Consumer Editor of Bennetts BikeSocial, John's owned over 20 bikes, has been testing motorcycle kit for more than 25 years and is a member of the International Association of Auto Theft Investigators, and part of the Motorcycle Crime Reduction Group.
When you’re buying motorcycle clothing there’s a good chance the protective performance is part of your decision-making process. After all, if it’s not, why are you spending your cash on bike kit at all? Why not just wear ‘normal’ clothes, and maybe buy a hiking jacket if you want to stay dry?
We’re not saying that you should ONLY look at the safest kit, but many people are interested in what protection their gear can offer. With four different standards and multiple levels between each one, it can be hard to understand, so thanks to the Bennetts High Performance award, it’s now much easier to choose the motorcycle kit that best suits YOUR needs…
If you’re a manufacturer or importer/distributor looking to submit products for an award, please click here to skip to the relevant section.
Bennetts High Performance Award products
The Bennetts High Performance Award (HPA) celebrates the products that have been proven – through independent and legally-required testing – to meet the highest levels of safety. Note that ONLY products that have been correctly submitted to the Bennetts High Performance Award will be listed. If you’re checking the status of an item that claims to have achieved the award but that’s not listed below, please contact us at hpa@bennetts.co.uk
Below are all the items that have achieved the award, which uses not only the existing standards for gloves, boots, jackets, trousers, and one- and two-piece leathers but also provides its own certification standard for manufacturers and distributors who want to PROVE their garments offer higher levels of protection.
What does this mean? Put simply:
The Bennetts High Performance Gold award uses the existing certification methods – agreed upon by all manufacturers selling into the UK and Europe – to recognise the gloves, boots and garments that have achieved the highest levels under those standards. This is your guide to what can offer the provably highest levels of protection as determined by these legally-required certifications.
The Bennetts High Performance Platinum and Diamond awards provide a detailed set of criteria covering abrasion resistance, tear/burst strength, armour location, size and performance that can PROVE that jackets, trousers, one- and two-piece leathers have levels of protection that exceed EN 17092 AAA. If someone is claiming high levels of protection (like jeans with supposedly long ‘slide times’), they can PROVE IT easily with this highly detailed criteria at a minimal cost.
Independent testing companies that are ready to certify to this standard are listed in the ‘How to apply’ section. It’s based on the old EN13595 Level 1 and Level 2 and uses the data gathered from testing to the legally-required EN17092 standard, combined with additional abrasion testing and an inspection of the garment to ensure the armour meets the requirements.
The Bennetts High Performance Awards help YOU to choose safer riding kit and not be misled by misinformation…
Why safety isn’t the only thing to look for in motorcycle clothing
If you’re buying motorcycle clothing, by its very definition you’re buying protective kit, so you should of course consider how protective it could be when you purchase. But that’s not the whole picture.
Products featured in this database have been proven to have passed some of the highest test standards for safety, but that’s no indicator of how comfortable they are, or – for instance – how waterproof they might be.
Comfort is entirely subjective, so ignore anyone who tries to tell you that one product is better than the other because it’s thinner or lighter; you need to try gear on for yourself as it all comes down to the quality of the design and the materials used.
However, it is true to say that comfort is extremely important – it’s no good having the toughest, safest riding kit if you’re uncomfortable; at best you’ll enjoy riding less, at worst your movement could be restricted, which could be dangerous. Try the kit on for yourself, and choose it armed with the knowledge of what safety levels it’s been tested and certified to.
Remember that in garments (ie jackets, trousers and one-piece leathers), EN17092 certifies the abrasion resistance, burst and tear strength. It specifies the position and (to a small extent) size of the armour, but you need to check that the armour itself covers your limbs and that it won’t move away in a crash. Look for Level 2 armour for the best impact protection.
When buying, you can decide if something fits you well, if the armour offers good coverage and sits – and stays – in the right place, if the features are what you want, and if you can afford it. What you can’t be sure of in store is how abrasion resistant the material is, or how strong the seams are.
