For the most part, I only wear sunglasses on the road, at least here in Austin anyway. With all the sharp, spiky plant life here, sometimes I’d force myself to wear eyewear but was never 100% content with it. I’ve always had an issue with how sunglasses read the splotchy light found in the woods on my local trails. It was either intense and white, or shaded and dark, leaving little to no middle ground or time to adjust and it was difficult to make out details.

A few of my friends here started wearing these Oakley Prizm Trail sunglasses and swore by them for trail clarity, so I picked up a pair. Sure enough, after wearing these glasses for a few rides, the difference was clear. Let me clarify that, they made a huge difference. Oakley achieves this through a material they call Plutonite and while it sounds like a marketing ploy, the performance backs it up incredibly well.

This material (it’s actually a material, not a lens coating) blocks out every bit of UVA, UVB, UVC and harmful blue light, resulting in incredible clarity, allowing you to spot every little variation in the trail, without being distracted by the intense light shifts. It kind of neutralizes the light and allows you to see the detail. (These photos don’t really do the experience justice!)

I’ve been using the Prizm Trail Radarlock Path but the Prizm system comes in a variety of sunglasses shapes.

There’s even a lens specifically engineered to read the road with the same clarity. More on that later…