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These wheels look fast, whether standing still, grinding up a steep incline, or blazing down hardpack double-track. That’s the beauty of the Mavic Crossmax SLR -- they exude speed. Maybe it’s the red anodization, maybe it’s the dirt-concealing shiny black anodization, maybe it’s the two working together. Regardless, these are wheels that you notice, others notice, and give a palpable heart-rate tugging sense of flight risk. Take their passport, or they might well speed over the border—in our case, it’s the border to speed insanity. Mechanically, they’re largely identical to the Crossmax SL, with cooler colors, better graphics, titanium quick release skewers and car-protecting wheelbags. Not a huge performance improvement, but man, they look good, make any rig look faster, and often inspires the rider to ride faster.

The Mavic CrossMax SLR comes with 24 spokes in both front and rear wheels. The spokes are straight pull Zicral, both profiled and double-butted, and are anodized black. The lacing is cross-two in front and Isopulse in rear (cross-two and radial). Oversized aluminum hubs are anodized a beautiful red. The axles are aluminum. The hubs can be specified to have either ISO 6 Bolt or CenterLock rotor mounting. The rims are shot-peened and black-anodized Maxtal alumimum. The joint is created with Mavic’s super smooth SUP process. Fore drilling means the inside wall of the rims is solid, with no need for spoke nipple cutouts, easy for running UST or tubes. Extra aluminum has been shaven off between spoke nipples on the inside diameter of the rim. The rim is 559x17 diameter. Mavic recommends tire widths from 1.0” to 2.1”. The rear cassette body can accommodate 8 or 9 cogs.

This wheelset comes with BX601 titanium quick releases. UST valves and mounting accessories are included, as are wheel bags, a wheel magnet, bearing adjustment tool, spoke wrench, and user’s guide and warranty card. 1520g.