Ahh the smell of leather (Frank Thomas Strike 2-piece suit)

I was really itching for some leg protection. I started hunting for 2-piece suits and didn’t get much further than Cycle Gear. I was able to get a Frank Thomas 2-piece Strike suit for $320. The jacket fit well in the store and ended up being a real breather. When at speed the air practically cuts right through it. Also, the Dainese back protector I have slips right into the pouch in the back, replacing the memory foam pad it comes with. Unfortunately my size in the pants, 32, didn’t allow me to bend my legs while wearing them which I thought might cause problems while riding. I tried on a 34 and they allowed me to bend my legs, but were pretty loose in the waist. I figured it wouldn’t matter with them zipped up to the jacket. After riding in the 2-piece suit for less than 10 minutes the insides of my knees were killing me as the baggy leather was bunching up and pinching. The pants were pretty awful. Shown in some of the pictures are some Frank Thomas boots I had for all of a week. They were also terrible and couldn’t even zip up over the pants. They also had no hard armor and were basically just leather sleeves you zipped up over your leg. I returned them for different boots you’ll read about later.

Frank Thomas Strike Jacket

This jacket is very comfortable, and for $200 is a steal. I must say that I’ve heard, and seen, that these jackets have problems with seems blowing open on impact. This is a little disconcerting, although I haven’t heard of any serious injuries, it’s mostly the fact that the jacket is ruined after one crash. Cycle Gear is very good about replacing them if this happens. Fortunately I haven’t had to test mine yet. I put well over 6000 miles on this jacket and never had any problems. The fit is nice and it’s very limber feeling when on. It’s completely perforated on the front and back with breathable textile material running down the sleeves. It only has one inside chest pocket, which can get cramped if you’re trying to stuff a wallet, cell phone, and keys inside. It’s a real bargain jacket though, especially if you want leather. It also comes in a variety of colors to match almost any make and model.

The Good: CE approved turtle shell type armor at shoulders and elbows. Fits the Dainese back protector in the back without modification. Has a full waist zipper to allow attachment of FT pants. The inside of the armpit and sleeve area is a softer synthetic material, rather than the net-like material used everywhere else. Comes with a zip in down vest, which helps to take the edge off at night. Cut a little longer in the back for more coverage when actually riding. Frank Thomas logos are reflective to help keep those pesky cagers off your back. Velcro wrist closures allow for almost infinite adjustment. Silver color is nearly reflective, making you very obvious.

The Bad: Full waist zipper looks measly in comparison to other companies. What’s the point of the zipper if the pants that match are terrible? Even with the vest in the arms still breathe, and it gets cold! There’s also no adjustable waist. Only one pocket means you have to pack light. Wrist closures stick out which makes it hard to pull long cuff gloves over. Silver color might be a little too intense.





Frank Thomas Strike Pants

I’m not going to bother writing much about these pants as you’ve already heard the gist of the story. The pockets on the front are nearly impossible to get in to, and with their location it’d be uncomfortable to have anything in there while riding. The sizing on these pants is all over the board. If you’re going to buy them I really suggest trying them on first. Make sure you do a full squat in them as well to see how the flexibility feels.

The Good: They’re cheap. They come with knee pucks. They have a Velcro waist closure, which allowed me to cinch up the extra slack from having to buy a size up.

The Bad: They’re cheap. The quality and thought just doesn’t seem like it’s there. Pockets are worthless. The pants are baggy making them uncomfortable while riding, and even more uncomfortable when stuffed in to a boot. The knees aren’t articulated.



Note: The Frank Thomas boots ended up getting a hole worn in to them on the ankle where they met with my rearsets. They also seemed to offer no hard protection, just leather. They had no adjustable calf, or adjustable anything. They were exchanged for AlpineStar SMX-Plus boots at Cycle Gear (which has an amazing return policy). Look for more reviews soon!

Gloves that fit?! (AlpineStar SPS gloves)

After passing MSF and riding around for quite a while with gloves a few sizes bigger than my hands I thought it was time to upgrade to something a little more comfortable. I purchased these AlpineStar SPS short cuff gloves from Cycle Gear for $60. They’re great street gloves for their easy on/off operation and are reasonably comfortable.

