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Helmets - the definitive thread.. Mod Note - Please read Opening Post

Felloffmebike

I'm sure this has been discussed before but I'm interested in a lot of recent comments about wearing or not wearing a helmet. It never occurred to me not to wear one but recently I'm picking up a lot of people who seem to have a different view. Why is that? Does wearing a helmet not make it safer if you fall, even a little bit? And those who advocate not wearing one, is it a safety thing or a style thing or a macho man thing or what? Or is there some evidence that a helmet doesnt actually give you any protection or even that wearing one could be dangerous in itself.

I'm not looking to start an argument, just interested in the different views.

Mod note

Title changed - this can hopefully be considered the definitive helmet thread that can be pointed to whenever anyone wants to start another discussion on the subject - I'll put a link from the FAQs to it also

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NeedMoreGears

To add an anecdote or two ....

In a thankfully few lower speed (<30kph) falls, I banged my head "late" in the fall. Usually a hand/shoulder/hip hit the ground first and my head then contacted the ground due to me rotating sideways. I would reckon that wearing a helmet saved me some stitches in most and kept my face from sliding along the road in one instance. For me, at least, that level of injury reduction makes wearing the helmet worthwhile. Anything else is a bonus.

dub_skav

This is all anecdotal and has been done ad infinitum, but it seems to be reasonably good natured for once, so I think I'll join in.

Just to be clear, in both conkennedy and NeedMoreGears examples, it was the helmet that hit the ground, that might sound obvious, but it is very important.
We spend our whole lives learning the size and shape of our bodies, through repetition in order to hone instinct. Also through instinct we reflexively protect our head. When you fall over you will instinctively pull your head away from the impact to minimise damage to it.

As previously mentioned when you wear a helmet you increase the size of your head. So, it is possible that in conkennedy's case his head may never have hit the ground if he was unhelmeted, certainly he would have had a split second extra to move his head further away from the impact so that the force was lessened.
I am not trying to say that helmets are useless, just that they can confuse the body. For an example try wearing a hard hat, or even wear your cycling helmet around the house and you will hit it a few times, you will be quite surprised by it too, as your eyes and brain were sure they had accounted for the obstacles.

To add my own anecdotes I have come off my bike a few times in my life, always unhelmeted and I never hit my head. One of those times was over a car door and a chin tuck and roll through saw my shoulders and upper back take the impact.

Pinches of salt for all, most importantly, stay safe everybody

magicbastarder

dub_skav wrote: »

Just to be clear, in both conkennedy and NeedMoreGears examples, it was the helmet that hit the ground, that might sound obvious, but it is very important.

colour me sceptical if there is an impact where the head is moving with enough momentum to crack the helmet, but *not* enough momentum for the head to impact absent the helmet.

dub_skav

magicbastarder wrote: »

colour me sceptical if there is an impact where the head is moving with enough momentum to crack the helmet, but *not* enough momentum for the head to impact absent the helmet.

As I said, we can't know and you're probably right that in a helmet cracking scenario the head would have hit the ground anyway, but the neck muscles would have had longer to pull the chin in and would have been protecting against impact at a different point.

As we have all said - very pleasantly ::eek: - it is impossible to know, but as his main complaint was a pronounced concussion, any reduction in force by additional time and velocity of the head in the opposite direction due to the action of the torso and neck muscles may have had some benefit.
Perhaps less benefit than the action of the liner, but it is worth considering and is one of the reasons why evidence and campaigners are so split on this

TonyStark

Crashed coming down Ballyknockan hill a fortnight ago (still sore). I have no doubt in my mind that my helmet saved me from serious damage as I spilled head first along the road. </two cents>

tomasrojo

Here's a recent article about helmets and concussion (about an hour old, I think!), since concussion was mentioned very recently here:

"All the peer-reviewed scientific research has shown helmets don't protect the brain from a concussion injury," Dr Pearce said.

Instead, headgear just protects the skull.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-08-05/pre-teens-most-likely-to-suffer-concussion-study/8774998

Of course, that wouldn't mean that the skull protection is not valuable. The article seems to be about Australian Rules Football, based on the images, but given what is said in the text, I assume the principle carries over to other sports headgear.

TiBoy

I've been in two serious crashes with serious life effecting injuries from both but no serious injuries to where my helmet protected me.

In both cases the first part of me to hit the ground was my head,

In both cases the helmet worked and stopped me from splitting my head open.

In both cases the medical team who worked on me said the helmet save my life. I knew seconds after both accidents the helmet had saved my life. In one case an experienced spinal surgeon who is also a cyclist told me I had dodged a bullet.

