedules, we ended with a 25-millimeter internal width rim that's approximately the same weight as the previous Control SL.

Being able to add material and width (3mm to be exact), without a weight penalty makes for a stronger XC wheel, but we weren’t content settling with just an increase in strength. With our goal being the fastest race wheelset available, we took the new and old rims, paired them with a set of size 2.0 Fast Trak tires, and performed rolling resistance tests at both 20 and 30 PSI. The result? The new, wider rim tested faster at both pressures, confirming our line-wide hypothesis that wider is not only stronger, but also faster.

Keeping the Zero Bead Hook design, the new Control SL rim keeps all the sought-after features that come with this design—added impact resistance, easy tubeless tire installation, and a better tire seal on the rim. And with a lighter rim, you're also rewarded with extremely low inertia, that translates to faster accelerations for the punchy efforts required of XC racing. Focusing on the wheels as a system, we kept with our core design tenants of lightweight and durability, so we made sure not to skimp on the build. Each wheel is built by hand, and while this is somewhat of a lost art, we know that a real person can achieve qualities that a machine simply can’t. When hand-building, little discrepancies can be found that would otherwise be missed by a machine, so we took the refined 2Bliss Ready rim and matched it with our CNC-machined hubs with DT Swiss Competition Race spokes. The hub internals feature sealed bearings and DT Swiss 240 internals with a 54-tooth star ratchet in the rear, making for lightning fast engagement.

Finally, with the 110/148 variant, you receive all of the benefits that Boost spacing offers. By increasing the width of the front and rear hub flanges, and in turn, increasing frame and fork clearance and stiffness, you obtain a stiffer, stronger, and more durable system at a minor weight penalty.

If you’re in need of sub-1400-gram, race-ready wheelset that has handling and strength of a modern trail wheel, the Control SL 29 148 is the perfect choice.

After designing the CLX 50s, we realized that an affordable, race-worthy carbon wheelset was nowhere to be found—until the CL 50 Disc was developed, that is. We paired our quiver-killing CLX 50 Disc rim with DT Swiss Competition round spokes, our Aero Flange Disc hubs with DT Swiss 350 internals, and steel bearings to deliver you an exceptional wheelset at a more than accessible price.

Sharing rims with the CLX 50s, the CL 50s feature many of the benefits as their higher-end siblings. Even though the CL 50 is similar in weight to many wheels in the “lightweight” category, aerodynamics came at the forefront of the development. With this, we jumped headlong into Computational Fluid Dynamics computer modeling to arrive at various rim shapes that could make the CL 50 as fast and light as possible. It took a while, but we narrowed the rim shape down to three contenders that were then CNC machined into rims, built into wheels, and put into the Win Tunnel.

In the tunnel, we tested every wheel, ours and the competition's, with a 24C tire (measuring 26C), as tires can drastically affect testing. We chose a modern-width tire to design our rims around, because they not only allow for less tire pressure (which results in more comfort and less rolling resistance) but are also just as aerodynamically efficient when paired with the correct rim width.

Now it was time for final testing validation. The result? A 50mm-deep, 1515-gram clincher wheelset that's race-ready and wallet-friendly.

It’s not often that “affordable” and “carbon” appear in the same sentence, but our Control 29 Carbon wheelset was designed to change that. Using many of the same techniques used in the development of the SL iteration of the Control 29, these wheels provide the lightweight XC performance you need at a more attainable price.

Creating a successful XC wheelset isn't as easy as you might think. Often times, keeping a wheel light, stiff, and strong requires an unlimited budget, so when we were asked to create a wheel that had low inertia and weight but was also strong enough to take on rocks and roots, wide enough so that the tire profile was optimized for both traction and rolling resistance, and most importantly, was affordable, we knew that we had our work cut out for us.

We started with the notion of keeping these wheels as close to their SL brethren as possible. With this, we explored what made the SLs so awesome in the first place and implemented nearly every aspect of them. Starting with the rim, we kept our renowned Zero Hook Bead that allows for continuous fiber layup across the sidewall and rim bed. We then paired it with a wide 22-millimeter internal, 27-millimeter external profile makes it resilient to impact and creates a tire profile that’s conducive to low rolling resistance and incredible traction.

On the trail, these technical traits translate to a wheelset that many XC riders have grown to love—quick accelerations on punchy climbs, swift stopping that lets you leave braking till the last second, and unprecedented reliability. Combine this with our easy to set-up 2Bliss system and you have a reliable XC wheel that’s as easy to climb on as it is to set-up.

To go along with the rim, we made sure to keep the lightweight, reliable, and affordable features in mind when building the wheelset, so we took our proven alloy hubs that feature DT Swiss 350 internals at the rear and hand-laced them with 32 DT Swiss revolution spokes. Finding hand-built wheels is becoming more and more difficult, but we're fully vested in the power of the human touch. When a wheel is machine-built, there are certain margins of error that are built into the system that result in inconsistencies. With a real person building your wheels, you're sure to have a wheelset free of imperfections. And even better, the Control Carbon gives you this in one sub-1600-gram, trail-ready wheelset.

If you’re on the hunt for a wheelset that meets both your riding and financial expectations, the Control Carbon 29 is a trophy find.