NRS Toaster Mitts
Love my NRS Toaster Mitts - good heat retention with good paddle grip, a rare combination. In winters past I’ve used pogies and neoprene gloves, with and without liners, and Toaster Mitts are the best so far. Down side is the loss of some dexterity fiddling with spray skirt, GPS, stopwatch, etc. Haven’t used all the solutions above, many of them sound good too.
Safety note - make sure you can find your spray skirt grab loop with whatever gloves you wear in case you have to wet exit. Sometimes you can’t feel the loop through the gloves. I attach a plastic golf ball to the loop so it’s easy to find with gloves on.
Pogies and Mitts
I haven’t found any gloves I like - so far, it’s been pogies for me. But I’m ready to try the Toaster Mitts to use with my greenland paddle. They seem like the only viable option to pogies for me. Whenever my fingers are isolated in gloves they get cold, no matter how dry . . .
Paula
Why is this so hard to make work?
Jack this is a tough one!
The physics of gloves has to do with the ratio of surfaced area to volume, and this if the cold challenge is low air temps, cold water, and wind, unless you do a bunch of push ups, jump in your boat, eat and drink, and keep hands out of water and wind, the conduction and wind chill off of gloves overwhelms the ability of ALL gloves at some point. In fact gloves reach a point of diminishing return even as one makes each finger more insulated the increase in surface area wipes it out.
I find Sing’s comments most relevant to my and many others experiences. Some of us are better heat producers and paddle is less severe conditions These are the fortunate folks who can use the gloves here, I envy you all!
For many, myself inculuded the best compromise are the Nordic Blues with a very thin liner. I found one that is superb but there are many others. The reason I like NB is that one can INDEED burp them and with a really thin liner and sized correctly, they actually have a really decent feel!!! When the hands get cold, put in some air and they are imo the warmest glove set up out there! This comes in part because they have a shape that when fingers are together acts somehwat as a mitten.
I am still looking for a three finger semi-mitt like the Nordic Blues or even a dry mitt. Anyone out there find one.
Evan
Sure,
After I asked the question, my wife just today dug out our three fingered cycling gloves by Pearl Izumi. They call them lobster gloves, and they are wind proof and waterproof
They are in the Performance Bike catalog for $50.
I feel like an idiot for asking here on the forum when I should have started with the boss at home.
I didn’t need gloves today, so I didn’t try them, but I will probably be trying them next week
Cheers, and
Merry Christmas,
JackL