just wondering.
I started off riding BMX and Road as a kid but never even owned a pair of biking gloves until I got into mountainbiking in my 20s (and only bought them after I was told I needed them for racing) been back riding gloveless again for a few years now and I’m much happier due to feeling much more in control without a layer of uncomfortable material between me and my grips.

So, what made you buy your first pair of gloves for biking?
have you ever ridden gloveless? how did you find it?
and why do you wear them now?

warmer hands for 50% of the year and protectiong from cuts and scrapes when i put my hand down falling off etc.

Dont really feel the need for protection/ padding etc

Nurses don’t wipe ar5es, so you need to look after your pinkies.

I wear them because I hate losing all the skin off the heel off my palms when I inevitable fall off and put an arm out.

Protection, mainly – mind you, I have a two inch gash across my knuckles from last night’s thorns, despite the gloves.

Mainly as protection if it has been decided that i have to crash. Had a few cuts and grazes on my hands in the past so keen to avoid them seeing as i work with the public all day and manky hands are not a good look.

Sam blenky wun a big race a couple of years back and rob warner said how cool it was he dint hav no gloves on so me and all my m8s binned our gloves then
is a bit slippy on the grips sometimes but it looks well cool

Your fingers are the most sensitive part of your body – worth protecting.

Scraped-up hands make life more difficult than it needs to be.

Sweaty hands are more likely to slide off grips.

There’s three reasons already. Give me a minute and I’m sure I can think of more…

I don’t ride in gloves unless it’s REALLY cold and my hands go numb. I carry gloves incase I need them.

When it’s really wet, I struggle sometimes. I’ll change my grips to sort that out, rather than buy gloves 🙂

I don’t wear them most of the time.
If it’s cold or wet I will, or if I’m riding a rocky trail/ course but otherwise I don’t.
I used to, but they annoyed me – I couldn’t think of a reason why I did so I stopped.

the protection thing is a funny one, I do more damage to my hands day-to-day than I would biking. the other day I sliced the end of my finger off peeling a potato… should I wear gloves for that?

As above – fall over, stick out hand, land on sharp sticking up object. Suede palms for me – have saved me several times!

grip..

More grip when I sweat in hot weather, less skin lost off knuckles/fingers/backs of hands from foliage encounters, less skin lost when I crash and put a hand out, warmer in cold weather. Bought my first pair of cycling gloves (fingerless ones) in 88/89 I think. Have been riding my BMX mostly gloveless for the last week and it’s a nice change I think I’d want gloves on as I do more interesting things.

I forgot my gloves on a ride last summer and couldn’t initially work out why everything felt wrong – steering was all weird and stuff. Pedalling uphill after the first bit of singletrack I realised that my hands were slipping on the grips without gloves, horrible…

I wear them because I hate losing all the skin off the heel off my palms when I inevitable fall off and put an arm out.

this

Sam blenky wun a big race a couple of years back and rob warner said how cool it was he dint hav no gloves on so me and all my m8s binned our gloves then
is a bit slippy on the grips sometimes but it looks well cool

You binned your gloves because Rob Warner reckoned it looked cool?

😆

You really need this question answered? Have you ever been over the bars at speed? Do you know what you tend to do instinctively?

Also: you should see the height of the nettles round our way, after all this rain! 😯

As Yunki says:

Grip.

also, I did a lot of judo as a kid, so if I take a tumble I tend to roll rather than sticking my hands out.
rather than breaking my wrists, I tend to knacker my shoulders instead! 😀

interesting that folk seem to see protection as a big reason so far. I’ve never really found the protection to be upto much from a decently thin pair of gloves.

I tend to get blisters without them. Plus I hate the feeling of sweaty, slippery hands on grips. Don’t wear them for shorter rides in warm weather though.

You really need this question answered?

it’s not urgent, no.. like I said, just interested.

Have you ever been over the bars at speed? Do you know what you tend to do instinctively?

Yes! many many many times. I tend to Tuck n roll mainly, what’s your point?

