I received an email from a motor officer who works in a southern state’s motor unit (photo shown from Mid-Atlantic Motorcycle Police Competition of 2011 — not the unit of the officer who wrote to me.) The officers in his unit all wear the same style of patrol boot — Chippewa trooper boots. These boots have a laced instep and a laced closure at the top of each boot shaft.

He asked me for advice on how to lace the closures on the sides (shafts) of his boots so the laces will not come untied while riding. He said that the other cops in his unit have been doing different things, and he wanted to “ask an expert.”

I’m not quite an expert, but I guess with the number of boots that I own and show on my website, including a pair of the same boots, perhaps I can help.

However, most of my motorcycle police patrol boots have buckle closures at the top of the boot shafts. I prefer a buckle closure because it is cleaner and never requires much fuss. But to answer his question, I looked at what other cops who wear boots like his do…

… the answer became obvious when I looked at the cop galleries on my website — photos taken of motor officers and their boots for some ten years.

Most cops who wear boots with laced shaft closures use a double-across lacing technique, shown below. That is, run the lace straight across — one to the left and one to the right, placing two laces through each eyelet. Move the lace into the next eyelet (left and right) inside the boot shaft in a square pattern.

When you get to the top of the shaft’s eyelets, run the lace inside the top eyelet and tie the lace inside the boot. That way, loose laces will not be on the outside of the boot, so they will not come untied while riding.

Images below demonstrate the technique.An alternate lacing technique is to lace the boot in an X-pattern, while still running the laces on the inside of the shaft, as shown below.Life is short: A picture is worth 1,000 words.