The best bar tape...EVER
Introducing Silca Nastro Piloti
When it comes to dressing up your bike and transforming the look is simply by replacing your bar tape. With all the colours of the rainbow available, it’s often the only thing we see as important. Well, that all changes with Silca range of bartape.
As with anything Silca, the product is a premium one. Silca changed the way we look at bar tape and went back to the drawing board to see what can be improved, on a largely unchanged product over the past 10 years. How can bar tape be anything more than color or thickness you ask?
Silca partnered with Nike and have utilized the “secret” foam technologies that were developed for the Breaking 2hr record. The result, a bar tape that is lighter and thinner, but maintains the vibration dampening properties of the thickest bar tape out there. I’ve tested the tape on the roughest of roads, which are usually enough to rattle the filling from my teeth. The result... quite frankly - unbelievable. Almost like my hands were floating above the bars.
Ever been caught in the rain and had to hold your bars in a death grip to avoid a catastrophic slip off? Silca have again amazed me. I ride without gloves usually, but when it rains this is a recipe for disaster. The Nastro bar tape is manufactured with two textures you can choose from when mounting. I wrapped bars with the grippiest side of the tape and recently was caught in heavy rain. Safe to say that I felt comfortable and secure with no hint of slipping...and it was raining hard! Amazing really...completely unexpected. Another thumbs up to Silca.
The next wow moment (which was actually my first) is before I even got on my bike. A simple, but extremely well thought idea that will be a welcome relief to anyone who has ever applied bar tape to a handlebar. A specifically manufactured, purpose built piece in a butterfly shape, that is designed to hide the unsightly clamp of your shift levers. Another wow moment. No more will we have to use an off-cut of bar tape to try hide the clamp. As an aside...it actually sticks with it’s full back adhesive, instead of the pinstripe backing found on the bartape off-cut.
Silca have thought through the design of this bartape and worked from the ground up to create a product that is absolutely perfect in every way. Well done Silca.
All three versions of Silca Nastro road bartape are available at Pushys; including Nastro Piloti (thin version), Nastro Fiore (thicker) and Nastro Cuscino (thickest).
By Ricky Swindale - Pushys sponsored athlete
