Motorcycle riding gear

A motorcycle riding gear store

In motorcycling, riders wear specialized clothing, safety gear, and miscellaneous equipment. Typically, motorcycle riding gear serves more than one purpose, including crash and weather protection, increased visibility, style or identification, stowing cargo, and accommodating communications devices.

Crash protection

For crash protection, helmets are often the first piece of gear a rider chooses, and in many jurisdictions, the only one required by law. Beyond that, crash protection comes in the form of jackets, leathers, boots and gloves covering a rider's entire body.

Weather

Most protective garments double as protection from the wind blast while riding, and from every kind of weather, keeping the rider warm, cool, and dry, either with passive insulation and ventilation, or active heating or cooling devices. Some motorcycle armor is minimalist in design, serving only to protect from crash impacts and abrasion, and so is intended to be combined with other clothing.[1][2]

Appearance

Motorcycling gear is also designed with appearance in mind, often to make drivers more likely to see the rider, increasing conspicuity, by combining elements of high-visibility clothing with the weather and crash protection functions of rider clothing, helmets and other items.[2] Selling these items to riders, comprising at least $1.15 billion (clothing) plus $1.2 billion (accessories including helmets and other equipment) of the $21.5 billion (2004) US motorcycle industry, depends on both practical and aesthetic appeal. Fashion and style drive these sales as much as utility, and an entirely separate category of motorcycle-inspired fashion exists in addition to the motorcycle-specific clothing industry, of motorcycle-inspired jackets and other items sold in general retail outlets, intended for non-riders.[3] Helmets, jackets and other clothing may also display designs, text and images to identify the rider or his group, such as club insignia, police, fire and other utility riders, or as adverting space for the logos of motorcycle sport sponsors.

Other purposes

Rider clothing may also be made with storage in mind, providing a variety of pockets including those for holding and displaying maps, smartphones, GPS navigation devices, and other wearables, or accommodating Bluetooths or CB radio two-way communication devices, often built into helmets with wiring routed through specialized clothing. Helmet-mounted displays may be included as well, along with visors that protect the face from wind or debris, and filter sunlight with permanent, movable, or variable visors.[2][4]

Notes

  1. ↑ Hough, David (2000), Proficient Motorcycling: The Ultimate Guide to Riding Well, BowTie Press, pp. 11, 13, 37ff., 282, ISBN 1-889540-53-6 (2008 2nd ed. ISBN 978-1-933958-35-4)
  2. 1 2 3 Hough, David (2012), More Proficient Motorcycling: Mastering the Ride (2 ed.), BowTie Press, pp. 24, 64, 82–101, 91, 92, 112–113, 189, 201, ISBN 978-1-935484-86-8
  3. ↑ "Motorcycle – U.S. Motorcycle Market is a $21.5 Billion Business", PowerSports Business, October 19, 2004, ISSN 1097-850X
  4. ↑ Lindemann, Mark (2013), The Total Motorcycling Manual (Cycle World): 291 Skills You Need, Weldon Owen, pp. 33–49, ISBN 9781616286071


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