All motorcycle clothing must legally carry CE certification labels like these. The Bennetts High Performance Award makes it easier to find the very best
How to find the safest clothing to wear on a motorcycle
All motorcycle riding gear sold in the UK and Europe has to be tested and certified as Personal Protective Equipment (PPE). You can find out about the labels that should (by law) be in anything you buy right here in our guide to the safest motorcycle clothing, but as a brief summary…
Gloves are tested to EN 13594, with Level 1 and Level 2. Level 2 is the highest performance level specified by the standard.
Boots are tested to EN 13634, with Level 1 and Level 2 for four categories: Boot height, impact abrasion resistance, impact cut resistance and transverse rigidity. Level 2 in each category is the highest.
Jackets, trousers and one- and two-piece leathers are tested to EN 17092, with the main levels to be aware of being A to AAA. The more A’s, the more stringent the test requirements. There’s also EN 13595 with Level 1 and Level 2 (2 is again the highest), but despite this being a much tougher test than 17092, it’s been withdrawn, so existing certificates will expire over the next few years.
Finally, armour is tested to EN 1621, with Level 1 and Level 2. Level 2 is again the highest performance level.
Remember that in garments (ie jackets, trousers and one-piece leathers), EN17092 certifies the abrasion resistance, burst and tear strength. It specifies the position and (to a small extent) size of the armour, but you need to check that the armour itself covers your limbs and that it won’t move away in a crash. Look for Level 2 armour for the best impact protection.
Motorcycle clothing that has achieved a Bennetts High Performance Gold Award deserves to be celebrated, which is why any brand that submits details of its products to us correctly (including copies of the test certificates for verification), will be given full and free access to the award logos, as well as being included on the database.
The Platinum and Diamond awards are also available for brands that wish to prove their garments can go even further in their protective performance.
What YOU choose will depend on your budget, the features you want and the fit, but all of these are things you can decide for yourself in store.
The Bennetts High Performance Award simply makes it easier to make that choice of protective performance.
When buying any motorcycle riding kit, it’s important that it fits well, it’s comfortable, and that it does what you need it to (which is why you should always check out the Bennetts BikeSocial reviews). But if it does all that, and you can afford it, why not buy for the worst case scenario and get the best protection you can?
All products submitted to the award scheme have their test certification, which is supplied by an independent notified body, verified by the HPA team before being included on the database.
The Bennetts High Performance Gold Award applies to the following products:
Gloves certified to EN 13594 Level 2
Boots certified to EN 13634 Level 2 in all categories EXCEPT height
Jackets, trousers and one- and two-piece leathers certified to EN 17092 AAA
The Bennetts High Performance Platinum Award represents products that are exceeding the requirements of EN 17092, and applies to the following:
Jackets, trousers and one- and two-piece leathers certified to EN 13595 Level 1 OR
Jackets, trousers and one- and two-piece leathers certified to EN 17092-2:2020 AAA that have also undergone additional testing to meet the requirements of the Platinum level of the Bennetts High Performance Award, which includes enhanced abrasion resistance with increased areas of coverage compared with EN 17092-2:2020 AAA, and Level 2 armour throughout.
The Platinum Plus award is for garments that meet the above requirements but that also have suitably-sized Level 2 chest armour and/or a correctly certified airbag.
The Bennetts High Performance Diamond Award represent products of the very highest safety and applies to the following:
Jackets, trousers and one- and two-piece leathers certified to EN 13595 Level 2 OR
Jackets, trousers and one- and two-piece leathers certified to EN 17092-2:2020 AAA that have also undergone additional testing to meet the requirements of the Diamond level of the Bennetts High Performance Award, which includes the most enhanced abrasion resistance across increased areas of coverage compared with EN EN 17092-2:2020 AAA, and Level 2 armour throughout.
The Diamond Plus award is for garments that meet the above requirements but that also have suitably-sized Level 2 chest armour and/or a correctly certified airbag.
