POWERED WARMTH

When I was a teenage motorcycle courier, come wintertime I would jam my gloves onto cylinder heads to warm them up while I picked up parcels, feeling a brief respite from the cold as I took each job across town.

It was nearly 10 years later before I experienced the warmth of heated hand grips while testing motorcycles for Two Wheels, and it’s an option I’d purchase on any new motorcycle I was considering buying.

Last year I finally got around to trying heated riding gear, a Venture Heat electric jacket liner, which actually makes riding more comfortable in many ways beyond simply being warm.

With electrically-heated gear you can control your comfort level without stopping to add or remove gear, you can ride like it’s springtime all winter, carry less on tour, and extend your riding time into evenings and through winter.

For some riders it can be the difference between a great ride and regretting throwing a leg over the bike.

Of course there are many ways to stay warm while riding – I have Barkbuster handguards designed for road bikes and built