Bollé might not been the first name that spring to mind when you think cycling ‘performance eyewear’. But the French brand make eyewear for a whole host sports including cycling, with these glasses – the 6th sense – being the shades of choice for WorldTour teams Ag2r La Mondiale and Orica-GreenEDGE.

Rewind 20 years, though, and Bollé may well have been the first name that popped into your head if you were asked about cycling sunglasses. Miguel Indurain, Alex Zülle, Laurant Jalabert and Pedro Delgado among others all donned Bollé shades and for a time they were the name to have. Lately, in a top-end market increasingly sewn up by Oakley, it’s been somewhat of a struggle for other brands vying for a slice of the pie, but if more companies bring out products with the quality of Bollé’s 6th Sense, it’ll be very competitive, very soon.

First up is definitely one of the more outlandish claims I’ve heard from a set of eyewear: aero gains. Yep, the add-ons that come with the glasses and clip onto the sides claim to improve aerodynamics – although Bollé don’t say by how much. Now I love a marginal gain as much as the next guy, but the idea that you can achieve an aero gain with fairings on sunglasses at anything other than the pro level really is pushing it. And presumably, if you have a rather un-aerodynamic face, or a lantern jaw like, say, George Hincapie, that could cancel those gains out…

Putting those claim aside, though, and the glasses really are very good. The arms, nose bridge and top piece all detach and you can take them all off one at a time. Better than that is the flexibility of the lenses. They’re extremely supple which makes them pleasingly durable, not a huge bonus on the bike necessarily, but if you stand or sit on them chances are you’re not going to break them – pretty handy seeing as the glasses cost £150 a go. On the subject of lenses, the glasses only come with a single set, but you can buy extras separately if you’re keen to expand the range. Size-wise, the lenses are very good. A pet hate of mine is glasses that don’t cover your field of vision properly as I find it distracting to have two-tone gaps in your eyeline, but these are large enough that it’s not a problem. Clarity is excellent as well, and the anti-fog treatment works like a charm – I haven’t had any fogging issues on these at all riding in various temperatures at varying intensity. They haven’t even fogged up when I’ve stopped at the traffic lights after riding hard, which is a real positive.