Last year at Le Tour I managed to grab of photo of Mark Cavendish prior to the race starting, and atop his hat was something new and shiny….

With style cues taken from both the Jawbones of modern times and Lemond-era Eyeshades they were clearly something a little special.

Today they were released to the masses. The Oakley Jawbreaker.

2 years in the making, 4 score and 20 design iterations, and countless hours of field testing – effectively the whole of the last 18 months of riding from Cav’ – and Oakley have come up with what Cavendish calls Armour for the eyes.

I’ve been a wearer of Oakley glasses since about ’92 when I stole and broke my big brother’s Frogskins (Black frame, purple Iridium lens), and whilst they don’t all work, this pair do look pretty awesome!

Designed specifically for cycling they offer an increased field of vision when riding in the drops (Oakley did some eye-tracking to see where riders where looking when riding).

https://youtu.be/Z2e-XiaDeT8

Oakley have kept their SwitchLock lens replacement system – incredibly simple to use once you know where to press – and have a bunch of lenses available for the Jawbreaker.

Featuring ventilated lenses to reduce fogging (massive pet hate!) and Oakley’s new Prizm technology – allowing the wearer to (and I quote) “spot subtle changes in the texture of the road surface”.

Oakley pretty much set the benchmark in optics, in my opinion, so any improvement in clarity will be a good thing!

Available now from £180….

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