The enhanced Zone 1 areas mean Platinum and Diamond awarded products are required to have larger key impact areas than the minimum needed to pass EN17092, for additional protection
Test requirements of Bennetts HPA Platinum & Diamond
In order to be awarded the Bennetts High Performance Platinum or Diamond Awards, products must have been tested and certified to EN 13595 Level 1 or Level 2 respectively, OR have been tested and certified to EN 17092 Level AAA AND have undergone further testing at a notified body to certify that they’ve achieved the following in accordance with the Bennetts High Performance Award Qualification Criteria document:
Bennetts HPA Platinum Award
Abrasion resistance in extended high-risk zone 1 of 4.0 seconds using a calibrated Cambridge machine
Abrasion resistance in zone 2 of 1.8 seconds using a calibrated Cambridge machine
Abrasion resistance in zone 3 of 0.8 seconds using a calibrated Cambridge machine
Additional and enhanced tear/burst strength testing
Additional and enhanced seam and fastener strength testing
EN 1621 Level 2 armour fitted throughout. For Platinum Plus, this must also include at the chest or an airbag
Bennetts HPA Diamond Award
Abrasion resistance in extended high-risk zone 1 of 7.0 seconds using a calibrated Cambridge machine
Abrasion resistance in zone 2 of 2.5 seconds using a calibrated Cambridge machine
Abrasion resistance in zone 3 of 1.5 seconds using a calibrated Cambridge machine
Additional and further enhanced tear/burst strength testing
Additional and further enhanced seam and fastener strength testing
EN 1621 Level 2 armour fitted throughout. For Diamond Plus, this must also include at the chest or an airbag
The data required for tear/burst strength testing and seam/fastener testing will often already have been gathered during certification to meet EN17092, so the additional costs to a manufacturer to achieve a Bennetts High Performance Award come down to the abrasion testing and general admin of certification.
How to apply for the Bennetts High Performance Award
The Bennetts High Performance award is a not-for-profit programme that helps motorcyclists choose the protection levels they want of the protective kit they’re buying. Besides the cost of additional certification that may be required to reach the Platinum and Diamond levels – which is paid direct to your notified body of choice – there are no fees at all.
The Gold awards simply require proof of conformity to AAA under EN17092, Level 2KP under EN13594, or Level 1 2 2 2 or 2 2 2 2 under EN 13634. To apply, simply request the submission document by emailing hpa@bennetts.co.uk.
The Platinum and Diamond awards are available for garments that can be proven to exceed the requirements of EN17092 Level AAA, and will require additional testing at an independent notified body. Companies that are ready to certify to Platinum and Diamond include:
Bennetts BikeSocial would like to separately review the products featured here, though this is not a requirement of the award and is in no way linked to any certification requirements or protective performance.
The Award cannot be used or mentioned in any way by any brand UNTIL it has been accepted by Bennetts Motorcycling Services Ltd. To do this, please download the Award Qualification Criteria document, then contact us athpa@bennetts.co.uk to request a submission document, including your company name, company registration number, and the company’s registered office / principal place of business. Only an authorised representative of the manufacturer or importer/distributor can submit an application, and please also include your full name and mobile number.
The Bennetts High Performance Award can only be used after successful submission of the documents required. Any items found to be incorrectly or fraudulently using the logo will be listed below. To report an abuse of the award, please email hpa@bennetts.co.uk, and will be reported to Trading Standards under existing legislation including the PPE regulation and Trade Descriptions Act.
The Bennetts High Performance Award has been launched to help riders choose the kit that suits their needs. Here are answers to some of the most common queries around it…
In the UK, you’re only legally required to wear a correctly tested and certified helmet; beyond that it’s entirely your choice. The Bennetts High Performance Award simply helps you to choose the protective kit that offers the protection you want.
Motorcycle insurance companies like Bennetts do not rate for risk against what you wear, as long as you comply with UK law regarding motorcycle helmets. What you wear will NOT affect your motorcycle insurance policy or its price.
