Continental Grand Prix 4-Season review

Table of Contents

The Continental Grand Prix 4-Season utilizes an extra bead-to-bead layer Continental calls Duraskin, reserved for their most durable tires.

Each road tire in the Continental lineup uses a puncture resistant breaker for the center tread. The Grand Prix 4-Season uses two, effectively doubling its puncture resistance when compared with the other tires. It makes for a road bike tire with a ridiculous level of puncture resistance, and is something I haven’t seen in any other road bike tire I’ve researched.

And last but not least, the Continental Grand Prix 4-Season uses 3 layers of 110 TPI for both durability and longevity, without sacrificing to much in terms of weight, grip and ride feel. Which makes this tire one of the if not the most fit-and-forget tires you can find.

The only thing keeping this tire from a 5-star rating is that it’s not available in a tubeless version. It comes in sizes 23, 25, 28 and 32 mm.

Our rating:

 4.5/5

Reasons to buy

The best, and lightest, all-weather tire money can buy, with bead-to-bead protection and dual breakers.

Reasons to avoid

Only clincher available

Continental Grand Prix 4-Season ride quality

The Continental Grand Prix 4-Season strikes an excellent balance between puncture protection and suppleness.

It means with the same width and tire pressure, it’s going to be stiffer than a true race tire, but more supple than a touring tire.

The 3-ply casing, with 110 TPI per layer is reinforced with the dual breakers and DuraSkin layer. Such a setup will not be able to compete with race tires such as the Continental Grand Prix 5000 or the tubeless Continental Grand Prix 5000 S TR version.

Those tires both only have a single breaker and the Grand Prix 5000 S TR version only has a dual-ply 110 TPI per layer casing.

But it definitely offers more road-feel than the touring-oriented Continental Gator Hardshell or Gatorskin tires which offer the toughtest protection and 3-ply 60 TPI casings.

Continental Grand Prix 4-Season weight

The Continental Grand Prix 4-Season has a very respectable weight of 295 grams for the 700Cx28 version, and is the lightest tires within a tire category offering this much protection.

If comparisons must made, the Vittoria Corsa Control at 280 grams offers a similar casing with markedly less protection.

Continental Grand Prix 4-Season puncture protection

The Continental Grand Prix 4-Season has the following puncture protection:

Vectran Breaker

Vectran™ is a synthetically manufactured high-tech fibre from a natural model. Like spider silk, Vectran™ is a liquid-crystalline polymer (LCP). Vectran™ is spun from the melted liquid polymer Vectra and processed further to a multi-strand thread. Spider silk like Vectran™ has an enormous tear resistance at a very low weight. A Vectran™ Breaker is lighter, more flexible and protects more effectively against cuts than the comparable nylon breaker. Vectran™ Breaker does not adversely affect the rolling resistance.

DuraSkin

Tires with DuraSkin® sidewall protection are used under the harshest conditions. The high-quality polyamide fabric protects the tire casing against the worst conditions. These tires stand out thanks to their brown sidewalls.

Continental Grand Prix 4-Season buying options

Size	ETRTO	Weight (gr)	Tread color	Sidewall color	Compound	Puncture protection	Tire bead	TPI	Max Psi	Buy at Amazon
700Cx23	23-622	235	Black	Black	Max Grip	DuraSkin / Double Vectran Breaker	foldable	3/330	120	link
700Cx25	25-622	230	Black	Black	Max Grip	DuraSkin / Double Vectran Breaker	foldable	3/330	120	link
700Cx28	28-622	295	Black	Black	Max Grip	DuraSkin / Double Vectran Breaker	foldable	3/330	115	link
700Cx32	32-622	340	Black	Black	Max Grip	DuraSkin / Double Vectran Breaker	foldable	3/330	102	link

Johan van Seijen is the founder of restoration.bike. His passion for cycling in general, and restoring older bikes turned into a website to share his knowledge with a broader audience. Starting out on his father’s road bike and riding classics as the Amstel Gold Race and Liege Bastogne Liege he has shifted his attention to trail, XC, and gravel riding since. No matter how much he loves writing about everything related to cycling, nothing beats actually using his ever-expanding bicycle collection.