That wasn't really what I meant, but let's just say we have an agreement about bicycle helmets and gloves providing about equal value at risk mitigation and leave it at that.

Great for knocking on a body panels to move 'em over into their lanes.

Dang TJ!

I have a pair of Cedric Gracia gloves with the Cabrone (roll the "r" when you say it) knuckles like that! Brown camo. They do make a nice sound on the quarterpanel of a text-messaging motorist's vehicle don't they!

I have massive Oury grips on my hardtail and without the gloves my hands hurt. I get a little clustrophobic with gloves so only wear full fingers when it gets cold. I love fingerless gloves, the only drawback was losing my manly calluses when I made the switch to gloves years back.

I wear Mechanix gloves.
Light and cool.

You could do like me, and just cut one finger off of your full finger gloves.

Where are the helmet teeth**********?

you were lucky, thats all

i have a set of cold weather gloves (louie garneau windtex eco) which are nice (a little thin) and a set of adidas fingerless gloves. i also wore a set of bell gloves until they totally fell apart.

gloves are good to have in case of a fall and for comfort, and i'm going to say they're absolutely necessary if you ride at a faster pace. someone said earlier that their hands grip on the pavement when they hit the ground, leading to bruised legs. i'm going to say that at a faster pace, what happens is this:
1) fall
2) hands hit first and slide
2.5) elbows hits, slide
3) torso hits, continue sliding, begin barrel roll
4) legs hit, barrel roll continues
5) stop.

upon post crash examination of my bell gloves, i tore cleanly through the leather. the elbows were also bleeding everywhere.

the difference between elbows and hands though, is that hands are very difficult, surgically, to rebuild skin on. the skin may be too tight after healing. also, seriously injuring, or even severing a hand tendon is EXTREMELY bad news, and also very difficult to repair. don't take the risk. gloves are comfortable and useful, especially if they have a nose-wipe patch (i use mine every single ride, haha).

I forgot about this use for gloves, the famous, (by New Zealand standards), mountain biking Kennett Brothers always said of gloves "left for sweat and right for snot".

When I was younger it was the influence of a certain computer game character that got me into wearing fingerless gloves almost 24-7. After playing at Urban chic for a while I discovered that fingerless gloves are extremely practical accessories for any active woman and by choosing the right kind of glove (leather & etc....) and having padding in the right places they were good for sooooooo many purposes. It takes a certain type of attitude to wear fingerless gloves with a Jane-coat-and-tie business suit in a corporate environment btw
For cycling fingerless gloves are spot-on in term of comfort and grip. I was plagued with joint pain in my hands at one time and wearing good quality and nicely fitting fingerless gloves did make a big difference. In terms of protection against cuts and blisters they can't be beaten in my opinion.
These days I live a more gentle lifestyle as a religious woman of faith who covers and dresses modestly, BUT I still wear and use fingerless gloves because they are just so good and practical.

Fingerless gloves look so much cooler.

And it covers the part of your hands that require grip (the palm and lower fingers) while leaving the more tactile parts (the fingertips) free to have more flexibility. Same reason why combat gloves have one or two fingers open... it allows you to grip the gun better while leaving your trigger finger flexible.

Okay, of course I was kidding about that, but I have to add that on my way home from work today, I was stopped at a red light, and I glanced in my rear-view mirror, and the guy on the bike behind me was actually PICKING HIS NOSE while he was waiting there too. He was using his thumb, though.

I just thought you all wanted to know that.

Do carry on.

He was not wearing gloves, by the way.

I wear gloves when it's cold out, and when I'm on the bike.
50dg F & above, fingerless (short-finger?)
49dg F & below, full finger; 35dg F & below, winter gloves.

Here is a video screen capture of my normal glove attire:



The red color is for turn signal attention getting. Don't know about cars but my riding buds say they look pretty good when I signal a turn. I presume motorists see them better.

Been wearing fingerless and gel filled mostly with the road bike for 30 years. Our streets are often beaten up and my hands thank me for the gel. As for fingerless, I guess it's cooler and does not hamper hand use in general - like finding small objects in my bag, pushing phone buttons, working a camera - whatever.

I thought it was obvious: comfort, both by the padding and by the fact that your sweaty hand won't slide around the bars. I always wear gloves, and my hands feel a bit weird when i don't. And fingerless because it's hot and it's summer, plus you get to use your hands and fingers without a problem.

I don't know what kind of cheezy bike gloves you had in mind; all the ones I have seen have a nice padding of a leather like material that indeed does save hands.... a lesson I learned long long ago when taking a fall on a turn on a wet slick road, and having to pick gravel out of my hands after. I don't know of any gloves that are a "thin cloth material" on the palms.

Make your own choices about why you wear whatever protective gear. But don't discourage others...

Yeah and they lick their balls too...

I think he was making his usual 'joke' about helmets by referencing 'styrofoam gloves.'

I think the joke is that some commuters feel the need to wear (possibly) snot filled, sweaty "safety" equipment in order to protect themselves from a low probability, relatively insignificant severity injury.

Comfort, shock absorption, better grip are reasons that make sense; the risk reduction angle is preposterous unless "safety" gloves are part of a full body protection (from boo-boos) assembly.

Protected my hands in my last fall. Tore the gloves up pretty bad. And really protected my hands from the sun during the Oklahoma Free Wheel last June. 460 miles of Oklahoma sun can be very harsh. Gloves and helmet don't leave home without them.

My hands tend to go numb if I ride without padded gloves.

When I had bare hands on twist-grips, yes, they began to slip on them. ("Scaryetta"--is that "Marietta?" )

Helmet wearing <> glove wearing. Most of us are not standing here brow beating everyone else who does not wear gloves. That is unlike every idiotic safety nannie helmet thread on these forums.

Besides, with my klutzy high speed riding, low probable falls onto the pavement are more like a several times a year incident.
I'm guessing that if I start racing next year the probability will increase.