Bar Mitts are an easily recognizable accessory on the bikes of many winter riders. Like other pogies (the general term for these products), Bar Mitts fit over the end of your bars and provide a nice little warm cave for your hands. They’re made of thick neoprene and use a simple zipper and Velcro tabs to attach. These have even fit fine on Nancy, which has both Ergon GS2 grips and the TwinLock lever.
Bar Mitts allow you to run thinner gloves which provide more dexterity. The only drawback is it’s slightly more challenging to use bar ends (if you run them). A little bit of wind does make it’s way through on the downhills so you still may want to bring a warmer layer if you’ve got a long screaming descent in the cold like we do here in Colorado.
If it’s under 45 the Bar Mitts are comfortable. If it’s under 35 they’re pretty much mandatory for me. For the cost I think they’re a great investment. What you wear underneath is going to vary based on how warm you run, but I’ve used them down to 7 degrees now and used softshell gloves that normally don’t work below 30.
At $40-65, Bar Mitts are a very affordable option for fairly low temperatures. When the temperature drops down into single digits, I have found my Dogwood Designs pogies to be worth every penny of the $155 they cost.
Yep. Lots of options out there for varying prices and conditions. I actually got these Bar Mitts from a teammate who wanted something more robust for Arrowhead. We run at different temps though and these were fine for me with relatively thin gloves at 8 deg, while sh wanted more for 30 degrees.