London Gear/Equipment/Accessory Store Recommendations

TL;DR; Bike is awesome, jacket and helmet strap are uncomfortable as they rub my neck a lot, any advice would be great


Thanks everyone :blush::tada:.

Here it is:


I’m really enjoying it. So far I’m really happy with my choice of bike. I’m not a huge fan of the front light, but there are hardly any bikes I like the front of. Wish it looked more like the front of the MT-10. But the rest of it looks great to me, and most importantly I love riding it.

I did a long 2.5 hour ride (with breaks) from Clapham to Wiltshire where my parents live. Was surprisingly well received by my mum :joy:.

However…

Jacket + Helmet Are Uncomfortable :cry:

Here’s my Dainese jacket:

The problem is that when I lift my arms up to the bars, the neck of the jacket presses into my neck just below my adams apple. On top of that, my helmet strap is just above where the jacket presses, so either:

  • My neck catches on the jacket as I check left and right
  • My helmet strap pushes into my neck as I look down
  • Worse - my skin gets pinched between the strap and the leather jacket

These are obviously the things you have to learn by experience I suppose… hard to know until you’ve ridden in it sometimes. They felt great in the shop, although I only realised that when I got on the bike that
I only tried on the GT-Air 1 with the assistant in the store and not the GT-Air 2 :sob:.

I initially wanted the 1 as it was on sale and I didn’t need the comms integration, but they didn’t have my size, so the assistant offered me 10% off the GT-Air 2. For £50 difference for the option of comms, I thought why not. I don’t recall the strap on the GT-Air 1 being uncomfortable, but then again it was the D-Ring type, not the ratchet that the GT-Air 2. Rookie error :(.

Any Advice About Jacket/Helmet Comfort?

At the moment I’m really disappointed that these two items worth ~£850 are so uncomfortable. It deters me from wanting to check my shoulders properly, and I didn’t enjoy my ride as much :(.

One solution I thought of is to wear a balaclava… just feels annoying to me to need a solution like that for these two expensive items.

Any advice would be great! Not sure if the leather will wear in? It’s the edge of the neckline, so I suppose not? Should I look at changing the strap on the helmet?

Thanks!

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