The Ride #1: Parcours Passista Wheelset

Weight: 1560g | Rim depth: 56mm | Rim width: 27mm | Cost: £819

Upon first glance of the Passista wheelset you might imagine your pockets lighten but this piece of kit is incredibly reasonable for the competitors equivalent. The Matte finish looks great and those deep sections could make any bike look fast.

Whilst applying my new set of S-Works Turbo 24’s I noticed the rather large rim width, making my 24’s look more like 28’s! This is the current trend in the wheel world and it makes sense. In short the 27mm outer rim increases the tyre width, allowing for the ability to run lower tyre pressures and therefore greater comfort when on those bumpy roads. This wider contact patch with the road decreases rolling resistance. Making us ride faster and in more comfort!

The wheels feel slightly harder to get up to speed than a shallower rim, but once you are up to speed you really do motor. The 56mm wheel depth gives that ‘whooshing’ sound you so often here from other riders coming up behind you on a pair of Zipps. The sound and the low rolling resistance really comes into its own when above 36kmh, almost feeling like you have a constant tail wind.

The ride is immense. The wheels feel super stiff and strong when applying the power in and out of the saddle, in short they just roll beautifully along the road. I have covered 900km so far on the wheels and they are still perfectly true.

One downside to the 56mm rim depth is handling in the crosswinds – I have raced in a few winter circuit races on #projectBAAW and one in particularly around the time of ‘Storm Doris’!

In fairness to Parcours these are not the kind of conditions you should be riding the Passista wheelset but when corning at high speed with a fairly strong crosswind I could certainly feel it cutting across the wheels. That said, I never felt unsafe on them and still finished the race well.

The wheelset comes complete with skewers and carbon friendly brake pads. These are components that I think I may upgrade in time. The brake pads feel quite hard under braking and I believe a softer upgrade would offer improved and more consistant stopping power. The skewers look awesome and help to bring the weight of the wheelset down, though this something else I would prefer change, sacrifice a bit of weight for a more substantial set.

Overall the Passista Wheelset is a bit of a bargain. There is not many full carbon wheels out there that offer so much for the £819.00 price tag. A stiff, aero wheel set at a low cost. Whats not to love?

To the #PASSISTAHOOD here.

See #ProjectBAAW in its entirety  here.