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1TallTXn
0
- Joined
- Jul 12, 2005
- Messages
- 10,898
- Reaction score
- 3
- Location
- Cleburne, TX
- First Name
- Nathan
- Last Name
- Seery
At the IMS cycle show back in Nov I purchased a Belstaff Challanger from British Motorcycle Gear. I have been seriously looking for a good winter jacket for awhile.
I went to the show hoping to look and try on some stuff. so thats exactly what I did. looked at, touched, tried on, nearly everything there (didn't touch BMW, out of my price range)
When I walked by the British Motorcycle Gear both, I spied this jacket, and looked it over pretty good. The guys running the booth were very nice and never pushed. They had me try on the jacket, worked with the adjustments to get it to fit my telephone pole frame. They showed off the features, gave me a brief history of the company and then gave me their personal experience with the jackets (which was quite extensive)
I thanked them for their info and time and continued looking around. Besides, MotoLiberty had a sale, couldn’t pass that up
Long story short, I wound up getting the Belstaff, it fit me really well, the features were right and I’d heard nothing but good things about Belstaff.
If I had to boil it down to one single point that made me get the Belstaff over the
Olympia AST, it would be that the Belstaff has an additional strap on each side above the waist belt allowing me to reduce the amount of space around my middle inside the jacket.
I’m not going to be the one to say it, but the AST sure looks like a knock off of the Belstaff
Yes, I really liked the High-Viz AST, that was my runner up option.
So I’ve had this jacket for about two months and I can’t say enough good things about it. I rode in it at <40* all the way to Atlanta and I was just barely cool, add a good thermal layer (like the UnderArmour I got for Christmas) and you’d be totally set.
As a test (and because I’m too cheap to buy a dedicated ski jacket) I wore my Belstaff when my family and I went to CO for a snow ski/board vacation. 5 days on the slopes of nothing above 34* wearing Chilly’s thermal pants, ski pants, UnderArmour coldgear shirt and my Belstaff, I was never cold. In fact 3/5 days I was hot, the UA did its job and wicked moisture away from me, then the insulated liner on the Belstaff did the same thing and pulled the moisture between it and the outer shell. I’m not any wonder when it comes to snow (I’m from Texas, cut me some slack) so I spent my fair share of time in the snow and not just on top of it. The jacket never even showed signs of getting slightly wet. Same thing was true on the return trip from GA, riding in a light drizzle for over 1.5hrs and it still shook dry.
Pic of me in the snow
Crash protection is something I hope to never have to test, but it should do great. CE armor in the shoulders and elbows are standard. there’s a pocket for an optional CE back protector (which the BMG guys threw in at 50% off). The armor has stayed in place even through my tumbling down the mountain so I would think it would stay in place in a real motorcycle crash.
The material is 1000 Denier on any area that would contact the ground in a slide, and 600 Denier for the rest of the jacket. It sure looks and feels heftier then anything this side of leather I’ve ever hand my hands on.
I got at least one comment per day while on the slopes. Everybody seemed to want to know what it was and where i’d gotten it. Interestingly enough there was a few people that keyed it as a motorcycle jacket, but everyone made some comment about how warm I must be when it was discovered it was a motorcycle jacket.
There’s a bazillion pockets inside and outside this jacket. all thoughtfully placed and well constructed. All the zippers have a long pull tab attached for easy working with gloves on. the main zipper is perfect. I can’t get the thing to snag! log pull tab is easy to grab and works every time.
The closure on the sleeves is a bit more finicky. same pull tabs so its easy to grab, but the mesh/liner material inside the sleeves gets caught in the zipper easily. not a clue how they could do it differently though.
The gent that sold me the jacket said the Challanger is rated to 0*F and I’d believe that. I was tempted to get the next step up (Discovery) as it has even better water proofing around the zippers and pockets, but after having it on for maybe a minute I was immediately sweating. Too much for Texas.
I am totally pleased with this jacket and would highly recommend it to anyone thats in need of a winter motorcycle jacket.
I went to the show hoping to look and try on some stuff. so thats exactly what I did. looked at, touched, tried on, nearly everything there (didn't touch BMW, out of my price range)
When I walked by the British Motorcycle Gear both, I spied this jacket, and looked it over pretty good. The guys running the booth were very nice and never pushed. They had me try on the jacket, worked with the adjustments to get it to fit my telephone pole frame. They showed off the features, gave me a brief history of the company and then gave me their personal experience with the jackets (which was quite extensive)
I thanked them for their info and time and continued looking around. Besides, MotoLiberty had a sale, couldn’t pass that up
Long story short, I wound up getting the Belstaff, it fit me really well, the features were right and I’d heard nothing but good things about Belstaff.
If I had to boil it down to one single point that made me get the Belstaff over the
Olympia AST, it would be that the Belstaff has an additional strap on each side above the waist belt allowing me to reduce the amount of space around my middle inside the jacket.
I’m not going to be the one to say it, but the AST sure looks like a knock off of the Belstaff
Yes, I really liked the High-Viz AST, that was my runner up option. So I’ve had this jacket for about two months and I can’t say enough good things about it. I rode in it at <40* all the way to Atlanta and I was just barely cool, add a good thermal layer (like the UnderArmour I got for Christmas) and you’d be totally set.
As a test (and because I’m too cheap to buy a dedicated ski jacket) I wore my Belstaff when my family and I went to CO for a snow ski/board vacation. 5 days on the slopes of nothing above 34* wearing Chilly’s thermal pants, ski pants, UnderArmour coldgear shirt and my Belstaff, I was never cold. In fact 3/5 days I was hot, the UA did its job and wicked moisture away from me, then the insulated liner on the Belstaff did the same thing and pulled the moisture between it and the outer shell. I’m not any wonder when it comes to snow (I’m from Texas, cut me some slack) so I spent my fair share of time in the snow and not just on top of it. The jacket never even showed signs of getting slightly wet. Same thing was true on the return trip from GA, riding in a light drizzle for over 1.5hrs and it still shook dry.
Pic of me in the snow
Crash protection is something I hope to never have to test, but it should do great. CE armor in the shoulders and elbows are standard. there’s a pocket for an optional CE back protector (which the BMG guys threw in at 50% off). The armor has stayed in place even through my tumbling down the mountain so I would think it would stay in place in a real motorcycle crash.
The material is 1000 Denier on any area that would contact the ground in a slide, and 600 Denier for the rest of the jacket. It sure looks and feels heftier then anything this side of leather I’ve ever hand my hands on.
I got at least one comment per day while on the slopes. Everybody seemed to want to know what it was and where i’d gotten it. Interestingly enough there was a few people that keyed it as a motorcycle jacket, but everyone made some comment about how warm I must be when it was discovered it was a motorcycle jacket.
There’s a bazillion pockets inside and outside this jacket. all thoughtfully placed and well constructed. All the zippers have a long pull tab attached for easy working with gloves on. the main zipper is perfect. I can’t get the thing to snag! log pull tab is easy to grab and works every time.
The closure on the sleeves is a bit more finicky. same pull tabs so its easy to grab, but the mesh/liner material inside the sleeves gets caught in the zipper easily. not a clue how they could do it differently though.
The gent that sold me the jacket said the Challanger is rated to 0*F and I’d believe that. I was tempted to get the next step up (Discovery) as it has even better water proofing around the zippers and pockets, but after having it on for maybe a minute I was immediately sweating. Too much for Texas.
I am totally pleased with this jacket and would highly recommend it to anyone thats in need of a winter motorcycle jacket.
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) and the Olympia AST was high on my list. Guess I'll have to check out that Belstaff too. 