Sam blenky wun a big race a couple of years back and rob warner said how cool it was he dint hav no gloves on so me and all my m8s binned our gloves then
is a bit slippy on the grips sometimes but it looks well cool

Please tell me you’re joking, if not this is the most stupid thing I’ve read in a long time.

I wear gloves because several million years of evolution means you will put your hands down first if you crash.

Blisters only really happen if you’re not used to it, they’ll eventually turn into calluses you can cut off with no blood loss at all.

At least once a year I destroy a pair of gloves in a crash, better them than me.

I wear them after a strand of thorns went between my middle fingers and then pulled through as I past 😥

And as above just general protection

Yes! many many many times. I tend to Tuck n roll mainly, what’s your point?

So what part of your body breaks your fall?

Saves scuffed hands when I do fall off, don’t like riding without them now as feels weird, like driving the car without a seatbelt on now, the TLD SE’s I use now do offer a fair bit of protection too, I’ve ‘tested’ quite a few sets now 😉

Coz i paid a fortune for these false nails

So what part of your body breaks your fall?

the whole point of rolling is that no one part of the body breaks the fall rather than stopping dead and being badly injured.

coz it’s what proper gents do, I wear them for driving too.

I’ve been riding for donks, started off road riding in 70’s and never used to wear gloves until I started doing big days/milages, – mainly to get some extra padding between bars & palm. Used to have some nice original 70’s string back fingerless mitts….er hmmm.

I started wearing gloves nearly all the time after a mate came off on a high speed road descent and shredded his palms – not a pretty sight….and trying to pick bits of tarmac, car window glass & dirt out before bandaging him up…not good!

After a high speed off myself whilst riding my mtn bike through a section of loose rocks, I now wear decent long finger gloves. I was wearing fingerless gloves at the time, and one of my fingernails got quite mashed (at the time, the least of my worries!!), but I could see where the palm on one of the gloves had taken a lot of abrasion, so I think it prevented injuries to one of my palms – shame about the rest of my body!

At the end of the day (and having worked in a hospital A&E Dept), I think with any ‘adventure sport’ it’s up to participants to take on some responsibility and precautions for themselves – and for mtn biking, wearing a helmet, gloves and glasses seems sensible to me. Oh, and it might even save you a lovely evening sitting in an A&E waiting room for hours (Don’t get me started on binge drinkers wasting A&E Depts time!)

Tuck and roll’s all well and good if you have time, last big one in Scotland I went down like a sack of s##t chest onto the stem only just managed to break fall with my hands. (hidden rock in the undergrowth) ribs still aching after 3 weeks. 😳

several million years of evolution means you will put your hands down first

I wouldn’t call that evolution.

if you’ve got kids, get them to do judo – I’m sure it’s saved me from having lots of broken bones over the years.

there’s something nice about not wearing gloves, a sense of freedom, like you get from riding without a helmet (but less taboo)

Snot wipes on gloves are useful when you are wearing short sleeves

Besides grip and crash protection, the main reason for me is to protect from sticking out branches, brambles etc. on overgrown or tight trails- which would otherwise rip your knuckles to bits.

Blisters only really happen if you’re not used to it, they’ll eventually turn into calluses you can cut off with no blood loss at all.

Or which tear off when I’m climbing and **** up the day.

I do wonder why I always wear gloves. The only real benefit I see is going through forests at high speeds to stop small branches hurting when they whip across my fingers and knuckles. Same reason I wear glasses.

Just feels weird not wearing them now after 15 years I guess.

There’s a H&S moto in our industry

“Hands are Handy”

It’s true

My hands can get a bit numb, so I prefer a bit of extra padding. Plus the gorse and brambles tend to rip the shit out of my hands otherwise.
Sweat / snot wipes handy too.

the whole point of rolling is that no one part of the body breaks the fall rather than stopping dead and being badly injured.

That doesn’t actually the question. :p (I know the theory – I learned to breakfall while doing Ju Jitsu)

So, when you crash, what part of your body tends to hit the ground first?