Icon Field Compression Pants Review

Under layer armoured clothing offers the rider a clothing option that can either replace or enhance the protection levels of existing clothing.

Here we review Icon’s Field compression pants

Not all Pants are Pants

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Icon’s compression pants are an armoured under layer that sits within their field armour range, containing arm sleeves, knee sleeves and a fully armoured shirt. Each of these products is held together with a lightweight, meshed, moisture wicking fabric known as ‘Hydradry’.

Rather uniquely, these pants are a full length short which enables them to provide armour all the way down to, and including, the knees. Something fairly unique in this market segment.

See our guide on all things armour: Motorcycle Armour Guide 

Price

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At a little under £140 they’re not the cheapest lower body protection product on the market, especially if you’ve already shelled out on a top-notch pair of motorcycle jeans.

See our jeans guide: Best Kevlar Jeans

Safety

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The first thing to point out is that they’re not CE certified. Which is probably a pay-off in using thinner, albeit good quality D30 armour inserts, to ensure they remain lightweight and unobtrusive under trousers and jeans. 

We contacted Icon and they had this to say about certification.

We decided to go ahead and release the FA Comp products without the certification as we felt the products were too good not to make available now. We’re waiting on the final version of the new standard before submitting for CE testing.

Behind the Kevlar panels in the FA comp product is D3O’s sheet stock material that we die-cut. We use a combination of the materials as we know that this sheet stock reduces impact energies. Just like how we know that Kevlar is more abrasion resistant than your typical fashion denim. 

So, with all of that said – can we say that the comp product will pass CE? No. We won’t know until the standard is written. Can we say that it’s going to keep your skin on your body in a crash? No. We live in a litigious country that prevents us from saying so.

What we can say is we developed the line of products and use them. We’ve got friends that had crashed in development samples that shredded their jeans but kept their skin and bones. We won’t sign off on a product that we don’t believe in. We won’t put a product on our friends that we don’t believe in.

It’s great to see a company standing behind their products in this way but we would hope to see CE certification in the near future.

Armour

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Each price of armour is made from a D30 insert inside a sealed Dupont Kevlar pocket. This offers a wide range of cover over all of the main contact points.

There are 11 armour panels in total, each leg has a large knee pad, and smaller calf pad and two large pads cover the upper and lower hip area. Further pads cover the butt cheeks and the coccyx area.

Comfort

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These pants are light and airy and are easy to wear in the summer. The material certainly allows them to wick and as a result I’ve never felt uncomfortably hot in them.

Although you’re always aware you’re wearing them, they are unobtrusive and comfy. I’ve started to wear them ‘off-bike’, and regularly wear them in the office with no issues.

However, I wouldn’t recommend it at the height of summer, or you may get a visit from our friend Betty Swollocks.

Sizing

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Whether you are going to wear these over your underwear or go ‘commando’ the waist fitting is good. Plus, the leg and knee fit manage to get the balance between comfort and fit by keeping the armour firmly in its correct positions.

Long Term View

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I’ve lived with these compression pants for several months and apart from some minor bobbling on the stitching, they still look and feel great, and have maintained armour fit on each area.

Conclusion

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There is an elephant in the room with these pants, and it’s the question as to whether they can replace your regular riding jeans.

If you want an enhancement to wear under your current armoured riding jeans, these offer a good, if not expensive option.

However, if you’re looking for a replacement for kevlar riding jeans, and wear them under your fancy designer jeans, you need to be prepared to take a risk with non certified pants. It’s a conundrum, and feedback suggests many users purchased them purely for the latter.

There are cheaper CE approved shorts, but they don’t have Knee protection. And there are cheaper CE approved leggings. But they have thick armour making them less easy to wear under clothing. This suggests that whatever you buy, it may have to be a trade-off between comfort and safety credentials.