A cool name for a cool glove
A little over twelve years ago I got a new pair of gloves from a company I hadn’t heard of before. Planet Knox. The gloves were called ‘Handroids’ and, if I’m honest, I paid a lot more attention to their design rather than the protection that they offered. They did, and still do, look cool.
Rather unfortunately I then went on, a few months later, to highside a Fireblade when demonstrating my superior on track riding skills. At the time I was very much ‘on it’ and the ensuing mess was significant. I went over the front of the bike which then, having its suspension unloaded, proceeded to hit me in the head leaving me with a nasty concussion. My suits zip failed, I sprained an ankle and broke a rib. That last one was accompanied to the ball with a burst spleen.
What was very interesting, once all the blood stopped flowing, was that in spite of landing on my left hand, my scaphoid had survived. While my wrist was broken it was a clean break and took a little more than a month to heal.
The reason for this was that these cool looking gloves had two little pieces on the heel of the palms. They looked like little knee sliders and when I hit the deck they allowed my hand(s) to slide rather than suddenly stop with all of my speed and energy carrying weight. Indeed their crash performance was staggeringly good.
Interestingly, while my suit and helmet were trashed, I continued to wear the gloves until I replaced them at the end of the season.
Since then I haven’t used anything else. While I’ve seen plenty of other gloves and tried many of them on I’ve yet to see a pair that I’d think of as being on a par with these gloves. As far as I’m concerned, the Handroid from Knox are the very best gloves on the market.
It’s now 15 years since the company released the first generation of these gloves to the market. While some of the details and design have changed the basic design of the glove has remained the same and they’ve spawned a host of other models that feature the same standards of protection. Now Knox release a limited edition pair to celebrate a decade and a half of the Handriod.
Head of field research and seasoned motorcyclist, Aaron Travell, elaborates, “2025 marks 15 years of Knox’s Iconic Handroid glove. To celebrate, we have created a limited-edition model limited to 400 pairs worldwide. While maintaining the excellent structure of the Handroid MK5, our design team was given artistic license to incorporate new design features, finishes and parts. The new Limited-Edition model features a new classic black and white colourway, with a unique tonal white print on the white leather, next generation transparent BOA dial with white stainless steel lacing, flecked design on plastics and a unique numbered print on the main pull tab”.
The Handroid MK5 limited edition model is available in sizes from small to triple extra-large. See the company’s website for all the details.