It’s been a long time coming, but it finally seems safe to say that wide tyres are here to stay. From road race bikes all the way up to gravel and adventure rigs, tyre clearances have grown to provide space for more rubber, and the comfort, reduction in rolling resistance and increased grip that goes along with it. And at long last, we’re finally seeing wider wheels become more prevalent, with updated profiles to match the aerodynamics and shaping of modern tyres.
Enve may not have been the first one to the wide wheel party, but the company made a splash when it launched three new gravel wheels earlier this year. The “Big Dawgs,” the G SES 6.7 PRO, certainly got most of the attention, and rightfully so: these are wheels that mean business. In fact, Enve makes the claim that they are the “outright fastest gravel wheel on the market.”
While the 6.7 PRO appears to be extremely fast, especially on long, open gravel courses like Unbound, Enve’s shallower option in the lineup, the G SES 4.5 PRO, provides a much more versatile option for most riders. They’re lighter, for one, and less susceptible to crosswinds, making them easier for smaller riders to control. And while they may lose out a bit in terms of absolute speed, the 30 mm internal width of the 4.5 rim enables riders to safely run tyres as narrow as 40 mm, something that isn’t possible with the mega-wide 35 mm internal width of the 6.7s.
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Design and construction
(Image credit: Future)
The G SES 4.5 PRO is the lightest option in Enve’s gravel lineup. The rims themselves are front- and rear-specific: the front measures 49 mm, while the rear is 55 mm deep. Internal width is 30 mm, while external width is 37.6 mm (37.8 by my callipers). Enve states that the rims are “tuned for aerodynamic performance with high volume tyres between 44-52 mm.”
The wide rims are mated to Enve’s top-spec Innerdrive Pro hub, which is built with ceramic bearings, oversized stainless steel ratchets, and a light-action spring to reduce drag. The hubs are laced with Alpina alloy nipples and Alpina Ultralite straightpull spokes. Like most Enve wheels, the nipples are internally located within the rim itself. Total system weight, including rim tape and tubeless valves, is 1482 grams, per my scale. The spokes and hubs both have a polished silver finish, visually differentiating the PRO wheels from the standard G SES 4.5 wheelset (which shares the same rims as the PRO version) and giving them a bit of added pizzazz.
In the box are multiple freehub bodies, and swapping them is straightforward; it can be done without tools in about 3 minutes. I conducted most of my testing with an HG driver installed, but also briefly tested the XD driver. Underway, the freehub makes a loud but not deafening noise that’s decidedly more of a growl than a high-pitched buzz.
The rims are hookless and ship with tubeless tape and valves installed. As this is a gravel-specific design, Enve has designed these rims with impacts in mind, and made the bead very wide to blunt the edge and aid in preventing pinch flats. The width of the sidewall measures a very robust 3.8 mm, similar to what one might find on a mountain bike rim. Max tyre pressure is 50 PSI and the minimum approved tyre size is 40 mm.
Enve manufactures its rims in the USA and covers its products with a limited lifetime warranty for materials conformance, as well as a limited lifetime crash-replacement policy.
Specifications:
(Image credit: Future)
- Weight: 1480 grams listed, 1482 actual (including tape and valves)
- Internal width: 30 mm
- Minimum tyre size: 40 mm
- External width: 37.6
- Depth: 49 mm front, 55 mm rear
- Price: $3100 USD / €3899 / £3500
The Ride:
(Image credit: Tyler Boucher)
These wheels are fast, full stop. Are they the fastest option out there? It’s tough to say. Enve’s road-going wheels seem to be working fairly well for Tadej and his UAE teammates, so it stands to reason that the equivalent gravel version would also be pretty quick.
In my time spent riding these wheels, I tested the G SES 4.5 PRO wheelset with two different tyres. I started with Schwalbe’s 2.1 inch/55 mm Thunder Burt tyres, a fast-rolling knobby tyre that is my go-to for dry gravel conditions. Installation was smooth, and the (slightly undersized) tyres measured around 54 mm, just over the upper edge of Enve’s recommended tyre size.
For such a wide rim, the G SES 4.5 PRO is impressively light. I didn’t try to ascertain any measurable aerodynamic gains during my testing process, but at higher speeds the wheels very obviously make a difference to the bike’s speed. Good wheels feel stable and encourage you to push, to dig deeper into your pedal stroke and tuck your head that little bit more to eke out another .5 kph. That feeling of liveliness at speed, where the entire system is working harmoniously, is addictive, and these wheels possess it.
I also tested the wheels with a tyre at the opposite end of the recommended range: Vittoria’s 42 mm Corsa PRO Control tyres. Setup with these tyres also proved uneventful, and riding on this (slightly) narrower rubber gave me a good feel for the character of the wheels without the interference caused by the knobby tread and sheer volume of the 55s. In this configuration, the 4.5 PROs felt very much like a standard aero road wheel, with good lateral stiffness and direct road feedback coming through to the rider. Here again, the wheels performed at their best when ridden aggressively, seemingly coming alive once my speedometer ticked over 45 kph. I think the wheels are at their best, performance-wise, with a slightly narrower, firmer tyre. According to Enve, these wheels are optimised for 44-52 mm, but based on my time spent riding them, I liked them the most with rubber in the 40-45 mm range.
Now obviously I wasn’t privy to the engineering discussions that Enve’s designers had about wide tyres and aerodynamics. Clearly, they know what they’re doing. With that said, I wonder why Enve decided not to make these rims even wider. I presume that making them more similar in width to the tyre widths they are supposedly designed for would improve their aerodynamic performance. Perhaps the extra-deep 6.7 wheels are better suited to tyres on the wide end of the range.
Regarding the hubs—I didn’t have any issues during my testing, but I do wonder how they will hold up long-term, given how they are touted as a race-day tuned setup. Enve uses the same hubs on its top-level road wheels, so the tech is not new, but then the demands (and conditions) of gravel racing are unique.
Also notable about these wheels is how they look—big logos and silver spokes tend to draw eyeballs, for better or worse. If you want people to notice your bike, these wheels provide an efficient, albeit very expensive, way to achieve that. Paired with a titanium bike, the shiny silver with a bit of dust on it looks, to my eye, quite proper. If understated is more your thing, these wheels may not be the best option for you.
Value and conclusion:
(Image credit: Future)
Enve has a reputation for making high-quality products and pricing them at the top end of the market. In my experience, it also provides a commensurate level of customer service and warranty coverage, which helps to justify the cost somewhat. At $3,100 USD, the G SES 4.5 PRO wheels aren’t at the very tippy-top of the carbon wheel market, but they’re close.
If you’re interested in Enve, but don’t want to spend quite that much, the standard G SES 4.5 wheels use brass nipples vs alloy and have black hubs and spokes instead of silver, but are otherwise indistinguishable from the PRO version. These wheels cost a still quite substantial sum of $2,850 USD.
Zipp’s 303 XPLR SW wheelset is another close competitor. Specifications-wise, they’re quite similar—the internal and external width are very close, as is the weight—however, the Zipp wheels cost a third less at $2,200 USD. Having ridden both, I would say the performance is indistinguishable.
It also must be said that the rise of direct-to-consumer wheel brands out of China, of which several, like BTLOS and Light Bicycle are now well-known and highly regarded, also make wheels with similar dimensions for even less. These products may not have the same wind-tunnel chops as a top-level name brand, but they aren’t far off.
Enve makes a very good product, but not one that screams value. If you want the best, flashiest wheel on the market, these are right up there. I could find no discernible faults with them, and I rode them hard. But for the money, that’s the way it should be.
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