AlpineStar SPS Gloves

The Good: The price is right! Lots of real carbon fiber and hard knuckle protection. Very easy to put on and take off. There’s light perforation on the inside of the fingers that allows for some breathing. Double stitching on the palm with varying grades of leather depending on contact area. Also has a nice padded flap under the wrist for protective purposes I assume.

The Bad: The pad under the wrist can get in the way, depending on the cuff of whatever jacket you’re using. There is no knuckle protection along the fingers. Why is pad on the top of the glove so big? The cut of the thumb made for some baggy leather that tended to bunch up on me when wrapped around the clip-ons. Could just be my hands though.

My first jacket (Dainese TT-72 Textile)

I finally got to feel the “cool factor” of motorcycling when I put on my first jacket, a Dainese TT-72 textile. I purchased the jacket off of a friend and no longer remember the agreed upon price. The TT-77, which looks identical while perhaps being a tad longer, is for sale through Cycle Gear for $139 while the MSRP is listed as $279. Either way, I wore the TT-72 for my MSF course and the first half of the summer of 05. The jacket felt fine to me, but then again, I had never worn anything else. This jacket now pulls rain and cold weather duty.

Dainese TT-72

The Good: The gray color scheme is pretty low key, making it a good “around town” jacket if you don’t want to attract attention. The lack of pre-curved arms adds to that effect as well. The jacket has CE approved turtle shell type armor at the shoulders and elbows and also has a pocket in the back that perfectly fits a Dainese hard back protector. I purchased the back protector for $60 through Cycle Gear. This jacket has a full sleeve removable down liner! It also has plenty of pocket space with two outside pockets down low, a chest pocket, and a pouch pocket in the down liner. This jacket is very light and with long cuff gloves is capable of providing me with enough warmth to ride in 50 degree weather. I’ve worn it in the rain for a few hours at a time and it manages to keep me warm for the first hour or so, but then begins to soak through at the zipper.

The Bad: This jacket is very short for not having a waist zipper. Since it was not intended to zip together with a pair of pants I can’t understand why it was cut so short. The TT-77 looks to be a little longer in the back in comparison with the TT-72, but don’t quote me on that. The waist and wrist adjusters are snaps rather than Velcro, allowing for only two different positions, and I’m apparently right in between both sizes. This jacket is very light so it tends to blow around at highway speeds. It can also exhibit a parachute effect when only wearing short cuff gloves. What, no matching pants?!

Re-gifted...(KBC TK-9, Joe Rocket GPX gloves)

Ahh, the first motorcycle. It's an amazing feeling. Hearing the bike turn over for the first time and the smooth whine of the engine as it spins past 10,000 rpms. The wind brushing past your neck tickling your senses and blowing away all your worries, save for things like “is there gravel in this corner?” “will this guy ever change lanes or is his blinker purely for decoration?” and “if that blue-hair pulls out in front of me will I be able to stop in time?” Actually, motorcyclists have plenty of things to worry about. It’d probably be best if they didn’t have to worry about the fit or comfort of their gear, allowing them to focus on the ride ahead. This was not the case with my first two pieces of gear; A KBC TK-9 helmet and a pair of Joe Rocket GPX gloves. Admittedly they were both purchased from the previous owner of my F4I, so they were not ideal, but I was desperate to get out on the road (and fulfill the prerequisites for my MSF class).

KBC TK-9
This helmet was purchased with the gloves for a grand total of $100. You can divide that up however you like, but either way it was cheap. Helmets should probably never be purchased used because you don’t know whether or not it has been dropped or damaged, compromising the integrity of the helmet. I trusted the seller and he seemed like a nice enough guy. That, and I’m trying to cover up not knowing any better at the time. I also didn’t know that this helmet looked terrible when worn, because I hadn’t experienced anything else.

The Good: It kept the wind out of my face and was legal as per DOT and Snell standards. Visor changes are fairly easy and the snap for the chinstrap is easy to operate and keeps the slack out of the way. The helmet also has lots of vents with controls for all of them.

