Passes & Canyons Blog

I’ve only ever owned three motorcycles and I still have and ride all three of them. I approach my riding gear in a similar fashion, although sometimes that stuff really does just wear out.

Case in point: my very first motorcycle gloves, which to this day are my first choice to wear in warm weather. I’ve had them for more than 35 years. That’s them in the photo above.

Dang, they’re starting to wear out. I guess maybe if I had oiled them occasionally or done something else to take care of them they might have held up better. For sure they would look better. But you know what? They still work great. But it does look like that gauntlet on the right-hand glove will eventually just rip off. That hole is a lot bigger today than it was two months ago.

I’ve always thought that motorcycle gloves should have gauntlets, that is, those spreading funnel-like attachments to the main glove that allow your jacket sleeve to go inside and keep the wind and bugs from going up your sleeve. I have acquired gloves along the way that don’t have gauntlets but I seldom wear them.

Among these are a pair of fingerless gloves that I bought just in the last year or two. I had only worn them once or twice but I took them along on this year’s OFMC ride, and that led me to what should have been an obvious realization.

Near the end of the trip we were in Utah and stopped in Green River for gas and lunch. We gassed up and figured to go in the restaurant right there but it was crowded and we didn’t want to wait that long. So we decided to ride a little further into town and find another place. Because we were going such a short distance I didn’t bother putting my gloves back on.

Important to realize here is that much of this trip was through brutally hot weather. I was wearing a mesh jacket but it was still hot and didn’t really seem to afford as much circulation as I would have liked. Well, we cruised a half a mile or so into town and I was amazed to realize how much cooler I felt. Duh! The gauntlets on my gloves were preventing cooling air from going up my sleeves and through my jacket. I wore the fingerless gloves the rest of the trip.

Meanwhile, my summer gloves, as I call them, will continue to be my main gloves but I can see–as can you–that their days are numbered. I think I got my money’s worth.

Biker Quote for Today

100 reasons not to date a biker: 44. Half gloves.

Gloves, gloves, we got gloves. Boy, do we have gloves.

If you’ve been riding motorcycles for any good length of time you probably do, too. As with helmets, eye protection, and so many other things, many years ago gloves were not considered essential riding gear. Nowadays, I don’t know about you, but I usually wouldn’t think of riding without them.

But just as my three bikes are each best suited to particular niches, gloves are as well. Which is why I have three motorcycles and a whole bunch of gloves.

In the beginning, I bought a pair of doe-skin gauntlets, which is to say, gloves with deep, flaring cuffs that allow room for your jacket sleeve as they extend back beyond the wrists of the jacket. A very good all-around riding glove. In warmer weather these are still my go-to gloves.

But those gloves aren’t lined or insulated so it wasn’t long before I bought a very similar pair, except that the new ones are lined with Thinsulate™. When the weather turns cooler I turn to these gloves. It’s kind of how I mark the turning of the seasons.

Thinsulate alone doesn’t cut it though when it gets really cold. So next I bought some heated gloves. Now we’re really cookin’! (Yeah, pun intended.) Now it doesn’t matter how cold it is, if I’m riding I’ve got warm hands (as long as I have the heated gloves with me–I sometimes don’t).

But I have a GoPro camera and while I’ve shot some video, where I set it to record and just go ride, I really have more use for individual still photos. To do that, I need to use a remote controller that connects via Bluetooth, and I need to press the button each time I want to take a shot. Well, I can do that with gloves on but it’s hit or miss; the gloves make it hard for me to feel the slight click as I successfully press the shutter button. So I’ve ridden at times with no glove on my left hand. That can get cold.

The answer: fingerless gloves. Judy had given me a pair of fingerless gloves a long time ago but I never wore them because they were really stiff and not at all comfortable. I wondered if treating them with oil, the way you do a baseball mitt, would soften them up and make them usable, but I couldn’t find them. I probably (discreetly) got rid of them a long time ago. So I went and bought some new ones. This is definitely the type of thing you need to pick out for yourself, not allow someone else to choose them for you when they have no idea of what makes a good product and what does not.

What else could I possibly need? Well, what about when it rains?

OK, so somewhere along the way I bought some waterproof mittens that are large and can be pulled on over regular gloves when it rains. They work great but one time I was up in Eagle heading home and it was wet, and I did not have the mittens with me. Jungle gave me a pair of scuba gloves. They not only are waterproof, they are also insulated. Nice.

And then Robert moved to Panama, and gave away everything he wasn’t taking with him. I got the top bag that I now have on my Concours and I also got . . . drum roll . . . several more pair of gloves.

One pair is made by Icon and has some armor on the knuckles. Another is made by Rev-It! and has a lot more armor in a variety of places. Both are nice and I wear them at times.

The last pair is made by Olympia and while I have worn them on occasion I don’t like and won’t keep them–for the smallest, most unlikely reason. The way they’re stitched there is a seam that comes to a point right between the thumb and forefinger where your hand wraps around–and presses against–the grip. On any ride of more than half an hour, this little bit of seam becomes very uncomfortable. It’s just poor design.

So yeah, I’ve got gloves. And did I ever tell you how I came to have five riding jackets? Or five helmets? Those are other stories for other times.

Biker Quote for Today

Harley-Davidson has invented a flying motorcycle. The old bikes will henceforth be known as ground Hogs.