GamJams Reviews: Handlebar Tape

[All cyclists are experts, at least when it comes to our equipment choices. We know why we chose what we chose, and what we think of the product after we've been using it. GamJams Reviews channels that collective expertise - category by category - into a tidy package of articles designed to help all of us make better equipment decisions. Buying what pros get paid to use is one way to go. But the candid testimonial of fellow racers who paid out of their own pocket - that's an endorsement that really counts.]

This week's GamJams Reviews is on Handlebar Tape. If you want to add your own review, do it in the comments or on your own blog and throw a link in the comments.

• Sweet Home Algomaha is fond of Fizik, in white: "It's technically made of Microtex, which is basically fake leather. It's grippy, but not blister-causing. When wet, it stays grippy. It's very, very comfortable -- I usually ride sans gloves, except in races. Prior to switching to Fizik tape, my hands were usually sore after long rides. I've had no pain since." Check out his picture after a rainy race of muddy kit, muddy bike, but gleaming white tape.
• Fizik gets the nod from Flamenco Chuckwagon too, who points out, "When you go to install this tape, you'll think it's crap because the adhesive is wimpy. It's actually ideal, you just have to work with it."
• First Dropped rolls Forte cork tape onto his bars, in black, which is not coincidentally "the most readily available color of electrical tape."
• Whine and Cheese is loathe to change his handlebar tape because of the stories told by each tear and stain: "It's fun sometimes to be riding, and look down to the bits of gray still clinging to the handlebars, and remember all the things they've seen. They've felt the wind in the gutter of a Belgian kermesse, the speed from that fast descent up at Fitchburg, absorbed the rain of that one stage in Ohio, and been partly torn on the asphalt of the Angles' baseball stadium parking lot at the Nationals Crit."
• And if you insist on white tape, L'Amateur Domestique points to this must-watch video on how to keep it clean.

Next week's Reviews: Winter gloves.

Comments

[DJ]

Fi'zi:k Microtex Dual Tape all the way!!!