Glove Review - Control is Everything

[Smithers]

To kick off my thread about gloves I would like to share what I think is the most important thing when it comes to riding gear: safety 1st, quality in comparison to price point, then comfort.


Safety 1st - Well every year motorcycle gear gets better and better. I want something that will allow me to walk away from a crash without a scratch. THAT is the goal. Now here is where quality and price point come in.
Quality / Price - There is a big middle ground of GREAT gear that can be had for a good bargain... this is typically the gear that is a year old BUT is top of the line. I do not care if its the best looking gear. I bargain shop like mad, my parent taught me that. You can get the BEST gear for nearly half off which puts it in the "I can afford the best" category.
Comfort - Some people would put this higher in the list but here is why I don't so much... It's not that big of a deal to find some gear that is comfortable. You can pretty much take any piece of gear, find your size and if it fits, GREAT. If it doesn't, get the correct size or just use it for a while and it will break in and be comfortable. Most every single piece of motorcycle gear needs to break in to be good and comfortable.

Now you have a pretty good understanding about what I look for and I think it represents a vast majority of other seasoned riders. We all buy gear strictly because we need helmets and we want to live when or if we take a spill on the bike, right? Then we all want a killer deal on an awesome jacket or a really technically advanced helmet that is super lightweight. And last the thing better be comfortable or you won't use it.

[Smithers]

So let's get down to the business of gloves. Leather and textile gloves were a normal affair to me that was all about utility when I was a young lad riding dirt bikes. THEN Axo blew the roof off the house with their rubber knuckled protection that also covered the fingers. All the other upcoming brands like MSR, Answer and JT Racing followed suit and started using plastic all over the gloves because it was the new wonder material. Fast forward and now what started with some catchy designs on the dirt bike gloves has taken over and now we have EVERYTHING we could want in any color made by TONS of brand name companies. You have full metal studded gloves that look like they are from medievil times and you have super soft form fitting kangaroo gloves that have gel in the palms for isolation from vibrations. Anything you want!

And thank goodness for the world economy as we now have all these brands and fancy gloves available to us at a normal price. Until I came around to my late 20's I had always used some extra dirtbike gloves or some cheap rain gloves in cold conditions. I didn't have any extra money and gloves were expensive because they weren't exactly mass produced and affordable for the quality that you received. When I started riding street fill time at 17yrs old gloves were $100-$150 for decent ones and money was worth a LOT more as minimum wage was like $6.75 to put things in perspective. $100 is NOT $100 anymore! And gloves back then weren't even close to as nice as they are now.

Now the gloves for sale are just awesome. They come in many colors, materials, sizes, shapes, thicknesses, vented or non, with wipers on the index, metal studs on palms, elastic, buttoned, velcro and etc etc. Why not have one for every occasion?

My first jump into the wonderful world of a glove for every day of the week was going shopping at http://www.motorcycle-superstore.com (http://www.motorcycle-superstore.com/). I've been a happy customer of theirs from the days before their online shopping cart was built and they have never let me down once. They ship your order with a return packing slip just incase you want to return it for another size and they also often include a flyer for their customer specials and now they even hand out their own magazine publication. But lets not forget why I chose to order 3 sets of gloves from them for my first online purchase... the low prices.

Two of the pairs of gloves I still use:
http://www.fourwheelperformance.com/streetbikestuff/gloves_shift_01.jpg