Rockgardn Landing Zone
Rockgardn, a small clothing and body armor manufacturer based just north of Los Angeles is the brain child of Mark Carlton, owner and operator. Rockgardn first debuted their flagship upper body suit in XXXX and has since expanded their line to various articles of protective gear. There are a lot of small manufacturers in the bike industry, but most are component and frame manufacturers - in the clothing and body armor product arenas, not that many small companies try to compete with giants like Dianese, Fox, SixSixOne,
etc…but Rockgardn does and does quite well.
Here at Hcor.net we have been watching Rockgardn progress over the last year and a half offering more products and making refinements to their products. Mark sent me a couple samples of his '05 gear to test and review a couple months ago. First on the list of products is his new knee/shin guards, aptly named Landing Zone.
Over the past two and a half months I have been putting this leg armor to good use. My First impression of the armor when it arrived was, "these things are huge!" Based on feedback from users, Mark changed the pads' design from the familiar "leg sock" design (which I personally hate) to a wrap around design. Instead of just throwing a couple straps on some leg armor and making a wrap
around design, Mark widened the sides of the soft material of the armor so that it gives more coverage to the sides and back of your leg. There is a lot of material in these knee/shin guards so they seem large when you have them open.
Mark forewarned me that the Landing Gear guards take some time to break in. For the first week or two of use, they were a little cumbersome because of the knee not flexing very well. I was starting to become a little discouraged but once the guards got broken in the fit was great. The new wraparound design made up for the short break in period - these guards are not such a pain to remove and put on as previews "leg sock" designs. The coverage that the extra material offers is great so there is no sacrifice of leg protection for ease of use. The plastic armor on this year's knee and shin offers more coverage than previous years'.
Fit, comfort and ease of use are all important but we all know what the most important quality of a knee and shin guard is: does it move? Short answer - no, they stay right where you need them. This past weekend concluded my third straight weekend of shuttling. What made me write this review now is a wreck I had my second weekend of shuttling. A wet root caused me to bail from my bike, falling toward a 1.5 meter hole in a creek filled with cold water and rocks. Not wanting to fall into the hole, I leaped to the other side of the creek. My "landing zone" was a large granite rock on the other side of the creek and down about 0.5 meters from my bail point. My right knee and shin took the full force of an impact on a rock - the hit was so hard I wasn't sure if I'd been injured or not. Upon getting up, I was amazed to find that my leg felt fine other than sore! Then I looked down, completely expecting to see a shattered knee cup or split shin guard, but there was no damage! I can safely say these guards kept me from breaking my knee cap and tibia. Thank you Rockgardn! The Landing Zone knee shin guards from Rockgardn get a 10 for 10 rating!
MSRP on the Landing Zone is $50. You can buy them directly from Rockgardn
>here.
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Posted by Brady on September 24, 2006 05:57 PM
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