Schwalbe G ONE RS PRO 700 x 55 off road rolling resistance results 📊

With the recent availability of 55 millimeter gravel tires, some folks may wonder if we arrived here purely for the sake of going big…and perhaps the true fastest setup in rough gravel is something like a 45 mm tire with a suspension fork.

These measured out to 54.5 mm wide on a 25 mm internal width rim, and have a bit lower height than the 55 RX due to the lack of any center knobs. This also brings about a flatter tread profile across the top, which may or may not be to your liking. Weight was right at 700 grams for both of the tires I tested. These share the same construction as the rest of the new Schwalbe PRO gravel lineup with the RACE PRO casing and Addix Race compound, along with the V Guard puncture protection. I had no issues inflating these tires or finding a pressure I was happy with. I installed them with the rear in reverse tread direction of the front, as suggested on the sidewall. Ben Delaney and The Bicycle Station both have recent YouTube content on the 55 RS PRO, so ya might want to give that a look also.

I tested these on smooth pavement, as well as 3 different roughness gravel tracks, to see where they stacked up against the current crop of ultra fast mountain bike tires in the 29 x 2.2 ish range…as well as all the more conventionally sized gravel tires I have tested. As the results show, these were very fast everywhere from smooth pavement to the roughest gravel.

One obvious showdown here is the 55 vs 45 RS PRO. This is the first tire model in 45 and 55 sizes I have been able to compare on ALL the testing areas… including Cat 3 / Rough Gravel. While somewhat similar on the other courses, the volume of the 55 dominates here with a 13 watt savings over the smaller model. From available testing (mine included) a suspension fork would get back about 5-7 watts at 30kph with the 45 mm tire if that is your preferred setup.

All test results are my own via Chung Method/VE testing.

NOTE: Everyone wants to know…what pressure am I using? Obviously, larger tires will require lower pressure than smaller ones to get the best speed and handling in general…especially off road. The Wolf Tooth Advanced calculator is very good in my usage for gravel and mtb tires. The Rough Gravel setting seems to get quite close to best pressure for not only rolling efficiency (yes, even on gravel that’s not super rough) but also comfort and handling. I will start with that based on the measured tire size, go ride some, recheck pressure once the tire warms up, the reasess the setting based on how the tire is riding. If it feels obviously harsh, go down 1 psi at a time. If it feels squirmy or I am smacking the rim on hard hits, I will go up 1 psi at a time. Often I end up sticking quite close to what the calculator says initially but it isn't written in stone. Even for tires with the exact same size and casing, tread pattern design can also influence finding ideal pressure. Rolling efficiency is actually almost identical across a bigger span of tire pressures off road than most realize, which means it is quite easy to get the pressure where the tire will be fastest…the rest is fine tuning to rider preference. Even though I’m testing, I am also enjoying being out there so take the extra steps to see how the tire performs best. Ultimately there is no magic “best” pressure… it is up to rider preference with no real speed penalty unless you really mess it up one way or another. All the Smooth Pavement testing I do is with the tires set to the PSI I would use for riding on average pavement, so in practice about 5-7 psi higher than I would use for off road riding. This requires different wheel circumference measurements than the off road test portions, but I think is worth it to get the best comparison between tires.