By Are the Metzler Karoo Street tyres any good for an average R1200gs rider with entry level off road skills? find out below.
After my first foray into off road riding I was primed and ready to see if I could have a go on my own bike. The one thing letting my bike down, a BMW r1200gs, was the road focused tyres it was sitting on. The Michelin Road Trail 5’s.
I knew I wasn’t ready to go for a full knobby 50/50 offroad tyre – afterall, the majority of my riding would continue to be on the tarmac. So I started the hunt for an 80/20 set of tyres (80% on road, 20% off)
I ended up with a set of Karoo streets, by Metzeler. More or less down to availability – the other options I looked at were the Anakee adventures, and the Contintenal tkc 70’s. Neither of which my local tyre shop had in stock.
First few miles.
First impressions as I got them onto the road, they felt very moveable as brand new tyres out of the shop – they didn’t step out, but they did feel like they were walking out. Maybe they had a bit of grease on them, maybe just that new tyre feel, maybe it was the tyres – who knows? not an average rider like me. This feeling stuck around for a little longer than I would normally get with a new set of tyres. Usually a hundred miles in I’ll be pretty confident in a new set of tyres, with these it took a little longer to feel like I knew what was going on with them.
On-road performance
A few hundred more miles in, and the tyres are starting to feel plenty confident – as would any modern tyre at normal road speeds. I’m yet to try them in the wet, but there’s plenty of contact patch, and plenty of room for rain to go. They’re a dual compound tyre so I expect they’ll do the job without much fuss on the road. They don’t feel quite so much like you’re on rails as the Road 5’s but there’s not a lot in it for normal touring.
I’ve not noticed any particular change in vibration vs the road 5’s – if it’s there it doesn’t stand out against the engine vibes from the boxer twin.
Off road
I took these tyres off road for the first time down a green lane – and learnt my first important lesson about 80/20 tyres. They’re useless in the mud. The grooves fill up instantly, and sideways grip is just gone.
What they will do is let you put your feet down and paddle through the mud with careful clutch control to ease yourself through the situation, but any more than that (at least with my minimal off road skills) – and you’ll be on the deck pretty quick digging rank stuff out of your crash bars.
I also took these round the trail at the ABR festival – they were fine for the most part, but didn’t have much confidence in them on the turns, particularly in any gravel sections – safe to say I didn’t do any of the expert section on these, and had a couple of wide corners where I just wasn’t confident in the grip for the traction I had vs the Knobby TKC 80’s on the r1250gs I rode on my off road training.
Noise. Lots of Noise.
Up to about 55-60mph the road noise on these tyres isn’t too bad. You start to hear them warble a little, but it’s not intrusive (with earplugs in). Get to cruising at 70 though, and the noise is downright annoying even with earplugs. It must be the alternating tread pattern or something – but it’s not just a steady hum, the tyres warble as you go along. Get past peak warble at 70, up to around 80 and it’s less annoying.
Overall…Meh.
I’m starting to realise that the quest for the best of all worlds is a naive one. The tyres are just fine for the road, and they have a ‘you’ll get by…probably’ kind of vibe for off road riding. Next time round I’ll likely be going for either a pure road tyre, or a 50/50 knobby like a tkc 80, Anakee wild or AX41.
When it comes to 80/20 tyres – my current view is that it’s 80% road – 20% looking cool outside Starbucks. And they do a decent job of the latter.