The Bad: The controls for most of the vents didn’t work. This could be a result of the previous owner’s abuse, or just bad craftsmanship, I don’t know. The controls for the top vents are incredibly flimsy feeling. The mouth vent was easy to operate but was apparently so worn down it would never stay closed. The visor fogged up constantly when not over parking lot speeds. The helmet is an odd shape. It looks like you’re adorning a bullet when you wear it. It’s pretty pointy up top, and comes down very low over the mouth as you can see in the picture. I also found out that there was a pretty massive recall on the helmet. Fortunately my particular helmet was manufactured just after the recall, but that didn’t make me feel too much better. The biggest problem for me was the fit. This is very important for a first helmet. My head is 58.4cm and the helmet is a medium 57-58cm. It fit more like a XXL. The cheek pads hardly applied pressure, the forehead was shaky at best and at free way speeds heavy gusts of winds would nearly yank the helmet off my head.

Note: This helmet was purchased used. My experience with the helmet does not reflect what this helmet would be like new.


Joe Rocket GPX gloves
The other gear purchased from the previous owner of my first bike, mostly to get me on the road as soon as possible, were some Joe Rocket GPX gloves. These gloves are a size XL and my hands are a size M. This immediately created problems. I will refrain from commenting on size and fit as any comments would be falsely influenced.

The Good: The gloves are very easy to put on. After initially adjusting the cuff Velcro for my jacket all that’s required to put them on when gearing up is to close the Velcro wrist strap, which is easily done. There’s hard knuckle armor on the top of the glove while soft pads for the smaller dot the fingers of the glove. There’s also a hard polymer piece of armor on the side of the palm that can barely be seen on the right side of the palm picture. The leather feels nice and is flexible enough to offer good feel of the controls. Also, notice the double stitching on most of the seems in the palm and thicker leather in areas that look to be “high impact.”

The Bad: The wrist strap is kind of skinny and the contact patch for the Velcro is pretty small. Seems like over time as Velcro tends to wear out this strap would become harder and harder to keep closed. The pads for individual knuckles are only soft foam rather than something hard. The thin leather in the palm offers good feeling of controls, but is thin.

Welcome!

Hello. My name is Courtney Bodett and I'm wrapping up my senior year at Linfield College as a creative writing major with a motorcycling focus. Well, the latter may be what my passion is, but I do not receive any scholarly credits for it. Since the age of 3 I've been riding bicycles. I raced mountain bikes competitively until I got my license at which point my focus shifted over to motor sports. I became nearly obsessive about my 98 Acura Integra and loved the Internet communities based around it. It wasn’t until the end of my sophomore year at college that I got frustrated with the Integra. It was still fun, but it was taking far too much money to make fast. Being 6 out of the top 10 most stolen cars wasn’t helping my stress levels much either. I made the leap in to motorcycling the summer of 05 with the purchase of a used silver and black Honda CBR 600 F4i.

The F4I was a fantastic bike. Possibly a little much for a beginner, but I got through it without any accidents. I took the Motorcycle Safety Foundation course and geared up before logging 5000 miles in just a couple months. I found the motorcycle Internet forums to be even better than car forums. The people were generally nicer and more willing to be helpful. I learned a lot from the forums: Honda-tech.com, 600rr.net, cbrworld.net, rc51.com, and rc51.org are where I spend most of my Internet time.
The summer of 06 of sold the F4I and bought an 01 Honda RC51 for the same price. I love the bike and love v-twin power.

Over the past year and some change I’ve had quite a bit of gear. Gear is one of my favorite parts of motorcycling. I love the way it looks, I love the comfort it gives me when riding, and I love sharing my experiences with my gear with other people. I’m a storyteller by nature. I’m not however a professional racer, writer, or gear tester. The opinions expressed in this blog are simply that; opinions. My reviews are not to be considered an evaluative look at the safety of a particular piece of gear. My goal is to simply give you an end-user perspective on a piece of gear or motorcycle product that I own. This is something that I feel is lacking from many Internet motorcycle stores. Newenough.com does a great job of commenting on the stuff they sell, but they are trying to sell this stuff. I on the other hand am not trying to sell this stuff. I will try and be as unbiased as I can while also being informative. I apologize ahead of time for the pictures. Remember, I’m trying to be a writer, not a photographer ;-)