Bontrager Classique mitts review

Bontrager’s Classique range packages modern features into clothing with a retro look and finishing details. It stretches to all the cycling essentials: jerseys, bibshorts, caps, shoes, socks, full-finger gloves and mitts.

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The Classique mitts are made predominantly from Pittards leather, both their palms and backs, which is soft and manages sweat well. The backs are perforated for a bit of ventilation. There’s a fabric nose wipe built into the back of the thumb and a reflective tab across the outer side of the mitts. They’re fixed around your wrist with a leather tab. This looks as if it has a press stud to fix it, but this is for effect only – the actual fastening is a Velcro strip.

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Those disguised modern features continue into the palm. This has a lot of areas of foam and gel padding built into it, both across the majority of the palm itself and across the inside of the knuckles where they rest on the bars. It’s fairly low profile, but does add plenty of cushioning against road vibration transmitted from the bars. There are also mesh sections hidden in the middle of the palm and between the fingers to aid comfort and air circulation.

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The Classique mitts have worked well on longer hot rides, my hands not feeling sweaty and the padding keeping my hands from feeling sore. The thumb wipe has proved useful too. The fit is good and the natural leather adds a bit of stretch to fit different sized hands. However without tabs to pull at, getting the mitts off warm hands is a bit of a struggle.

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They wash up well, provided you are careful, and durability looks good, although they take longer to dry out than synthetic leather. But at £50, they are quite a pricy item – although less so than Rapha’s equivalent. As well as the black model which we’ve tested the Classique mitts are also available in tan or white.