Gear

Six of the best… handlebar tape upgrades

It's a little luxury that can make a big difference to your ride, and it's important in the style stakes, too. Here are six of the best bar tapes around

Tortec Super Comfort (£20.00)

Like everything, there’s good handlebar tape and there’s bad handlebar tape.
A fresh wrap of handlebar tape can make a big difference to the feel of your ride
Zipp may be best known for their wheels, but their Service Course bar tape is lovely, too
You get plenty of tape in a roll of Super Sticky Kush, so there won't be a problem even if you like to wrap your bars almost all the way to the stem
You may have seen Prologo's tape on the handlebars of the Orica-GreenEDGE team in recent years
Widget's Grip Wrap tape does the job well and won't break the bank at £14.99
Tortec are better known for making bike racks but their tape is also top notch

Tortec Super Comfort (£20.00)

Tortec are better known for making bike racks (that’s racks to go on bikes as opposed to racks to rack bikes) but they’re recently expanded their range into other areas. One of these is bar tape.

With a 3mm-thick shock absorbing core, stretchable adhesive backing and a generous 2.1m per roll, it’s not only good to ride with, but it’s easy to install too. In fact, it stands up pretty well to being unwrapped and re-wrapped which is an all-too-rare quality in the bar tape world.

The finish is grippy and comfortable to be used without gloves, but if you do decide to wear gloves too you’ll find a wonderful amount of grip between them and the bars.

Tortec have four colours in the Super Comfort tape: red, white, black and green, so there should be something to match your bike. And if not, go black. It’s hard to go wrong with black.

UK distributor: Zyro