Urge Bike Products reshapes their eco-friendly mountain bike helmet tech into an all-new and affordable Papingo road bike helmet. Using recycled plastics wherever it can, the new Papingo hits the road with the light weight, open ventilation, and subtle aero shaping cues we expect to see in helmets at three times this price.
Urge Papingo lightweight, affordable, vented road bike helmet
The French helmet company says after their XC/gravel-oriented TourAir a couple of years back, they couldn’t resist the allure of the road. That’s not hard to imagine.
Even with mountain biking in their blood and gravity legend Fabien Barel as one of their founders, being based on the French Côte d’Azur, you have to think that the winding coastal roads and climbs into the foothills of the snowcapped Alps would be calling.
Actually, just looking at the promo photos they shot of the new helmet makes me want to go for a road ride in France!
Papingo – Tech details
OK, after being distracted by beautiful landscapes while international travel is still out of reach of many of us, let’s talk details of the new Urge Papingo road helmet.
The helmet rides the line between ultralight, super-vented, and aero with an almost completely open front profile, a smooth top with a single scoop vent, then several exhaust vents in the chopped off tail.
Fifteen vents in all, with an internal support skeleton that allows for the open front without sacrificing safety.
Securing each of the two sizes (S/M 54-58cm & L/XL 58-61cm), Urge’s dial retention locks in fit.
The Papingo uses full-wrap in-mold EPS construction, but the outer ABS plastic shell itself is made from recycled EPS and the straps from recycled PET bottles – for an Urge eco-responsible rating of 6/7. All that, at a claimed weight of 285g (S/M) with CE crash test certification.
Urge Papingo – Pricing & availability
At just 79€, the Papingo looks like a lot of value and performance for not a lot of cash outlay. The new road bike helmet comes in four subdued matte colors – red, black, mocha white & yellow. It is available to order now direct from Urge Bike Products, with the first Papingos shipping to customers by the end of next week.
In fact, the first 25 buyers will also get a free Aínsa Zona Zero t-shirt celebrating the picturesque region just across the Spanish border in the Pyrenees, where rider Steven Le Hyaric was captured riding in the new Papingo for this photoshoot. Renown for amazing mountain biking, it’s also apparently home to killer asphalt & gravel roads, too. If you don’t catch one soon enough, for 35€ Urge will also sell you the tee separately.
