ENVE Composites Twenty6 AM Wheelset

Tubeless Setup / Weight Comparisons

The wheelset comes with a tubeless kit consisting of valve stems and ENVE-branded gorilla tape. Setup was straightforward: just be sure to smooth the tape consistently, keep it tight, and overlap the valve hole, then punch it through afterward.

My Maxxis Minion DHF Exo 2.5 (not officially a tubeless tire) beaded and sealed quickly and easily with a scoop and half of Stan’s. The Maxxis Crossmark LUST 2.25 I use in the back also mounted without issue. I use Stan’s Tubeless Sealant on the LUST tire, even though it voids the warranty. (And I should note that both tires were mounted with a floor pump, for extra bonus points.)

ENVE lists the 28h Twenty6 AM rim laced to Chris King hubs at 1,554g. My review set is 32h with the Chis King 20mm hub and 142mm rear axle, so I’m going to estimate they come out over 1,600g with tape and stems. (Mental note: add digital scale to digital tire pressure gauge shopping list.)

For reference, my aluminum Easton Havens were listed at 1,650g, so weight-wise it’s just about a wash. (I should mention that ENVE also offers the Twenty6 AM rim built to either DT Swiss 240 or 180 hubs, which shave about 100g and 180g, respectively.) The ENVEs are 3mm wider internally, so they do offer a more square tire profile, which I personally prefer. Both the Easton and ENVE wheelsets have amazing acceleration at that weight.

Clearly, there are wheelsets similar in mass to the ENVEs, all of which are well regarded, performance-wise. I am convinced that what really sets the ENVEs apart, however,  is their lateral stiffness and overall strength.

Ride Performance

I installed the wheels on my Knolly Chilcotin, a great test piece for evaluating the stiffness and tracking ability of a wheelset, because that frame is about as flexible as my hips…which is to say, not at all. There is a lot of chatter in the bike industry these days about building the stiffest frames possible, and there is no doubt that stiff frames deliver a precise ride. Having my rear wheel track exactly where I intended it is a wonderful thing. This stiffness makes a massive difference in a competition scenario, but also lends itself to avoidance of detonation on an everyday, after-work rip.

That said, the handling improvements of the stiffest frame in the world are going to be compromised by a wheelset that is flexing under drivetrain load and deflecting while cornering hard and descending.

So with the Knolly as the test piece, and the Easton Haven to compare directly against, the ENVE wheelset did not disappoint. The wheels go exactly where I need them to go, without deflection. When crossing (or slamming into) diagonal ledges and waterbars, whether climbing or descending, there is no rim flexing or spoke windup. This spoke “popping” noise is a trait I have noticed on other wheelsets, particularly my Havens.

I’ve done a considerable amount of test riding on this wheelset all around Salt Lake and Park City. It’s not the rockiest terrain in the world, but the trails I like to ride on my Chili are on the chunkier side, and I prefer speeds up around ludicrous when I can get ‘em. I generally ask a lot of my wheels. There was plenty of autumn riding where leaves obscured sniper rocks, and there were some direct hits, but you’d never know it if you inspected the rims.

After my break-in rides up in SLC, spoke tension remained constant. ENVE builds a very nice wheel, and obviously invested care into de-tensioning the wheel before delivery. The Chris King hubs, however, always need a little snugging after a few laps, which is not a big deal.

These wheels have also gone through the wringer in a few races in the bike breaking-est place south of Whistler: Moab. I headed down for the inaugural Enchilada Enduro, a time-trial race down one of the most demanding trails on the planet. My friends and I like to joke that a run down The Whole Enchilada takes a month off the life of your bike. Twenty-something miles, 7,000 feet of vert, and everything from raw, high-alpine granite to embedded snipers in the high speed turns of the Hazard section, finishing with 13 miles of relentless, pounding sandstone…now go do it at race pace. It’s hurtful to body, mind, and bike.

The ENVE wheelset worked flawlessly throughout a weekend that included a full-course practice run, my race run, and about 15 miles of rough desert riding in between. There were multiple episodes where I found the bottom of everything on my bike, suspension, and tires, but instead of the unnerving “ping!” that emerges from alloy wheels, the ENVEs gave a rather reassuring and muted “clack.” Post-Enchilada inspection of the rims showed absolutely zero evidence of impact, whereas I’m positive an alloy rim would have shown some damage in the form of dented and/or cracked rims.

A few weeks later, I went back to Moab for a race down Amasa Back, followed by a Super D down the Lower Porcupine Singletrack and the original Porcupine climb, which, always fast and rough, has gotten even more-so since barely anyone rides it anymore.

Again, the ENVE Twenty6 AM wheelset allowed for the utmost confidence in line selection and durability. On the Super D, I got off line and hit a huge ledge that put me in the dirt hard enough to crack some ribs, but again the wheels emerged unscathed.

After those two weekends, I would expect to have turned an alloy rear rim into something resembling a stop sign, but the ENVEs just got a little dusty.

Bottom Line

Ultimately, the ENVE Twenty6 AM rim is not a wheelset you should buy solely for the weight savings. It’s a wheelset you should buy to achieve the current pinnacle of durability, stiffness, and weight. For the all-mountain rider, durability and downhill performance are important issues, and the ENVEs absolutely deliver the maximum in those categories, at a weight that is competitive with wheels that can’t take as much of a beating and just keep smiling. The price is shocking—there is no way around it—but once you have some time on carbon rims, it’s tough to take them off the bike. I’ve simply never had this amount of confidence in an alloy rim.