Your motorcycle insurance policy covers your bike, not you, and there’s no precedent that I’m aware of for the protection level – or lack thereof – of the motorcycle clothing that a rider was wearing in an accident caused by a third party affecting the value of their compensation, outside of helmets.
The most likely circumstance where contributory negligence might attempt to be applied (and it’d be by a third-party’s insurer, not the provider of your motorcycle policy) were if a rider suffered abrasion injuries while wearing shorts and a tee-shirt, for instance. In that case, the insurer of the third party that caused your accident might look to reduce how much they paid in compensation as the injuries might be attributable to a ‘failure to be careful’.
But… as it’s not law to wear protective kit, it’s far less likely than a driver being injured while not wearing a seatbelt having a claim reduced, which is where contributory negligence was first applied, in the case of Froom and others vs Butcher, 1975.
Since the introduction of ECE 22.06, the testing of motorcycle helmets has got a lot tougher, and it’ll apply to all that are made from July 2023. However, we will always keep in consideration any way of highlighting any products that go above and beyond.
For any product to receive a Bennetts High Performance Award, it must first be submitted to us using the required document below. This allows us to check that it has indeed been through the relevant testing and has been proven to offer you the level of protection it claims.
The safest riding kit doesn’t have to be more expensive – it comes down to the quality of the product’s design and the materials used. We’ve seen boots that cost £49.99 that could feasibly achieve the Bennetts High Performance Award.
Bennetts takes no fees whatsoever for the use of the HPA award. Where products have received the Gold award, it’s simply celebrating those items that have already met the highest existing standards that all manufacturers are legally obliged to comply with in the UK and Europe. For Platinum and Diamond, they might already have certification to EN13595, or they will need to carry out a small amount of testing in addition to their existing EN17092 AAA certification, as well as meeting other criteria, like the inclusion of appropriately sized Level 2 armour. The qualification criteria have, however, been carefully designed to keep costs to an absolute minimum.
Garments that have already been certified to EN 13595 can be submitted for the High Performance Award, despite the standard having been withdrawn in September 2022. However, once those certificates expire, these products could no longer be sold into the UK or Europe.
In future, all garments will have undergone testing to meet EN 17092 anyway, so the additional cost of using the full suite of the old EN 13595 tests would be much higher than necessary.
The Bennetts High Performance Platinum and Diamond awards use the existing seam and tear strength tests from EN 17092, but with higher performance requirements and with additional testing required only for the specified relative abrasion resistance.
The Darmstadt machine used to test motorcycle clothing’s abrasion resistance utilises a concrete slab that’s designed to be a good analogue of asphalt roads, however this doesn’t necessarily represent the routes that UK riders typically spend most of their time on.
A submission of 92 Freedom of Information requests by Bennetts to every local council in England, Scotland and Wales, as well as Transport for London, Transport Scotland and the Welsh government has indicated that that at least 43% of all Great Britain’s roads are surface dressed.*
This figure excludes the motorways and major A-roads that account for 2-3% of England’s road network and are managed by National Highways, and it also looks at both rural and urban roads.
43% is an average figure that includes areas that are predominantly urban. Councils like Cumbria, for instance, reported 73% surface dressing across its 4,712 miles of roads.
Further information supplied by some councils indicates that surface dressing is far more prevalent on rural roads than urban, and as the majority of UK motorcycle leisure riders prefer rural back-roads over urban routes and motorways, the chances of them riding on the more abrasive surface dressed roads is likely to be significantly higher than 43%.**
It should also be noted that all abrasion testing is only intended to give a relative comparison of products. Slide times and test ‘speeds’ are irrelevant due not only to the chaotic nature of a crash, but also the fact that the initial impact can see the road surface pull and tear at a product, leading to it suffering far more damage in the first few split-seconds of a crash.
* Data was received for 168,530.63 miles of roads in England, Scotland and Wales. Of these, 97,114.49 miles of roads included information around the amount of surface dressing. Of these, 41,610 were surface dressed. Transport for London’s city roads are included in this, representing 9,190 miles of roads that are not surface dressed.
