Which factors contribute to (rear) tyre wear?

Question

I'm well aware that in most riding scenarios, there is more weight on the rear tyre of a bicycle and power transfer as well as the typical "swaying" from side to side (causing additional friction) contributes to a higher wear ration compared to the front (also explained in this old post)

In my case, I'm well within the range of expected wear rates of 1/2-1/3 front to rear, about 8000 kilometers on the front and still showing the grooves on the center of the tread, on the rear, it's getting shallow after 3000-4000 km in. I'm pretty sure, a third Vittoria Corsa will be through before the front needs replacement.

My question is: Are there any particular riding styles (or other factors) that especially contribute to high wear?

Update

I've added a picture of my front (right) versus rear (left) - just for comparison's sake, no advise on swapping, they'll probably come off by the end of season at latest.

I track components on Strava and unless my LBS has swapped a 40€ tire for free, the front has done about 7.500 km and the rear about 2.800 km.

My riding involves a fair bit of climbing and often on pretty rough b-roads such as the picture below, ironically taken when I had a puncture. I know, other factors like rider weight, power (=torque) and the rubber compound also play an important role, but is there something such as a "tyre killer" within normal riding parameters? (No skidding or wheel-mount trainers, indeed...)

Answer 1

Conditions contribute to wear - riding in the wet of winter, with grit and sand will chew up the tyres faster than summer riding.

Surface matters too, riding on loose stones and gravel eat tyres faster.

Hot roads can accelerate wear, so a road surface where the tar is sticky will affect the tyre tread.

All of these will wear the rear more because it is carrying more of your weight.

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Riding any tyre with insufficient air pressure will cause it to flex more, affecting the side walls and cause wear in the "shoulder/corner" much more than the tread.

Climbing a hill should cause more faster wear because of the increased weight transferred from the front, but you're going slower which balances that. Coming down the hill should be lower rear wear because there's less weight on the back.

Answer 2

Tyre Pressure

With the same tyres run front and rear on road, I have the back 5-10psi (⅓-⅔ bar) harder than the front. That stops the rear wearing flat s badly, while helping with road buzz. Running a slightly wider (by 3-4mm) tyre on the back, at the same pressure as the front, is another mans to the same end.

Technique

I would expect a sit-and-spin climbing style to be better than standing up and stomping for everyone. Certainly when I stand on the pedals the stroke is less even, and I'm more likely to slip the back wheel (bad). But I don't tend to get out of the saddle much anyway, only for a few strokes at a time to boost a dropping climbing speed.

You mention not skidding the back wheel, which of course is the best plan for several reasons. It's a plan that I find hard to stick to when I swap from my tourer/commuter with cable discs and long chainstays to my road/gravel bike with hydraulic discs - so check that you actually stick to this intention.

Loading

If you ride laden, shifting load weight forwards is good, and if you use a big saddlebag, check it's not swaying. This can be enough to affect handling, and make the back wheel squirm. As an example, over the weekend a pothole broke my 3rd bottle cage, and initially I strapped my toolcase to my saddlebag (which probably needed tightening up anyway). The back wheel seemed to have a mind of its own, at its worst accelerating out of bends. Moving the toolcase into the front of my frame bag made the handling much better, in fact better than when I left the house with it under the downtube.

Obviously if you ride light as for racing, there's nothing significant you can do here

Rotating and relegating tyres

I swap tyres between winter and summer. That means that increased wear in bad weather isn't on my best tyres. When I put them back on, if one is really worn it gets relegated to the commuter, visibly more worn, it goes on the back, but often they're too close to tell so front and back may get swapped. My tyres must last quite a lot longer than yours given the state they're in at the end of a season, but I don't track component distances.

Typically I use Marathon Supreme in summer, Marathon Mondial in winter (for merely wet conditions; I have ice spikes on another bike). The latter are very hard-wearing and grip well on dirty roads. Both handle the odd bit of gravel, but the Mondials do it better especially in the wet.

They save a lot of wear on my faster summer tyres, and I don't mind the extra weight so much in the winter when my rides max out at about 300km and I'm carrying more kit (summer can be up to 400km days, or 600km weekends).