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ZEAL Pro Bag Review By JP Syverud

The fine folks from ZEAL Pro sent the Secret Underground Lair of Fat-Bike.com a beautiful new Zeal Pro fat bike cover kit for some testing. The kit we received contained the bike protector cover, a brake light kit, and a set of Fat-Pawz to cover longer bars and poggies. I have always wanted something like this to protect my custom Fatty from Wisconsin’s harsh elements and road Gnome juices.

One of the best ways to protect your bike from the elements is to travel with your bike tucked safely inside your vehicle.  But folks with regular cars may not be able to fit a (filthy) fat bike inside their vehicle. Anyone that travels with their fat bike on a rack affixed to the outside of their car in the winter knows what a little bit of precipitation can do to a twelve-speed drive train. The Zeal Pro bike cover keeps that coating of frozen road slush off of your brake rotors and drive train. This product could be just what you need to keep your whip happy, clean, and ready to race when you arrive up north.  As a bonus, it also camouflages what bike is hidden inside.  Thieves don’t know if it’s an old Huffy or a $10,000 fancy carbonium race machine. 

 

The first thing I noticed when I took the cover out of the package was the thickness and flexibility of the neoprene material. It really helped to stretch around all the odd parts of my bike.  On my first attempt at covering my bike, I realized that there was no way my 830mm wide Tumbleweed Persuader bars were going to fit without the additional Fat-Pawz extenders.  But once I put the Fat-Pawz on I had no issues fitting my wide bars and even my Cedaero poggies. So, if you have wide bars, bar ends, or poggies, make sure you buy the Fat-Pawz attachment.  You may have to get creative in how you stretch them around the bars.  I had to unzip one of the extensions and pull the bar through then and re zip them.  If you have 800mm or less bars you shouldn’t have to do this at all.  On my 770mm titanium loop bars, I do not have to use the Fat-Paws.

Installation is super easy.  Simply put one end of the bars on first then flip the rest of the cover over the other side of the bars. Then flip the rest over the seat to align it.  I like to flip the bike upside down, zip it up, and place it right on my rack.  Put the lights on inside the pocket pouches and connect to the 4pin hitch wiring harness and you are ready to travel to the trailhead in style. 

The ZPBC has been engineered to attach to any type of rack out there. Tray, fork mount, or post and mast style. This is done by having designated pass-through slots for bike racks that wrap around your rims, connecting the bike to the rack. If you use a rack where you remove your front wheel, there is an opening under the fork crown to attach your bike to the rack. 

I have a 1UP USA rack. I just placed the covered bike into the trays and lifted the arms to secure the bike.  The only thing I can’t do is lock my bike to the 1UP USA rack with 1UP’s locks.  But I can lock it with a cable around the tray and bike using the pass-through slots.

The cover fits any bike from XS to XL.  I ride a medium which left lots of extra room for a larger bike, just in case I hit that high school growth spurt I was promised by my Mom. If you decided to order one of these kits make sure you get the one for your type of bike.  There are two versions, one for Road, Cyclocross, and gravel bikes, and one for mountain and fat bikes.   

A few years ago, I looked into a bike cover system similar to this but was always worried about how the protectors cover the rear brake lights. The optional light package eased my concern.  The only issue I have now is that car license plate holders placed above the bumper may be covered.  Those in that situation would have to relocate their plate to follow Super Trooper Farva’s laws.  After a few weeks of testing, I ended up buying a license plate holder from 1UP USA to solve this problem. I feel so legal now!

 

I usually ride a single speed and worry very little about the dirty ride to the trailhead.  But as I turned 50 this year, my mid-life crisis present to myself was a new sparkly set of Sram GX AXS gears. The Zeal Pro was the perfect product to protect those gears for years to come. 

When I traveled up to Levis Mounds for the Sweaty Yeti this year, I tried to wrap up my cassette and derailleur with a Ziplock bag and some tape.  It didn’t go perfectly as the backside of the cassette and most of my bike got hit with salty gnome juices.  If I had this bag before the event I would have arrived with a clean and perfectly functioning bike.  Gone are the days of wrapping your bike in plastic and duct tape or covering it with a few garbage bags and arriving at the trailhead with a wind-torn mess.

You’ve probably spent years building up your dream bike and now you can protect your investment on the way to and from events or trailheads.  The cover is $399, the light kit is $99, and the Fat-Pawz are $49. The kit as tested, was $547.00 shipped. I Look at it this way. It’s a modest investment that ensures a clean perfectly functioning bike when I get to the trailhead or the big event that I’ve been looking forward to all year. #beachfunduro

Zeal Pro has a one-year warranty against defects and a 100-day guarantee that if you don’t love it, for any reason, you can return it for a full refund. After one year if it fails, at their discretion they will fix or replace your cover. 

The ZEAL Pro earns 4.5 out of 5 Flaming Gnomes!

Happy Trails!

JP

For more information about the ZEAL Pro visit – https://zealpro.com

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