Flylow Compound 2.0 Pant is the top dog in the Flylow line up for pants. They feature Polartec Neoshell waterproof breathable membrane. There has been a lot of hype over what the best membrane is, so we put these Flylow pants through the ringer to find out if the new Polartec Neoshell is as good as they claim. Read on to find out what we discovered!

Flylow Compound Pant during AIARE level 2 course

Sean has been busy trying out pants and bibs in the backcountry all year. There have been the standard Goretex pants, then the Event materials and even some outliers as well, but never have we tested out a material quite like the Neoshell. Polartec really nailed it with this technology. First – it’s waterproof – something you obviously need to keep snow and moisture out. Second – they breath well – something that is often hard to accomplish while keeping the garment waterproof. We won’t go into the magic that makes the membrane work, but we will tell you all about the pants.

The Compound 2.0 pant is a new and improved version over the last model. Flylow made the pants even lighter (745 grams) this year. That is always nice when your moving around in the backcountry. Even though they are lighter, they are not wimpy. The fabric is super burly and the cuffs are 1000 denier (yes!) Cordura fabric – so you know they are made to take a beating.

The Compound Pants have a 7/8 outer zipper to allow you to put them on over your ski, snowboard, splitboard boots with ease as well as dump lots of heat. There is also inner thigh vents as well to allow for extra cross flow venting. Sean actually never had to open either vent, even on pretty warm days and lots of extra work digging snow pits during an AIARE 2 course.

The pants never wetted out either. Flylow must be using some dang good DWR! There are 4 zippered pockets as well. Two hands, one thigh and one rear. The pants come in 2 colors – Sunset (yellow!) and Blue (blue!).

Sean is 6’1” 200lb 33” waist and used the XL. He could have gone down to a large (especially for the waist) but found the XL to be the right length and a little steezy. He did wind up using a belt or suspenders to make sure the pants did not sag during long tours.

Flylow keeps making great products for skier, snowboarder, and splitboarders. Plus they are Colorado-based and just nice guys to work with. During SIA 2016 at Copper on-snow demo day – the co-owner, Dan Abrams, wound up buying Sean a pass as he had misplaced his (may have been beer related). Good peeps, good products, good karma. MSRP $475