Review: Bliz Nova Goggles

In the fall we reviewed a sweet pair of sunglasses from Swedish eyewear company Bliz. Well, we’re back with another Bliz review but this time it is there Nova goggles that have caught our attention. The Bliz Nova Goggles incorporate a proprietary lens technology called Nordic Light into an affordable goggle that not only looks stylish but performs as well as goggles with much higher price tags. We’ve put three months of daily wear into the Bliz Nova Goggles, read on to see what we thought about them.

Rab Khroma GTS Bliz Nova — Bliz Nova Goggles and Rab Khroma GTX Jacket

Overview Bliz Nova Nordic Light

Weight: Manufacturer Claimed 120g
Light Transmission: 49% Category 1
Color Tested: Blue Mirror, Amber Base
Protection: 100% UVA + UVB

The Frame

The frame of the Bliz Nova Goggles is chamfered, meaning as the frame moves toward the middle of the goggle it becomes thinner. In the middle of the upper frame there is a small Bliz Logo. Think of it as your third eye of stoke. Holding the straps onto the helmet are wings. Dual mounted, they rotate out nicely for wide helmets, and lay flat when rocking the goggles with a beanie. There is a nose piece of matching color but then the lower part of the goggle frame on either side of the nose piece is noticeably missing, giving the goggles a semi frameless look.

Three Layers of Foam and The Siliconized Strap

The Foam and Ventilation

Like any good modern goggle, the Bliz Nova has three layers of foam. The inner layer, that which is closest to your face, is fleece like. It was adequately soft but nothing to write home about.

Ventilation is provided by the frame and the thinner middle foam layer on the top of the goggles. That’s it, and that’s all that is needed. In normal use I have yet to fog these goggles. I’m obviously not setting a skin track with a buff up and these goggles on, and that helps. They also never sit on my forehead for much more than a stationary minute or two. They do however not fog after 1,000m vertical descents where I’m working up a sweat and feeling my heart rate go up. I’d say the ventilation is more than adequate.

The Strap

The strap is 40mm tall and features a rubberized Squiggle on the inside. This rubber keeps the goggle strap from immediately springing off of your helmet when you undoubtedly forget to do up the goggle clip. The rubber squiggle does a decent job of holding goggles on helmet. The strap is also comfortable on a toque.

Adjustment is a snap with opposing sliders. Standard fair here, and it works. There is no clasp to undo the goggles in the back.

The logoing on the Bliz Nova Goggles strap is super subtle. On the right side is a leather embossed circle with a Bliz logo. Strangely, the letters are in an odd order and the logo, at least to me reads BILZ. On the left side is a small leather patch that reads BLIZ.

The Lens

The Bliz Nova Goggles have a double lens, like any decent snow goggle should have. A single lens would be a recipe for disaster. You don’t have single pane windows on your house, so why would you put single pane windows on your eyes to rip down a mountain?

The lenses are made of a polycarbonate that Bliz calls X-PC. Bliz claims the X-PC is unbreakable. I have yet to sit on them for the true test, though I have lawn darted once or twice with them on, and there is no dreaded O-Crack on them. To make the lenses even better they are hydrophobic and oleophobic.

The lens also has what is called OTG customization. OTG stands for Over The Glasses. It is designed to allow regular corrective lenses to be worn inside the goggles. As the only glasses I have are Bliz Fusion and Smith Cycling glasses I was not able to test this feature out. Plus, goggles on sunglasses would have made for very sub-optimal light transmission.

As these are cylindrical goggles, the field of view is quite wide. The goggles look quite tall, and by no means are short, but I have a massive head and could have gone slightly taller. I’m honestly just nitpicking here. I have managed to put two small scratches on the lens, but that was while navigating some near unnavigable trees. It was user error. I don’t suspect these goggles to scratch with normal attention.

The Optics

The Bliz Nano Goggles come in two options, the normal version and the the Nordic Light version. We’re partial to fancy shiny things at Black Sheep so we opted for the Nordic Light version, and boy are we glad we did.

I had hoped I was going to see the Aurora Borealis the whole time I was riding in these goggles. That, unfortunately, did not happen. What happened was that the Nordic Light lenses cut out the blurry light color spectrum in between the clear colors. I’ll let Bliz explain it: “it’s difficult to distinguish colors between the blue and the green, and the green and the red wave lengths. These crossovers are blocked by the Nordic Light lens, providing the carrier greater contrast and clarity in tough conditions.”

The Bliz Nova Nordic Light takes on a Greenish hue depending on the angle

Summary

I’ve been riding with the Bliz Nova Goggles all season, since December 4. They’ve done well in almost all conditions. Über bright days, despite the goggles VLT of roughly 50%, are easily handled. It’s been 7 years since I had Lasik surgery so on some flat light days I still wish the VLT was more.

I often wear a Smith Vantage helmet. I find that the Bliz Nova goggles can ride a little high with this helmet, bringing the nose piece a little higher than I would like. Normally, I ride with a brimmed Elmer Fudd style hat, and then the Bliz Nova goggles stay right in position. Bliz also makes helmets and I expect there would be no fit problems there, at all.

These are a comfortable Goggle. They have all the essentials of a good goggle with a really cool new coating in the Nordic Light. The Bliz Nova Goggles are a straight forward, no nonsense goggle with everything you need. Great Contrast, wide field of view, no fog and a silicon lined strap all at a price that won’t break the bank.