Montane's baselayer tee uses a cunning mixture of merino wool and polyester fibres intended to give the best of natural and synthetic performance attributes, but does it work?
Montane Bionic T-shirt Tested
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Price:
£30
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Weight: 130 grammes (men's
medium)
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Features:
Base-layer tee made from SportWool - 23/77 mix of merino
wool and polyester fibres - featuring flat-locked seams, 3M
Scotchlite reflective cuff bands and reflective Montane
logo. Available in navy, black and eye-burning fluoro
yellow.
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What's It For? The Bionic is intended to be used either as a
standalone, lightweight technical tee shirt or as a baselayer part of
a multi-part layering system and be capable of dealing with moisture
efficiently so you don't get wet and cold.
It's also designed to provide UV protection and to minimise
ponging when used repeatedly. And there was you thinking it was just
a tee shirt.
The Techy Bits The real standout feature of the Bionic is the
use of SportWool. Like the fabric used by Macpac for some of its
baselayers, SportWool uses a mix of fine-fibred merino wool and
polyester at a ration of 23/77. The merino is on the inside of the
garment for comfort, while the polyester outer layer in intended to
mover moisture away and spread it out for rapid evaporation.
Flat-locked seams make for comfort with pack straps and neat
reflective bands on the sleeves and a reflective Montane logo up your
chances of survival if you're say, running after dark. For daytime
extroverts, there's also an eye-burningly bright fluoro version -
above.
How It Performs We like the Macpac kit which uses a similar
merino/polyester hybrid and we got on swimmingly with SportWool as
well. The theory is that the merino fibres sit against the skin for a
comfortable feel in both hot and cold conditions, while the polyester
fibres draw any excess moisture outwards for evaporation.
In practice that seemed to be pretty much what happened. Straight
merino tends to hold moisture while remaining comfortable, but can
get increasingly sodden with high activity use, while polyester can
feel a tad plasticky when temperatures are threatening to blow out of
the top of the thermometer.
SportWool seems to do a bit of both. You can still overwhelm it,
but it's a nice compromise between comfort and wicking. The fabric
has a stretchy feel for close, high performance fit and while the
sleeves on our pre-production sample were slightly tight, Montane
tells us that production versions have a slightly larger sleeve.
Another major benefit of merino is that it has natural anti-pong
properties and thankfully these seem to carry over to the SportWool
mix and we found we could wear the top repeatedly without any nasal
penalty. Always good if you're on a multi-dayer.
One thing we didn't like, in our spoiled, prima donna-ish journo
way was that the reflective strips felt cold against the skin when we
first put the tee on in really cold conditions; that's not really a
big deal though and more princess and the pea territory than anything
else.
Our one real regret with the Bionic is that it's a simple tee. Our
baselayer design of choice is a long-sleeved zip neck with collar.
Long sleeves and collar give some added sun protection and comfort
when layered and the zip allows additional ventilation in hot
conditions, while you can always roll up the sleeves for a forearm
tanning session...
Tees are fine in so far as they go, but less versatile for
all-round use in our opinion.
We like the fabric a lot as a good compromise between the
positive qualities of merino wool and synthetic polyester. It gives a
good balance between all-temperature comfort against the skin and
wicking performance, plus it seems to have inherited merino's
anti-pong qualities.
We also like the fit and the reflective trim is a thoughtful touch
for walkers, runners and cyclists who may find themselves out after
dark. If you're after a baselayer too you can either layer or use as
a warm weather top, it's one of the best available.
It's just a shame that it's not also available as a long-sleeved,
zip-neck top for picky beggars like us ;-)
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Nice fabric thoughtful detailing.
Simple design means less versatility.
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Performance
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Value
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