Buying Seasonal Motorcycle Riding Gear

Harley Tips Episode 4 – Shoulder Season Riding Apparel

Welcome back as Motovan presents the experience, I’m Dave Hatch and now that we’ve got you all fired up for another ride, we’ll wrap up our show we’ll wrap things up by showing you how to dress for those chilly spring and fall season rides. Joining us now is the chief riding instructor at Georgian College, Jenn Martin.

 

Dave

So Jenn, last week we were talking about extending your riding season, you know, the shoulder seasons and we were examining all the gear that you can add to your motorcycle, heated saddle, heated grips, lower protectors, all kinds of things that you can do to keep yourself warm. But then we started playing around with the new gear, the new riding gear and I thought, we’ve got to talk about that as well.

 

Jenn

Yeah, like the jackets that we’re wearing. I mean, mine is a shell, so underneath a jacket or something like this is an additional layer for warmth.   But the one that you’re wearing is really interesting.

 

Dave

Well this takes the term shell to a whole new ball game.

 

Jenn

Yes it does.

 

Dave

This actually is heated, this entire jacket is heated, you can get gloves that’ll plug into this, you can get pants that’ll plug into this but it’s dual source, so not only is it heated by plugging it into your bike’s battery or accessory outlet, but it also has a battery pack which allows you to unplug, walk away, and with a push of a button you’ve got battery power so you can continue that warmth. Or, I guess you could even ride your motorcycle using the battery power.

 

Jenn

And what’s neat about that one is it has three different settings so you can have warm ‘cause it’s not so cold out and if you need a little bit more warmth then you can just add it up.

 

Dave

Yup. There’s also safety factors as well which we’ll also come to. But this is amazing, you pulled out the gloves, but you’ve also got some gators and things.

 

Jenn

Yeah I mean we have… for your ears, the headband to cover the ears so if somebody has not a full face helmet, has more of an open face helmet, this will give you additional protection around the head. You have it in the face, to cover the face there. Definitely I love these, the neck warmers.

 

Dave

Yeah.

 

Jenn

That’s nice, that’s great material. And then a balaclava so that’s full, full over the.

 

Dave

Right, soup to nuts. So you can cover your entire upper region… whether you’ve got open face, close face helmet and then there’s the underwear, undergarments as well.

 

Jenn

Yes

 

Dave

You picked… see what else you can find, you pulled this out and this is a fleece, right.

 

Jenn
Yeah, it is a fleece but it’s um water resistant, or waterproof actually and it has the armoring in it as well so great protection so something like that you’re wearing that under your protective gear with the armoring and stuff.

 

Dave

Right.

 

Jenn

Yeah.

 

Dave

Awesome so, here we are promoting the idea that you can extend your riding season spring and fall and you can do that by heating yourself in a number of ways but we haven’t talked about what do look for and why it’s important to do this. Cold temperatures, I mean, especially when you’re riding and you’ve got wind chill, that’s, that can be pretty nasty to a rider.

 

Jenn

Yeah we’re talking hypothermia so I mean we want to prevent that. It’s great that we can extend that riding time, but if you’re cold and you’re not concentrating on what you should be concentrating on it’s not a good thing.   SO the heated gloves or combination heated hand grips. That is great, I mean joint pain is relieved and you’re able to grasp the levers and use the operation of the unit.

 

Dave

In terms of your core and hypothermia, that can really effect you just in terms of your thought process right? You slow down….

 

Jenn

Yeah your judgement is affected so if you’re not concentrating on what you should be concentrating which is everything out there then you shouldn’t be riding.

 

Dave

Right so there’s also a serious safety factor to all this stuff. Alright, well it’s amazing how far we’ve come in the three decades that I’ve been riding, this is a long way from the days of pulling a rain suit over your jeans.

 

Jenn

No kidding. I think I’m going to keep this jacket.

 

Dave

Okay, good stuff.

 

Well, that’s it for this week’s program folks, we’re all out of time but be sure to join us next week as we’ll be sampling the very latest generation of this puppy, the Honda Valkerie. So until next week, keep your feet on the pegs and your right hand cranked, bye for now.