Well after smashing my collar bone into three parts and puncturing my lung as well. I thought it about time that I got some body armour to buggy with.

After searching the net, I went and tried on some Dainese gear. I also got some first hand reports about a six six one product. Well the dainese top was tight and close fitting, all good, but for this sport we need to be able to raise our arms above our shoulders. This was hard to do, and I got smacked in the side of the head with a shoulder pad. Even without wearing a helmet. Much the same responce with a mates six six one body armour, it rode up to.

So off I went looking for some thing to fit the bill. Stumbled accross these guys: http://www.forcefieldbodyarmour.co.uk/ They already had two kiters in their sponsored riders section, so I was very interested.

To cut a long story short, I got the latest new product from them. The Extreme Harness, Adventure model. A full torso, shoulder and arm protection system. Now this stuff is designed for motorcycles, so it is realy a bit of overkill, but then in an accident does that matter if it's stronger/tougher than you need?? The great thing about the Adventure, is it all comes apart. You can just wear the torso protector/vest, or the vest with the shoulder guards, or all of the parts all the way down your arm. Easily pulled apart, it's just velcroed together, and simply removed or adjusted for a perfect fit. I am not a huge guy (165cm and 65kgs) so it was going to be interesting if it fitted well. A Small was suggested. Gee this is realy good! The vest part fitted on nice and snug, and had plenty of velcro to adjust to get the best fit. Being soft, the armour was very flexible. No where as restrictive as the dainese gear. There was still some resistance when you put your hands above your head, but I doubt that there would be anything as good as this. It fits well considering it is not worn like a full on shirt, but just strapped to you. It's advised to wear some form of abrasion protection over the body armour, more for motorcyclists, but as it is flexible, the last thing you would want is to rip up the armour. So I tend to wear a shirt over the top. This also has the advantage of keeping the vest down, so it doesn't rise up when seated in the buggy.

Standing, the armour fits and moves well, but once seated (don't forget it is designed for motorcyling), and wearing a kite surfing harness, I have found it moves up a little bit. The Coxyx protector sits under my harness, and even held tight, I can arch my back. I don't think there is much body armour that can do that!

Overall I am very impressed. Considering there are no manufactures making kite buggy specific armour, this armour is very close to being the first to work for our sport. Only a few minor points pull it down from being perfect. I have ended up putting the left arm on the right. The reason for this is that once you have your arm in the armour, you can't see the tabs where you are suppost to put the elastic into! But once you swap sides (easy to do as it's just velcro!!) the tabs are now verticle and are easily visable so slotting the elastic in is now quick and painless. It has ridden up, but only a touch. With a kite surfing harness over the top, the front chest protector hits the top when sitting in the buggy, so I have found it comes up, but nothing that is too worrying. I now wear a shirt/jumper over the top of the armour, and then put the harness over the top. This stops the chest plate from rising too much. I would have liked it to be washable. With me finding all the dust, and any heavy sweaters it might become on the nose or dirty quickly.

Performance 4/5: It fits well, is flexible, provides protection????? That I can't say as I have not taken a fall with it!! And I am not eager to try, being six moths almost to the day I did the collar bone. But given the feel of the armour and me smacking myself with a steel cap boot square in the chest, it should work!

Build Quality 5/5: Very good! I have noticed a few threads that were not the best or have come free, but nothing else! It's all finished to a very high standard. Value for money 5/5: Well it is about the same price as much of the other offerings from the other manufactures, but as it has less restricted movement, and fits my intended role better than the others. It does very well there.

My only message to Forcefield is could they put a little plastic attachment point/loop at the bottom of the chest and supply another little bit of the elastic. It would mean you can pull the chest plate down, and it will anchor to the velcro on the waist belt. See last pic. Grabbed myself a mesh washing bag from Kathmandu. A great idea to store it in and it can breath, so it won't be on the nose if you sweat alot.

A thanks to Dom for modeling the armour :) Happy to answer any question anyone mght have.

Nigel.