Review: Rapha's Trail Pants & Knee Pads Are Impossibly Comfy

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Trail Pants Details

Up at the waistband is where you'll find two adjustable straps, each with a locking cam to hold them in place once adjusted to fit properly. While some brands use a big plastic ratcheting strap or straps to get the job done, I prefer these barely-there plastic cams and they never once loosened their grip. There are also belt loops for some strange reason - does anyone out there wear a belt while riding? - and the metal waist snap locks closed no matter how much eggnog and Christmas cookies you've managed to consume over the holidays.




If you need pockets but don't want to dig out your cargo pants (we don't want you to either), you'll like what Rapha has done with these Trail trousers. There are two normal, unzippered pockets at each side so you have somewhere to put your hands while standing around at the trailhead like a goober, but it's also worth mentioning that they're deep enough to actually be useful, unlike some other options out there. There are also two zippered cargo pockets on the side of each thigh, both with an internal sleeve to keep your phone from flopping around, and that's where you'll want to keep anything important during a ride.

Down at the bottom of the legs is where you'll find non-adjustable cuffs - some other brands use Velcro enclosures or zippers down here to rein in any loose fabric - but they are both reinforced and elastic for durability. And speaking of that, Rapha has also added some reinforcement at the knees and the cut is articulated to keep the cuffs from being pulled up while you pedal or bend over on the trail.




And because it's almost always better to fix something rather than replace it, Rapha also offers an interesting repair program where they'll fix your pants (or other Rapha gear) that you've damaged: "Rapha offers free repair service for the lifetime of the product with valid proof of purchase. This service also applies to garments outside the 90-day return policy."




Knee Pad Details

On a scale from 'These would be ideal for a vert ramp' to 'Am I even wearing them?' Rapha's new knee pads are definitely aimed more towards that latter. To that end, you'll find that they sport a very slim shape that doesn't protrude out from the knee as much as pads that use some sort of hard-shell protection. They're slim enough to fit under even the tightest of white slopestyle jeans, although they don't offer the kind of protection that anyone who knows they'll be hitting the ground multiple times a ride would want; rather, these are for trail riders who want protection but also want to pedal for hours while wearing them.




Rapha has used a density-changing material that stays somewhat soft-ish until it's struck, at which point it nearly instantly hardens up to offer more protection. There isn't a ton of coverage - it doesn't wrap around the sides of your knees and only extends a few inches below them - but these weren't intended to be a full-coverage option. The outer material is made of the impressive-sounding SuperFabric, and Rapha says that it's an "Incredibly durable ceramic polymer that reduces friction and adds tear resistance so riders won’t get hung up on any obstacles."

These are also pull-over pads with a closed back, and stretchy cuffs with silicone gripper strips are used instead of adjustable hook-and-loop straps.




Fit and Performance

My 5' 10" frame is mostly legs and that means that pants can sometimes feel a bit short on me, but that's not the case with these. They're long enough to not get pulled up above my ankles while pedaling, and while I thought I needed an adjustable cuff to deal with baggy fabric, it's not an issue because there's not much extra material to begin with. As a relatively slim guy, the POC and Race Face pants I also have in my drawer can feel a bit baggy in comparison to the Rapha trousers, and for that reason, I almost always reach for the Rapha pants first. Another factor in me preferring them is how quiet they are; who remembers the Seinfeld episode with the swooshing pants? That's a real thing with some riding pants out there, but not these.




Much like on their Trail shorts, the pockets on their pants are at just the right size and angle to slip a phone or multi-tool into and have it basically disappear. The internal sleeve does a good job of holding either from flopping around while you spin circles, and there's enough room to add in some snacks or other stuff that you might need. Another often-missed detail is how easy (or hard) it can be to open and close the zippers while you're on the move, but it's easy to do with the large pull tabs on the Trail pants which means you won't need to stop to pull out more gummy bears.

Up at the waistband, the two adjustable straps and plastic cams never once loosened and were much more inconspicuous than the large plastic ratchets that some pants use. I had both snugged down during our fall Field Test when there was a bit less of me, and I've let them out a bit more recently as the winter donuts have added up.




I honestly hate knee pads because I like to pedal and, well, every type of pad that I've ever worn has felt okay for up to an hour or so, at which point they start leaving raw spots behind my knees, slide down every few minutes, or feel so uncomfortable that I'd almost prefer yet more stitches over my knee cap rather than keep wearing them.

This is why I was surprised to not be annoyed by Rapha's knee protection. They do a great job of articulating freely while your legs are going around in circles, and there was next to no bunching of material or weirdness from the padding, even taking into account the closed-back design. In fact, I'd say that these are easily the most comfortable knee pads I've ever worn, so much so that I actually end up using them on a somewhat regular basis. That's half the battle when it comes to knee pads; you need to want to wear them or what's the point?




As far as protection goes, they're intended to be a somewhat slim, pedal-friendly option, so while there's more than enough padding for anything I get up to, I can see more aggressive riders wanting more coverage, especially at the sides of the knee.

Do they manage to say put? Well, no, but if we're being honest about it, I've never worn a set of pads that manage to stay where they belong for over an hour of pedaling. And while these weren't terrible and seemed to move less than other options I've tried, I still found myself having to pull them up every ten or fifteen minutes. Not ideal, but at least they're very comfortable. The cuffs on the large-sized pair of pads I've been wearing were tight enough, too, so I don't think going down to mediums would have been the answer. Why hasn't someone made knee pads that attach to your shorts or pants to keep them from moving?

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Pinkbike's Take

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