This is all anecdotal of course.

in my experience its better to wear a helmet, it saved my life, and it may do the same for others.

I'll take anecdotal and experience over voluminous conjecture in this instance and remain a helmet wearer.

If you don't want to wear a helmet then don't but don't discount anecdote and experience in arriving at that decision.

tomasrojo

Glad to hear you're mostly ok (at least, I hope you are).

I think most of your points have already been dealt with (in particular, if they're very effective at the individual level, they should turn up strongly at the population level, unless what happened to you is uncommon), but this table, from earlier in the thread, is worth keeping in mind in terms of how medical people respond to injuries.

            Ok                   Death           Serious Injury

Helmet      Helmet prevented    (S)he did all    Dead without helmet 
            all injury          (s)he could                             

No Helmet   Incredibly lucky,   What do you      Helmet would have 
            irresponsible       expect?          meant no injury

No that any those responses is always wrong. But they can't be always right.

Akrasia

CramCycle wrote: »

How do you know there is not a reduced risk your head will hit something without a helmet on due to decrease in size? Or a reduction in rotational forces due to reduction in weight? There are pros and coins to wearing a helmet. Alas, like many things, it is not black and white.

Also, wearing a helmet deprives you of some sensory information that might possibly help you to avoid the crash in the first place or help your body's panic response to avoid collision with an obstacle. Our brain is used to interpreting sounds, air pressure changes, changes in velocity of things around us, so wearing something artificial on our heads can degrade this ability slightly.

Some helmets have a lip on the front to act as a sun screen or to block rain, but if you've got your head down, it can block your vision to the front, Some ill fitting helmets have straps that might interfere with peripheral vision to the sides which might rob you of that spit second to take evasive action or protect your head in an accident. This might affect kids who are constantly growing so helmets need to be adjusted regularly to make sure they fit correctly. When a kid gets to 9 or 10 years old, they're not likely to be asking their parents to adjust them for them, they'll adjust them themselves, and maybe keep them too loose so that they either slip when they have a fall, or shift while cycling and end up blocking vision.

rubadub

TiBoy wrote: »

I've been in two serious crashes with serious life effecting injuries from both but no serious injuries to where my helmet protected me...

in my experience its better to wear a helmet, it saved my life, and it may do the same for others.

So do you now wear a helmet while undertaking any other dangerous activities, e.g. walking home after a few drinks, or walking in the dark. Also you said you had other injuries, do you now wear any other protection devices on the bike which would have prevented these, or at least reduced them. Do you at least advise others to?

I wear MTB elbow. knee & wrist protection if it is very icy out. But don't worry folks, if I crack my knee pad I will not blabber on about how I would be in a wheelchair without it.

When I was in secondary school the majority of lads I knew cycled to school, nobody wore helmets, in icy weather they were dropping like flies, amazingly the roads were not awash with blood & brains & skull splinters -going by all the anecdotes I hear nowadays there should have been.

I fortunately have not known anybody who died from a cycling crash, this included friends of friends in school etc, a huge circle of people I would have heard about. This was back when nobody wore helmets and would cycle drunk and very recklessly. However now I have met several people who claimed the helmets save their lives -these were adults and I would guess they were not engaging in as reckless behaviour I saw teenage friends doing.

The anecdotes simply do not add up, odds are I should have heard of loads of deaths, quite a few more than the lives I heard about being saved -as I should have known a far greater number of overall miles & falls done without helmets.

TiBoy

rubadub wrote: »

So do you now wear a helmet while undertaking any other dangerous activities, e.g. walking home after a few drinks, or walking in the dark. Also you said you had other injuries, do you now wear any other protection devices on the bike which would have prevented these, or at least reduced them. Do you at least advise others to?

I wear MTB elbow. knee & wrist protection if it is very icy out. But don't worry folks, if I crack my knee pad I will not blabber on about how I would be in a wheelchair without it.

When I was in secondary school the majority of lads I knew cycled to school, nobody wore helmets, in icy weather they were dropping like flies, amazingly the roads were not awash with blood & brains & skull splinters -going by all the anecdotes I hear nowadays there should have been.

I fortunately have not known anybody who died from a cycling crash, this included friends of friends in school etc, a huge circle of people I would have heard about. This was back when nobody wore helmets and would cycle drunk and very recklessly. However now I have met several people who claimed the helmets save their lives -these were adults and I would guess they were not engaging in as reckless behaviour I saw teenage friends doing.

The anecdotes simply do not add up, odds are I should have heard of loads of deaths, quite a few more than the lives I heard about being saved -as I should have known a far greater number of overall miles & falls done without helmets.

