Flylow Baker Bib

When I decided it was time for me to switch to bibs, the Flylow Baker Bibs beat out all of their competitors across all winter uses.

My Flylow Baker Bibs were a game changer this season. I knew I wanted to make the switch to bibs after seven previous seasons of constantly re-tucking my mid-layer into the back of my ski pants. The shifting of bottom and top layers during the four major movements that take place during any single ski day were causing me madness; boot up, lift riding, skiing, and hiking.

These movements are far more enjoyable when done in the total-cover-comfort of the Baker Bibs. While booting up my entire system used to become completely untucked. While I was booting up in the parking lot, the disarray of exposed lower back, sagging waistline, and gut-gouging belt buckles would have been unconscionable. The bibs fixed this.

 Shouldering skis and poles and making my way to the lift line, I do a sort of bodyguard pat down to make sure I have my necessaries. Right hip, season pass dangling in place. Back right, wallet. Lower right leg, notebook (because I find inspiration everywhere). Left front, phone. Bib exterior pocket, Kershaw Leek folding knife, Pilot G-2 pen. Bib middle pocket, Leatherman Squirt PS4. Inner Bib pocket, pack of tissues.

Once I’ve ensured all my possibles are in place, I jump in line. The gondola turns, I’m standing by myself, first chair isn’t for another twenty minutes. But I like to be first. I don’t film my first tracks through the glades or anything like that. I just like the quiet, elitist nature of everybody showing up to join me in my lift line. The air is usually extra cold, and the light is either flat or blinding in the base area. Westerly winds rip across the flats, funneled by the neighboring hills. My Baker Bibs keep me warm by blocking out all of the chilling outside air and trapping in all of my morning gas.

While I’m waiting for the lifty to come out of his warming hut and grant me access to my gondola car, I do my stretches. Once you’ve experienced a series of deep forward folds in bibs, you will never again wear regular little pants. I’m currently looking into formal wear and beach wear in bib form. (Email me with suggestions if you have a line on a three-piece, two button from Brooks Brothers with bibs, or a nice, light pair of linen bibs for this season on the coast.) 

 Once I’m on the summit, I enjoy the thirty seconds or so while I have the whole place to myself, before the next gondola car spins into its unloading position. I breath it in. Finally, I reach down to close the last buckles on my boots, enjoying maximum blood flow right up until the day really begins. The Baker Bibs accommodate all shapes of ski and snowboard boots comfortably. The powder cuff is snug enough to trap heat and block snow, but loose enough to forget it’s even there. The cuff moves nicely with my leg motion and never has it once ridden up.

The next, and arguably most important movement in my pants are the movements I make while shredding the gnar. The Bakers have been accused of looking too baggy. This is not the case. I suppose if you are 250 pounds and wear a 26 inseam, the bakers may not be your style. However, at 200 pounds, six feet, with a 33 inseam, the Bakers allow for maximum knee bends, big leans, and tucks, and do not come across as any baggier than any high-end ski pants I have worn.

When making my way to access some of the real freshies, off to the side of certain glades, or out behind certain areas lesser known to the day-of-groomers tourists, I am forced to contort myself into a series of odd movements. I may have to side-step or herringbone certain uphill areas. I may have to skate long stretches of traverse, and then I may have to shoulder my skis, click my boots into walk mode, and hike a couple hundred feet.

It goes without saying that the inner and outer thigh vents on the Baker Bibs are crucial. They allow me to ventilate in the places where I need heat to escape while also keeping out all but the deepest powder. The sealed zippers are so smooth and the pulls so well designed, when I see the deep stuff coming, it’s a reach and a tug on each side and I am sealed back in, wind proof, powder proof, marching on.

I’ve worn the bibs for the entirety of the 2020-2021 season. From early season wet stuff to mid-season minus 20-degree days, and through to this last week’s 55, bluebird, windless, tee-shirt sessions. The glory of the Baker Bibs is that I never feel like I’m out of options. They can be snuggled over a midweight top and bottom for sub-zero, hard and fast days, but can also be airily worn over a t-shirt on those goofing-off, spring-skiing days.

Without a base layer bottom the inside of the Baker Bib material is neither abrasive, nor cold-feeling in temps above 40 degrees. As long as you buy the appropriate size, there should be no problem fitting mid to heavyweight fleece bottoms and tops under the bibs for those high wind, sub-zero mornings.

This industry is always about the one thing to rule them all. The daily driver skis that ascend effortlessly and weigh just enough to slice into groomers and float on powder. We all want the helmet that weighs nothing, plays tunes, and stops bullets. Ski poles that are flasks. Flasks that send texts, and so on.

The Baker Bibs are like the first time you sip mezcal on a summit covered with a 45-inch base of soft snow, ready to descend the last run of the day with a deep brown goggle tan in May. Once you’ve experienced it, nothing else compares and you go out of your way to endorse the experience to everyone who will listen to you.

Background

I started with some Outdoor Research soft-shell pants, then I added suspenders. I just didn't have the durability I needed. I switched to Patagonia's Patrol Pants (?); they were burly, but always slid off my butt. My move to the Baker Bibs changed everything.