For year-round riders in northern latitudes, cool to cold riding conditions are setting in. Reaching for heated gear and/or well-insulated gear is already happening. The problem is, most varieties of cold-weather gear do not come with any impact protection, nor do they offer the option to add it via prepared pockets in the garment’s interior.

So, if you extend your riding season into the chilly months, it can be challenging to wear gear that protects against both the cold and potential impact injuries. This applies to on- and off-road motorcycling, snow bike riding, and snowmobiling.

Or, you may have a favorite leather jacket that is a little roomy but doesn’t have provisions for impact protection.

Here to solve these problems is the Alpinestars Bionic Tech V3 Protection Jacket. The beauty of the product is that, by simply putting it on, you can cover all the bases for upper-body impact protection: back, chest, elbows, and shoulders. Also, the Bionic Tech jacket is designed to provide a precision fit to your body size and shape, and to allow easy, full range of motion in use.

If you follow the old multiple layers rule for winter warmth, you can go with a comfort baselayer under the Alpinestars protection jacket and your favorite cold-weather jacket over the top. This gives you the warmth of that insulated jacket, impact protection that the jacket didn’t provide, and a comfort layer underneath it all.

For example, I have a Castle Racing CR2 snowmobile jacket that is lightweight, insulated, and has bright, high-visibility fluorescent orange colors, and a cold-weather hi-vis fluorescent green/reflective jacket. However, it has neither impact protection nor an option to add it. The hi-vis and reflective materials are particularly good for late-season riding, when cloudy, low-light conditions are common, so it’s a favorite of mine.

Slipping on a good base layer, such as a ZeroFit sweater, under the Alpinestars Bionic Tech V3 jacket, and then topping it with one of those jackets, allows me to ride my motorcycle or hit the trail on my Chrysler Sno-Runner with warmth, optimized visibility, and impact protection.

While the Bionic Tech V3 jacket is primarily designed for off-road motorcycle riders, it is adaptable for other all-season applications. For pavement work, ideally, the outer jacket will provide abrasion resistance, wind protection, and warmth.

There’s a lot to the Alpinestars Bionic Tech V3 Protection Jacket, as it meets the high Level 2 impact protection standards every time. Its résumé includes Nucleon Flex Pro shoulder and elbow armor that meets EN 1621-1:2012 Level 2 benchmarks. The back armor is EN 1621-2:2014 Level 2-compliant and UKCA-certified, featuring Polyhedron Hybrid Technology. The non-divided chest armor is EN 1621-3:2018 Level 2-rated and uses UKCA-certified Polyhedron Hybrid Technology. Both chest and back armor are detachable for laundering the jacket.

With all these certifications, you may wonder if any of them are required. The European Union requires gear certification, and it is the source of the EN and CE standards we’re seeing more frequently. In the United States, it’s up to you whether you wear riding gear that offers CE-certified levels of protection against impact or abrasion.

The chest and back protectors have a fully ventilated, rigid central area, surrounded by flexible wings described as bio-foam padding. The chest protector attachment uses a quick-release magnetic buckle at the left shoulder. Adjustable V-belts with quick-release buckles at the lower corners also secure the ventilated rib protectors on each side. The chest protector allows for quick access to the central zipper.

The Alpinestars Bionic Tech V3 Protection Jacket arrived in what I initially thought was in good order. Still, as I went through the initial donning of the jacket to make fit adjustments, I found I couldn’t get past closing the main zipper.

I figured I must be doing something wrong, so I soon resorted to trying to find detailed instructions in one of the three red product manuals that came with the jacket. Unfortunately, all three relate only to the technical specifications of the CE-approved armor elements of the jacket.

So, I went to the Alpinestars website‘s listing of User Manuals to look up the user manual for the jacket itself, only to find that there isn’t one listed for the Bionic Tech V3 jacket. Upon closer inspection, I realized one of the key buckles was missing.

The red buckle that should have been attached to the lower left corner of the chest plate was missing. Without that buckle, it is impossible to close the jacket and go on to the next steps. I got in touch with Customer Support to let them know the buckle was missing and apparently had never been attached. They arranged for one to be sent along. In the process, I learned that this has occurred in the past and that, in the future, the buckle may be permanently attached to prevent this problem.

In a few days, the buckle arrived, and I attached it to the chest plate and began working through putting on the V3 and adjusting it for fit.

After donning the jacket, closing the front zipper, and the quick-release buckle at the left shoulder, it became apparent that the best way to use the red buckles is to remove them from the chest plate and snap them into the holes in the rib protectors first and then pull them to snap onto the studs on the chest plate. That allows the chest plate buckles to slide and click into place as they are designed to.

Starting out with the buckles mounted on the chest plate studs and trying to get the other stud into the holes on the rib protectors while wearing the jacket can be difficult. Adjusting for size is done by moving the stud on the end of the strap to other holes on the rib protector.

When you get that far and have the rib protector straps adjusted for size, then move up to the elastic strap attached to the magnetic quick-release buckle at the upper left side of the chest protector. That’s easy since it has a Velcro tab at the end of the strap. The elbow protectors are similarly adjustable; in my case, they fit as delivered.

Finally, I pull the wide elastic kidney belt strap with a hook-and-loop closure to snug it up.

The Spandex/mesh inner jacket lets the Bionic Tech jacket fit like a second skin while maintaining full range of motion. The adjustments all around make it possible to ensure the impact protectors fit comfortably and will stay in place should the time come when they are needed.

Wearing the Bionic Tech V3 over a compression-fit long-sleeve base layer and under well-insulated, wind-stopping, high-visibility riding gear makes for cool-to-cold weather riding that is warm, comfortable, and much better protected than using non-armored cold-weather riding gear alone.

Once properly fitted, the Bionic Tech is comfortable to wear; it’s easy to forget you’re wearing it, even after hours of continuous riding. The size guide on the Alpinestars website works based on your regular jacket size. However, the protection jacket is so flexible thanks to its stretchy spandex base material and fit adjustability, so it’s probably possible to vary a size either way from your usual size and get a good fit. I went with a medium and found the fit to be excellent, with only minor adjustments needed.

At only 3.2 pounds, the Bionic Tech V3 does not weigh you down. With all the armor elements fully ventilated and the base material including plenty of mesh areas, when hot weather arrives, it won’t overheat the wearer, particularly when worn with a mesh jacket.

If you’re an all-season rider looking to have optimal upper body impact protection that allows more choices in riding gear, the Alpinestars Bionic Tech V3 Protection Jacket is a piece of gear to consider.

Alpinestars Bionic Tech V3 Protection Jacket Fast Facts

• Sizes: Small – 2XL
• Weight: 3.2 pounds
• Chassis: Stretch mesh
• Certifications: CE Level 2 back, chest, elbows, and shoulders
• Color: Black/White/Red

Alpinestars Bionic Tech V3 Protection Jacket Price: $350 MSRP