Zoggs latest goggles offering ticks all the right boxes

Triathlon and open water swimming have been a massive boon for goggle manufacturers. It’s been amazing to see over the past few years how much innovation can be squeezed out of something that essential comprises two eye cups and a piece of elastic.

From a triathlete’s perspective, swimming goggles must fulfil a number of criteria:

• Visibility – you need to navigate around swim courses in a variety of lighting conditions.
• Security – goggles mustn’t leak, nor must they be easily dislodged by a stray foot or elbow.
• Comfort – you might be wearing them for an hour or more.
• Hydrodynamics – while goggles or masks probably only contribute relative little to your overall resistance through the water, you obviously don’t want something that will slow you down.

With the Predator Flex, Zoggs have convincingly fulfilled each of these criteria. Lenses are impregnated with an anti-fog compound to help keep them clear for longer. They are also curved to increase the field of vision and the mirrored version is ideal for those early morning race starts or evening swims when the sun is close to the horizon.

The goggles can easily be tightened or loosened while wearing them so it’s no problem to crank the elastic a couple of notches for a more secure fit on race day than in training. The eye cup is made of soft silicone that sits comfortably across the face (around the eye sockets rather than in them, as some pool goggles do) even when the elastic is pulled tight. The ‘Flex’ in the name comes from the ultra-flexible nose piece which is supposed to improve the fit. However, having worn many types of swimming goggles and rarely having problems with the nose piece, we weren’t totally convinced of the benefits of this feature, although it certainly doesn’t do any harm.

Finally, the goggles have a flat profile, so no concerns there about increasing your water resistance.

As a contact lens wearer, out tester is paranoid about keeping dirty water out of his eyes. The Zoggs achieved this without any worries. His only complaint was a slight distortion of his vision under the water. However, as vision above the water was excellent and visibility below the water is often nil anyway, he didn’t see this as a problem.

The goggles retails at £19.99 (£22.99 for the mirrored version) and are available from www.wiggle.co.uk

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