We all love shiny new things to adorn our bodies and bikes with, especially with the anticipation of a day on a hill with your mates doing what you love, but in today’s economic climate, can we still afford to spoil ourselves with new kit? There is no getting away from the fact that times are hard and while some manufacturers are delivering new designs to market that are three times the price of their predecessor, 100% have gone the other way and rolled out a goggle that is both attractive and affordable for the week-end warrior who knows what’s what…

Words: Olly Forster | Photos: Thomas Gaffney & Olly Forster

What can you say about 100% that hasn’t already been said before? Not even two years on the scene and they are everywhere they should be and have become a brand associated with two things: off roading on bikes and looking bad ass in the process. In this review we take a look at 100%’s latest addition, the affordable yet unmistakably to-the-point, Strata.

In the box: Goggle and bag. No tear offs, no fancy packaging and no extras which have no place away from the moto track. The more you look and the more you analyze the more you realise that these could well be a perfect goggle for what we do…

The first thing you notice is the soft and very pliable urethane frame, which really reminded me of how mid 90’s Oakley’s did – which is a good thing in my books! While MTB is on the whole bigger than MX, DH and gravity is not, so off-road optics manufacturers will always have a design bias to someone twisting a throttle and wrestling a couple of hundred CC’s for half an hour against someone (quote Danny Hart) “tickling” a sub 40lb bike down a hill flat out for three minutes, to then take ten minutes before you go again… When you break it down, we really do have differing needs!

Featuring a pretty standard lexan lens with anti-fog and scratch resistant properties, it is the Strata’s field of vision and soft fit against the face that makes them a welcome addition to my kit bag.

Nothing fancy in the foam department – dual layer and more than enough for a day sweating on the side of dirty rutted hill.

The tear-off system is a very simple double post mount on the lens and singular piece on the strap to allow you to layer them up for easy grabbing. This is another area where our needs vary from our gas guzzling cousins. Where you’d grab tear offs on the track (that’s the idea!) while actually riding, DH by its very nature is very different and not every track has a point where you can grab a tear off and the ability to do so is a skill in itself – remember

Generally for MTB, I try and run at least one tear-off in mixed conditions, just to protect the lens and if its muddy, I’ll slip no more than three on there and re-up at the van as and when. If you run laminated tear-offs you can go to town as vision is hardly impaired by increasing the amount of layers sitting on the lens.

The design utilised on the Strata is the same as the

Conclusion.

So, what are we looking at? A great set of goggles that are I think, amazing for mountain biking and at £25 a pop, make you wonder why you’d spend more as these not only look great, but are some of the comfiest I’ve ever tried. The boxy design of the frame is similar in shape to 100%’s other goggles and for good reason as they all share the same lens design, which I have to say is genius and a great way to appease the goggle enthusiast in all of us who likes to have a selection of lenses ready for what the week-end’s conditions bring! Not only that, but with helmet shapes becoming more angular, they make the more ‘organic looking’ goggles out there look dated and for all the wrong reasons. It’s also worth stating that while 100% is a new brand (sort of – read this) with new designs, there is a strong retro design cue that runs throughout their range and a good reason why they are quickly becoming the optics brand to be seen in.

With 10 colours/designs to choose from, there’s a Strata for you!

With a winter of pretty awful conditions behind me (almost – it was snowing when we did the shoot in March!) the Strata’s have held up well with only a few scuffs in the fabric on the strap and what is more awesome, is that these are a sub £30 goggle. If the economics of the Strata aren’t enough, their looks and feel should, which far out-weigh their value and I definitely recommend these as a worthy addition to anyone’s collection.

100% Goggles and accessories and exclusively distributed in the UK by Decade Europe and for everything 100% and beyond, hit the logo below. Happy trails, Olly.

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