** Suffolk County Council reported that only 53% of its 4,094 miles of roads are rural, but that 75% of those are surface dressed.
Argyll and Bute Council reported that its 1,420 miles of roads are 81% rural and 19% urban. Furthermore, all of its rural network will have been subject to at least one surface dressing treatment, with the majority treated several times. Urban routes are reported to be less suited to surface dressing, so surface dressing accounts for only around a sixth of them.
MotoCAP is an outstanding resource that thoroughly tests motorcycle riding kit, however it only focusses on gear that’s sold in Australia. Also, as the team buys all the kit it tests, brands are not able to submit products for testing themselves.
We thoroughly recommend using the MotoCAP website to get another perspective into the protective performance of motorcycle riding kit.
No product can guarantee to keep you safe – it can only offer the best protection possible based on laboratory testing.
All products featured in the Bennetts High Performance Award database have already undergone testing to meet the requirements of UK and European law – the award simply celebrates those that have met the highest standards.
The testing required for the Platinum and Diamond awards is in addition to EN 17092, and is intended to allow manufacturers to indicate how much protection above and beyond AAA that their garments could offer.
Every real-world crash is entirely unpredictable, and it’s your responsibility to ensure you wear kit that fits you well, is comfortable and unrestrictive, and that you always ride appropriately. Wearing the most protective riding gear reduces the chances of you suffering an injury.
Terms of Use of the Bennetts High Performance Award Database
Please note the following terms on which you may access and use the Bennetts High Performance Award (“HPA”) Database (the “Database”).
1. All products featured in the Database (“Database Products”) have undergone independent testing to meet the requirements of UK law, which gives an indication of the level of protection offered. The HPA Gold Award simply certifies that Database Products listed as accredited to the Gold Award have met these UK standards.
2. The testing required for the HPA Platinum and Diamond Awards is in addition to EN 17092, and is intended to allow manufacturers, importers and/or distributors of Database Products to indicate how much protection above and beyond AAA that their Database Products could offer.
3. Every real-world crash is entirely unpredictable. It is your responsibility to ensure that you wear kit that fits you well, is comfortable and unrestrictive, and that you always ride appropriately.
4. The Database simply reports on the level of safety that the applicable Database Products have attained according to the manufacturers, importers and/or distributors of Database Products, as verified by an independent third party testing facility. You should undertake your own due diligence prior to purchasing any of the Database Products.
5. No item of motorcycle clothing can claim to offer a guarantee of safety.
6. BENNETTS DOES NOT UNDERTAKE ANY TESTING ITSELF. The Database simply aggregates the results of independent safety testing carried out on behalf of the manufacturers, importers and/or distributors of the applicable Database Products.
7. BENNETTS GIVES NO GUARANTEE THAT THE DATABASE PRODUCTS LISTED HAVE THE SECURITY FEATURES STATED.
8. YOU RELY ON THE INFORMATION IN THIS DATABASE AT YOUR OWN RISK.
9. BENNETTS HEREBY EXCLUDES TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW ALL AND ANY LIABILITY TO YOU AND ALL OTHER PERSONS IN RESPECT OF THE TESTING, MANUFACTURE, SALE, SUPPLY, DISTRIBUTION AND USE OF DATABASE PRODUCTS.
10. BENNETTS SHALL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY DEATH, PERSONAL INJURY AND/OR LOSS SUFFERED DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY BY ANY PERSON IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OF ANY DATABASE PRODUCTS REGARDLESS OF WHETHER SUCH ITEMS ARE, OR HAVE BEEN, ACCREDITED WITH AN AWARD AND/OR ARE, OR HAVE BEEN, LISTED IN ITS DATABASE.
11. Bennetts shall use its reasonable endeavours to update the Database on a monthly basis and to keep the Database accurate and up-to-date but shall not be liable for any failure to do so.
12. Bennetts shall not be liable for any claims, losses and/or liabilities arising from any delay to add a product to the Database following its successful submission for an Award, and/or any errors, omissions and/or inaccuracies in respect of the content of the Database.
