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After three years of shopping it around, Investcorp has finally sold the Dainese group of brands, with The Carlyle Group (an American private equity firm) purchasing the Italian apparel manufacturer for a reported €630 million.

That number represents a nearly 5x return from the €130 million that Investcorp spent when it purchased 80% of Dainese SpA from founder Lino Dainese in 2014 – making the venture quite a profitable one for the Bahraini firm.

It is no secret that motorcycle racers at the top of the sport use flat track as a way to hone their skills during the season. The practice dates all the way back to Kenny Roberts Sr., and has stayed in the grand prix paddock ever since.

Like all great champions though, Valentino Rossi has taken things to the next level, building his own private flat track course near his home in Tavullia, Italy.

Italian motorcycle apparel manufacturer Dainese has acquired Italian motorcycle footwear producer TCX.

The move is an interesting one for the Dainese Group though, especially when it will come to merging the TCX lineup into Dainese’s own.

The stated reason behind the acquisition is that Dainese bought TCX in order to bolster its footwear lineup, with the goal of the Dainese Group to offer a truly head-to-toe range of products (for those who don’t know, the Dainese Group includes helmet maker AGV).

Genetically speaking, I feel like I am a bit of an oddity. I am a true 6’2″ in height  (not a Tinder 6’2″, which is more like 5’9″ mind you). So, that’s 190cm of Jensen Beeler, coming at yah.

I mention this because I was reading recently that for humans, something seemingly as basic as height isn’t controlled by a single gene. In fact, there are about 700 genes that factor into how tall we are.

It is a fascinating concept on how the DNA from our parents interacts to make us who we are. For instance, despite my tall stature, my parents are pretty much right in the middle of things: my father was 5’8″ and my mother 5’6″. 

I could make a joke about having a tall mailman growing up, but really I get my height from my mother’s father, who was six-foot on the dot. I got his red hair too, which went white when I was a teenager, just like all the rest of the grey-haired Beeler progeny. We must get our hair attributes from a number of genes as well then.

Despite being tall, I have a relatively normal inseam, of 32 inches, which means I make most of my height in my torso. I have broad shoulders too, but like my father, I have short arms (thankfully, not quite as short as his).

I have small feet and hands, so it is size 10 shoes for me (with a high arch), and “small” size gloves in most brands. My head is a large in just about every helmet though, which makes for an interesting bookend on the sizing spectrum.

The point that I am trying to drive home here is that we are all very different people when it comes to our body shapes. There is no simple break down of putting humans into categories like small, medium, and large.

We are more complicated than that…and so should the items we wear.

Episode 18 of the Brap Talk podcast is now out for your two-wheeled audio pleasure, and this is another topic-packed show that runs the gamut of the motorcycling experience.

Before we get into the show’s details, it should be noted that this episode was recorded during the practice week of the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb.

So, we talk a bit about Carlin Dunne during the show, and are of course unaware of what would happen later that weekend. We deeply miss our friend Carlin, and plan to talk about his amazing life in our next podcast.

We have be extolling the virtues of airbag-equipped motorcycle jackets and suits for quite some time now, and to repeat a favorite line of mine, your standard leather motorcycle jacket is now obsolete, if it doesn’t have an airbag in it.

That statement still holds true, but Dainese just gave your old jacket a new life, as the Italian brand just debuted its “Dainese Smart Jacket” system.

Don’t let the name fool you though, this isn’t a new jacket from Dainese, it’s a vest – an airbag vest, to be precise. What makes the Dainese Smart Jacket so…smart…is that the airbag vest can be worn under or over your typical motorcycle jacket.

On Thursday, a German court of appeals in Munich released a ruling that Alpinestars had infringed upon a patent by Dainese, which held bearing over the the brands’ airbag suit systems.

The impact of that decision amounted to a big blow to Alpinestars’ ability to sell its Tech-Air garments in the German market, as the ruling meant that Alpinestars could no longer sell its Tech-Air products in the German market, and also that Alpinestars would have to pay restitution to Dainese for damages.

Letting that news circulate through the weekend, Alpinestars has now issued a statement about the German court’s ruling, which not only adds more clarity to the patents in question, but also shows that the legal battles between the two companies are far from over.

Airbag technology is making your traditional motorcycle apparel items obsolete, and the technology just keeps getting better and better. Both Alpinestars and Dainese continuously raise the bar against one another, proving that competition improves the breed.

As such For the 2019 model year, Dainese is releasing its third generation D-Air airbag system, which boasts significant improvements over the previous iteration.

For starters, the new Dainese D-Air system is 37% lighter the previously generation, which is a big deal if you have ever picked up an airbag-equipped leather suit or jacket.

Dainese also says that its third-generation system has better ergonomics and efficiency than before. Most importantly though, Dainese is going to start using the D-Air technology in suits and jackets for women.

Episode 74 of the Two Enthusiasts Podcast is out, and it covers a busy schedule at the 2EP HQ. 

First off, we talk about Harley-Davidson’s investment in Alta Motors, and discuss what the future holds for these two American brands. The conversation shifts from the future, to the past, and also examines Harley-Davidson’s management of Buell and MV Agusta, which makes for an interesting contrast.

The conversation then turns to two pieces of equipment that we see shaking up the motorcycle apparel space: the Dainese D-Air Misano jacket and the Sena Momentum helmet. Both of these pieces are bringing new technology to the industry, and we’ve had a chance to spend some miles on both of them.

The show then covers what it’s like to ride the Triumph Speed Triple RS and Triumph Tiger 800 XCA, as Jensen was in Spain and Moab (respectively) riding these two British bikes.

We finish too with another quasi-review, as Carlin Dunne was down at the Alta Motors Redshift MXR launch, riding Alta’s new electric dirt bike and relaying his thoughts back to Asphalt & Rubber.

You can listen to the show via the embedded SoundCloud player, after the jump, or you can find the show on iTunes (please leave a review) or this RSS feed. Be sure to follow us on Facebook and Twitter as well. 

We hope you will join the conversation, and leave us some audio comments at our new email address: twoenthusiasts@gmail.com.