First Review – Vitesse ‘Glove’ Motorcycle Boots

by Mark

The good people at Vitesse have sent us a pair of their finest boots to test. So test we shall, we’ll be performing a long term test as I’ll use them for my daily (ok, almost daily) commute into the office.

So, just who are Vitesse? You can read our first mention of them here which will fill in some gaps.

Vitesse started with one simple, “single purpose in mind: design performance motorcycle boots that you will want to wear everyday when you are riding and after you step off. Because our single most important goal is to get more riders to wear boots.”

So that will be our test. Currently I leave some shoes in the office, ride in and then change. From now on I won’t, I’ll ride in and keep the Vitesse ‘Glove’ boots we’ve kindly been sent on, all day, every (almost) day.

My first impressions are the same that many of you will face, which is looking through the website and deciding on which style and, more importantly, which size.

Handily, or should the be footily?, Vitesse are on hand to help you make the right decision about the size that’s right for you. This page on the website will take you through which size you should think about ordering. You simply download a PDF document, print it out and follow the instructions, simple.

Vitesse seem obsessed with making sure you get the right size boot and that’s obviously a good thing when you’re paying out quite a bit of money.

Fast forward a couple of days (in fact coming, as they do, from France, the boots took less time then some items I’ve ordered online from companies based around the corner from me) and the boots arrive.

Opening the top of the brown box they arrive in and I’m faced with the question “Is it a fetish?” and nothing else…I wondered if there hadn’t been a mix up at the depo? But once I took the box out and saw the Vitesse writing I allowed myself a little chuckle at this writing as you definitely get the impression that for Vitesse, it almost is a fetish.

The boots arrived in perfect condition, the box didn’t even have so much as a scratch on it, and inside the boots are housed in their own little cloth bag, much like the ones you get when you purchase a really expensive pair of shoes (ask the wife).

Perhaps I should just mention what these boots are going to be replacing. Since I first start riding I’ve always had Sidi, recently I tried to purchase a pair of Arlen Ness boots but had to take them back as I couldn’t change gear! I’ve gotten use to my Sidi Vertigo’s, I remember thinking they weren’t too comfortable when I first got them, and I do enjoy taking them off at the end of the day if I’ve been on a long ride. But they’re like a pair of old gloves, I always wear them and they’re starting to show it now.

So, onto the boots, they feel extremely well made and very light. They have a nice zinc alloy forefoot slider for those who like to spark it up on the corners to. The fastener is roughly half zip and half Velcro with a nice little touch on the zip, as the tag has a large Velcro piece attached. So, when you zip the boots up, stick the tag to the Velcro, fold the main part over and your boots are doubly secured.

Putting them on they are very tight, though being made pretty much entirely of leather they will obviously stretch a bit and actually it’s a reassuring fit rather then a concerning one.

One thing I noticed straight away was the lack of any kind of specific ankle protection. There’s plenty around the heel area and either side of your ankle joint, but the actual ankle bone itself only has some extra protection on the inside of the boot (unsure what makes up the additional padding).

The styling is nice and subtle which should help in the cause to wear them all day, there’s none of the ‘plastic’ gubbings you get on the Sidi boots except for the tibia (shinbone) plate at the front which is pretty standard on boots these days.

There’s no obvious vents like you’d get on a pair of Sidi’s either though there are some perforation marks on the leather at the side of the boots, just behind the forefoot slider.

On the bike the boots feel good (I could change gear which is always a good start), the soles are different from the Sidi’s I’m used to in that I can actually feel the pegs my feet are resting on. I’ll leave it down to you if this is a good thing or not.

Other than this it’s hard to say anything else. The boots performed as their supposed to. I didn’t necessarily feel I was wearing anything different, the position my foot sits is slightly different, further forward then my Sidi’s but this wasn’t any issue.

The test came when I got to the office. A word about our office, it’s hot, I mean really hot. We’ve no air con and whilst the windows open we get very little wind (other than some of the other guys in the office!). I can’t always keep my shoes on that I leave in the office so I wasn’t holding out much hope for some leather boots.

However, I was pleasantly surprised. I couldn’t keep them on all day, it was just too hot, but I kept them as long as my shoes. Nobody commented (wearing Sidi’s with strange red riply heals gets a lot of comments) and there was no squeak! That’s right folks, I could walk around and not sound like I’m standing on mice as I go. Silence, well almost, the boots on linoleum makes the same sound as your old gym shoes in school but that’s pretty specific!

Walking in the boots is much, much better than the Sidi Vertigo’s. The Sidi’s suffer from being very rigid on the sole and are pretty inflexible even now after ‘ahem’ years of use. However the Vitesse feel more like shoes, they’re not quite there but strides (excuse the pun) ahead of other boots I’ve walked in…so to speak.

So, so far very impressive. I’ll think they’ll wear like a pair of old comfy shoes and I’ll keep you updated as I go. I would say that I think they would sit rather nicely on a custom or chopper bike but they looked fine on my GSXR.

A big thank you to Caroline at Vitesse for providing the boots to test and we’ll be updating on a regular basis.