Motorcycle leathers come in the 1 piece or 2 piece suits or jacket and trousers designed to protect motorcyclists for the strawberry road-rash encountered in a slide down the road. The motorcycle leathers are not fashion statements. The leather is of the protective variety and only moderately flexible.

Affordable motorcycle leather comes from beef cattle. It is somewhat attractive and flexible. It provides adequate protection for road abrasion and is cut, tear and burst resistant.

Newer motorcycle leather on the scene is kangaroo leather. It is very popular because it is very light weight and supple as compared to cow leather. The one piece leather suit is sometimes called “racing leathers”.

Today we have in production two styles of motorcycle leathers. The first is the tight fitting one or two piece motorcycle racing suits. They are sometimes made very colorful. And a type with metal studs and tassels that are mostly black. They are somewhat looser fitting jackets and trousers.

Sometime around the early 60s bikers adapted the cowboy leather chaps for added protection from the road rash.

The modern leather protection also comes with crash protection also. The leather has built in extra armor for the possible impact regions. These include the back, elbows, hips, knees and shoulders. The armor comes in many forms from shock absorbing foam backed hard polymers and carbon fibers. You can also find motorcycle jackets with built in airbags designed to protect the lower back neck and torso of a biker.

Modern motorcycle racing suits provide additional protection for elbows knees and shoulders. The material used can be the more pricey titanium or the less costly high-density plastic. This type of suit provides protection from bouncing and the rotations that occur in a fall.