I was not entirely convinced by my pre-trip, ride-along-the-street, “road test”, on my Norco Optic, so I decided to pack my old grips for a recent three day Chilcotin back country trip just in case my hands did not agree with my new LoamLab grips.
The excellent news is that the LoamLab grips are amazing!!
By the time I had ridden from Lorna Lake to the base of the hike-a-bike to Lorna Pass I was reasonably sure they were going to be my new best 'hand friends’. By the time we reached the bottom of the first long single track descent, from Lorna Pass, I knew it was going to be a beautiful and lasting relationship. The grips just continued to impress me for the three days of riding back country single track and some steep, dusty descents.
My second set of LoamLab grips are now on my Norco Sight (Whistler trail bike) and have had a week of proper Whistler trail testing (much rougher on the hands and body). They are incredible and offer very good dampening on properly rough trails. Thus far, the grips provide insane levels of grip, despite high levels of perspiration, in 22ºC to 34ºC conditions. They are tacky without leaving residue all over one’s hands.
They dampen exactly in the matter proposed by the animation. The extra rubber is where it is needed and there is just enough rubber for grip and dampening everywhere else. The cut outs, in the inner barrel, are obvious under the hand but in an unobtrusive manner and the smooth outer upper edge (on the end of the grip) feels great on the ulna pad (compared to other grips that might have a flare at the end of the grip). The end of the grip, whilst soft rubber, appears to be robust enough to survive tree strikes and repeated resting the bike on its side (this might just be a guide thing).
It will be interesting to see how they wear (my other grips, now the second best, gloveless grip in the world, are good for 1000 km) and how they perform in rain (we had several tiny showers but not enough to be considered a proper wet grip test) and the cold (I leave the gloves off until about 0ºC) but I have expectations that the LoamLab grips will pass those tests with flying colours. I haven’t needed to test them with gloves yet but I am sure that they provide excellent grip on any decent glove for those glove wearing riders out there.
So for anyone that needs a small diameter grip that really does behave like an outstanding, well dampened, super grippy, push on grip but with the convenience of a single lock ring grip these are the grips to fit to your bike.