Specialized Captain Control Tire Review by Donn O

Posted by FatBob on February 1, 2010

Donn O

Fat Bob said Donn you got to test tires –but dang I love my Racing Ralf’s please don’t make me switch tires.

I looked at the tires he gave me and I decided that maybe a little more aggressive tread on the back would help me claw up thru the big rocks on our local Jonesboro Fault Trail and stir up the sand better for an upcoming Florida trip so I put the Specialized “The Captain” on the back of my Niner RIP 9 and left my favored Racing Ralf on the front.

Captain control retains mud.

In my opinion there is nothing better that my Racing Ralf’s on dry hard pack clay soils.

When I switched to the Captain the first thing I noticed was the taller tread would skid easier under heavy braking when on the same dry hard pack trail.

The Captain side view photo by Donn O

On the plus side it did have more climbing traction in the loose stuff and would claw slightly better over the big rocks.

In the wet neither tire are great - both are prone to load up which I found out the hard way in Florida. I thought our North Carolina red clay was bad but I got into some sticky white clay down there and it totally clogged both tires to the point I had to stop and use a stick to scrape off the white crud so the tires would spin again.

We have built several miles of new trail this winter and this tire does a reasonable job on the soft wet new trail surface except for the occasional loading up problem.

We had a rare winter snow storm so I took this opportunity to do a tread impression in the new snow so you could visualize how the rubber actually connects to the trail.

I might have to get Fat Bob to spring for some extra thick frozen Margaritas so I can do this test in the summer. You can see a fairly continuous center block pattern with widely spaced side paddles – the side tread did not come into play even though I weighted the tire to make this impression. Overall I like this tire only wish it did not clog as bad.