Bike Perfect Verdict
Useful shoulder season and mild weather protection without losing vital control feedback, there's no smart fingers though and relatively pricey with lumpy seams
Pros
- +
Useful intermediate weather protection
- +
Uncompromised bike feedback
- +
Silicon grip boost
- +
Snot/glasses wipe
- +
Minimalist ‘armor’
- +
Adjustable wrist for snugness
Cons
- -
Not smartphone compatible
- -
Irritating seams
- -
Relatively expensive
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Endura’s Singletrack range has been a benchmark for no-nonsense trail kit for decades and its gloves have always been super popular. This Windproof version gets a soft-shell backing to keep you comfy when the leaves are off the trees but still leaves you with plenty of bike feedback. How do they stack up against the best mountain bike gloves?
Design and aesthetic
The Singletrack Windproof glove uses exactly the same unpadded synthetic suede palm with central and fingertip silicone grip as the standard Singletrack glove. Rather than mesh finger darts and a woven back you get a two-piece soft-shell upper with lightly fleeced insides. The knuckles are articulated with tiny finger rubber ‘armor’ detailing just above the splits and a thin rubber logo strip across the punch zone of the 2nd to 4th knuckles. The thumb gets a toweling snot or glasses wipe and the 3D molded neoprene cuffs close with a rubber-reinforced and logo’d velcro strap.
Fit and performance
Being able to open the wrist makes it a bit easier to pull on the gloves and the pre-formed fit worked well with everyone who tried them and the dimensions and proportions are true to size. That means no extra long tips to fudge feedback and there’s no bunching in the palms either. There was great grip in the wet or dry from the mix of silicon and faux suede too. The fingertip stripes are particularly useful if you’ve just dropped your bar end and levers in a bog and the snot or glasses wipe (decide beforehand before things get nasty) is useful too. The softshell fabric bounces a fair amount of wet and blow off down to keep them comfy down to frost point if you’re working reasonably hard. They dry quickly too and in terms of uncompromised control feedback, they beat fatter winter gloves (like Endura’s own Deluge) hands down.
It’s worth noting that more fussy testers found the amount of prominently raised seams from the various panels and articulation cuts and finger ends irritating compared to single-piece gloves using stretchier fabric. There’s no touchscreen connectivity in the fingertips either and they’re relatively expensive for the category.
Verdict
Endura has added useful shoulder season/mild winter weather protection into the Singletrack format without compromising bike feel and feedback. The seams can be irritating though, they’re not smartphone fingered and they’re more expensive than our benchmark glove in this category.
Tech Specs: Endura Singletrack Windproof MTB glove
- Price: $44.99 / £29.99
- Sizes: S, M, L, XL and XXL
- Colors: Black, Electric Blue, Navy, Paprika Orange or Camo Green
