Troy Lee Designs

For serious motocross and mountain bike riders, most reviewers feel the spend is justified. Troy Lee Designs draws on decades of helmet experience, and the brand began with founder Troy Lee hand-painting and vacuum-forming visors for his racing friends. You are paying for that protective pedigree as much as the unmistakable graphics, so the value lands best with riders who actually log time on dirt.

Both are trusted names in off-road riding, and protection is broadly comparable. The usual shorthand is that Fox plays it bold and athletic while Troy Lee Designs leans into the artist's eye, with the wild, custom-inspired graphics that grew straight out of Troy Lee's helmet-painting roots. If you want gear that looks like a moving canvas, TLD is the one people reach for.

Helmets and the artwork on them. The company started in 1981 when Troy Lee, an aspiring Southern California motocross racer, gave up chasing racing fame to paint the helmets of his pro friends full-time. That custom-paint instinct is still the heartbeat of the brand, even now that it makes full lines of motocross and mountain bike apparel and protective gear.

Yes, and the mountain bike side actually came first. Troy began developing mountain bike helmets in cooperation with Japanese helmet maker Shoei, building out helmets, visors and MTB apparel, and only started a dedicated motocross apparel line in 1998. By 2004 that had grown into a full range across both disciplines.

The company is headquartered in Corona, California, and it remains privately held, run by founder Troy Lee with investment partner Fasthouse. In the US you will find it through retailers such as REI, Backcountry, BTO Sports and Fasthouse, and worldwide it is carried by distributors across roughly 15 countries.

It is still the eponymous founder's company. Troy Lee runs the privately held business, and it is co-owned by investment partner Fasthouse. That continuity is part of why the brand has held onto its hand-built, paint-shop character rather than feeling like a faceless gear label.

Troy Lee came from a racing-minded family: his father Larry was an artist and motorcycle racer, and his grandfather Marvin was a co-founder of the Bonneville Speed Trials. Troy began by vacuum-forming custom helmet visors in his mother Linda's oven in Corona, until the constant smell of burnt plastic got him evicted to a hangar at Corona Municipal Airport. The lease there even required him to paint registration numbers on private aircraft to satisfy an aviation-services clause.

Plenty. In 2001 Troy Lee formed a supermoto race team featuring himself alongside supercross and motocross stars Jeremy McGrath and Jeff Ward, with backing from Honda and Red Bull. The team grew to include riders like Doug Henry and went on to win multiple AMA Supermoto titles between 2004 and 2006 across the 250cc and 450cc classes.

There is. In 2003 Troy moved the business into the historic former Ganahl Lumber building in Corona, a 22,600-square-foot facility that includes a 4,000-square-foot showroom and museum showcasing his collection of sports memorabilia. It is a fitting home for a brand that has always treated gear as something to display, not just wear.

As with most riding gear, end-of-season changeovers and the period when new model-year helmets and apparel arrive tend to be when previous designs get marked down. If you have your eye on a specific graphic, buy it when you see it, since TLD's custom-style colorways rotate and the loudest ones often sell through first.