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When I first started biking any money I had (not much) went on the bike so my kit was thrown together cast off rubbish: old flying boots, ski gloves, regular jeans and a second hand 'fashion' leather biker jacket (part PVC!) with a denim jacket underneath. It offered little protection from the elements and still less crash protection. I regularly arrived at work soaked and freezing cold (stopping off for petrol meant I could warm my gloves on the exhaust for 5 minutes and feel my hands enough to continue). And my jeans wore out fast just from sliding about on the bike seat! My one real safety concession was a decent shoei helmet which I afforded partly due to the training centre I did my riding lessons at having a 20% off deal on lids with the bike shop they were linked with. And they sensibly pushed you to get a good lid at least. And I got a reflective sam brown belt to use only for test day to try to fool the examiner that I was really a sensible and steady rider rather than a barely skilled hooligan in waiting...
Luckily, no thanks to my limited riding skill, I never properly tested this early kit in a crash. As I got older and less broke the bikes got better and thankfully so did my kit (and my riding)... so I was wearing decent vanson two piece leathers with full armour, arai lid, sidi boots and some awesome gloves from a company that no longer exists (texpro?) when I had my one big off on a silverstone track day. Knocked myself out trashed the bike and got my hand trapped in between lever and bars, wearing through both the lever and the gloves carbon fibre knuckle armour, but thankfully not my knuckles, as I slid along. Got away more or less unscathed barring a headache and feeling like I'd been tortured on a rack from all the rag dolling... praise be for the massive run offs at the track... helmet and gloves were written off but did their job really well, leathers needed some small repairs before they could be used again but held together superbly, and boots were scuffed but bombproof. My ego was rather tattered tho' (once the adrenaline had worn off and I'd got over the stupid feeling of invincibility I got from having a high speed crash that miraculously left me essentially unscathed).
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