One is that Mr Millar chose these POC glasses because of their outstanding qualities. The glasses are definitely outstanding in their performance.
Two is that Mr Millar styled them in a way that makes them so much cooler. They are almost not cycling glasses.
There are number of great things to say about these glasses put forward here by CPT3:
- Clarity. This is more than just a word denoting transparency. The Carl Zeiss lenses, as expected, are extremely good. The lens design has made for excellent light transmission with little to no distortion. Truly. The shape and thickness means that there is little to no chromatic aberration whilst field curvature aberration, coma, and other lens problems are absolutely insignificant or non-existent. This extends from side-to-side and top-to-bottom. Wearing these glasses leads to an outstanding and uncompromised viewing experience. I did expect these glasses to be very good, but it was in riding that this is truly noticeable - the capacity of your eye and your natural viewing is uncompromised - you have full use of undistorted sight, peripheral vision is near unimpeded and you receive true and accurate focussing, colour, depth-of-field, etc. The frame only barely creeps into your peripheral vision, but due to the wrap fit and large frame, this is so extremely to the side that it is unconcerning in any way.
Even though the lenses that come with the glasses have a fair degree of light transmission reduction so as to cope with harsh sunlight, they are not darkened in a way that compromises sight - riding in dappled light at speed on descents is a joy. The only time that the glasses start to impede sight is as dusk and night sets in or under extremely dark tree-cover, but these are situations that any sunglasses are not appropriate for. However, in saying this, the colour clarity of the lens means that colours stay absolutely true to life as dusk sets in - so much so that you only think that dusk is occurring more quickly than it should.
Although, there is the issue of the frame creeping into view when looking over the shoulder or the like, it is as minimal as can be. Personally, I would not choose to ride with frameless glasses. I have seen too many faces cut and bleeding from frameless glasses when accidents happen and would personally never chose a frameless glass. In all, the frame does not appear in any sight-lines except for extreme viewing situations and when it does, it does not affect your riding or viewing performance.
- Fit. The first, most-noticeable part is the grip from the arms. The arms are not adjustable, but have a large degree of flex along the parts that contact the head resulting in a firm, but not overly pressured fit. I have a particular bug-bear with many cycling sunglasses and that is when one turns one’s head, wind blows behind the lens due to the large gap between the edge of the lens/frame and the skin. This is just poor and lazy design and utterly unacceptable as it allows for dirt, debris and sweat to be blown behind the lens and into the eye. The shape of these glasses is such that for 99% of people out there, they will be able to look over their shoulder, especially at speed, with certainty that their eyes fully protected. I made the decision that these glasses were suitable for me based on this from the photos of Mr Millar wearing the glasses as he has a similar-shaped face to mine and that it is pretty clear from the ethos running through the CPT3 line that he would not accept lesser quality.
- Experience. To a large degree, you will hardly notice that you are wearing these glasses. They are extremely light, the glasses don’t exert pressure in a way that will lead to irritating pressure points and the lenses have so little aberration and visual clarity, your eyes and face will think that they are not there. Epic rides can be undertaken without the worry of increasing pressure points.
- Styling. This was the main point of purchasing these CPT3 glasses rather than elsewhere. I could have bought glasses of this technical level from any POC retailer, but the styling brought by Mr Millar has lifted these to level above the average cycling glass.
Overall, the main thing you are getting with these glasses is increased safety:
1. Your sight is essentially unimpeded and gets to respond to the environment in which you are riding in a natural way without errors caused by poor lens design or materials. This is near to the best that anyone could ever expect from a sports sunglass.
2. Your eyes are very well protected from wind, sun, debris and many other things that they are exposed to when riding.
The second thing you are getting with these glasses is cool factor. If these sunglasses were not so specifically sports-orientated I would wear them everywhere.