I'll clarify, if the activity is road bike training, my advice is to wear a helmet, to mitigate risk of injury for that specific activity. Other activities you mention, people can make up their own minds.

You mention having mtb pads. Do you ride mountain bikes at speed on mountain bike trails?. More specifically, do you do any downhill racing and would you advocate not using a helmet to mitigate risk for that activity?

rubadub

TiBoy wrote: »

You mention having mtb pads. Do you ride mountain bikes at speed on mountain bike trails?

No, never have, I got them specifically for commuting in icy weather. I actually saw a guy on the N11 on a cycletrack wearing similar the other day, elbows anyway -think it is first time I ever saw another adult commuter wearing them, along with a helmet.

TiBoy wrote: »

do you do any downhill racing and would you advocate not using a helmet to mitigate risk for that activity?

I would definitely want to wear a helmet doing downhill MTBing, if I ever did decide to do it, I have made this point in old posts numerous times. If I was doing rally car racing I would want to wear a helmet too. But I do not wear helmets when commuting in cars or buses. I did wear one doing go-karting, don't think there was an option but would have wanted one.

If I was really cautious & worried I would look at it rationally and would sooner wear a bike style helmet in a typical car journey before a bicycle. I do know of people killed in car crashes and do wonder if a helmet would have saved them.

Seweryn

Interesting...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGsM-XIuGwo

Eamonnator

^^^^^^^^^^^^
in that video, it says that Dublin has 9 rentals per bike per day, compared to two cities in Australia, where the rental rate is 0.3 per bike per day.

Chuchote

Met someone who had a serious head injury due to a car crash (seat belt doesn't work if you're thrown sideways…) Was lecturing me about wearing a helmet when cycling.

Asked if they now wore a helmet in the car.

Astonished stare. "Uh… no…!"

Fireball XL5

Not really getting involved in the debate but here is a picture of my hemet after a particularly nasty fall a while back - I had a pretty sore head afterwards and was more than grateful for the protection given.

Picture was taken in the ambulance.

Chuchote

Fireball XL5 wrote: »

Not really getting involved in the debate but here is a picture of my hemet after a particularly nasty fall a while back - I had a pretty sore head afterwards and was more than grateful for the protection given.

Picture was taken in the ambulance.

Yowch! How did the fall happen? Sport cycling or functional bike riding?

Fireball XL5

Chuchote wrote: »

Yowch! How did the fall happen? Sport cycling or functional bike riding?

It was as the end of this year's Ring of Beara sportive - about 1k from the finish line I overtook some slower riders and when moving back in my front wheel caught a really high cats eye sideways and just bounced off - over I went on my right side, bashed my head and cracked a rib. My shoulder still hurts!

Helmet really did its job - an expensive replacement but well worth the money. I know people have different views on helmets here and elsewhere but this is not the first time a helmet has helped me. A number of years a go I hit the safety barrier outside RTE (don't ask how - I wouldn't want to bore you with the details.). My helmet took the brunt on the collision but I still spent three days in St.Vincents hospital with concussion and another week with a thumping headache.

I won't enter the discussion because I know how divisive it is - I suppose its down to personal choice and experience.

I have made my own choices in relation to helmets however.

Chuchote

I hope you've contacted Cork County Council to point out the danger of badly installed catseyes.

iwillhtfu

Right so after a fairly heavy spill off the MTB the other week.

I'm curious to anyone that might have MIPS on there lid and does it work as suggested. I'm fairly sure most of the damage I suffered which wasn't to bad bit of whip lash neck compression type thing was caused due to lack of movement within the helmet.

I'm currently looking at some and POC seem to have a great rating specifically POC trabec race

https://www.bike-discount.de/en/buy/poc-trabec-race-mips-mtb-helmet-209589?delivery_country=71&varid=209591&gclid=CjwKCAjw_dTMBRBHEiwApIzn_Clv2zqv9ycF-ZTAWtvcj6Y6Yx6JGKbluKRSAYj2CVUTGvuuvnfaWBoCbRwQAvD_BwE

I'm not interested in the pros v cons on helmets my mind is set and not for turning.

tomasrojo

Chuchote has a MIPS helmet, I think.

Annie get your Run

iwillhtfu wrote: »

Right so after a fairly heavy spill off the MTB the other week.

I'm curious to anyone that might have MIPS on there lid and does it work as suggested. I'm fairly sure most of the damage I suffered which wasn't to bad bit of whip lash neck compression type thing was caused due to lack of movement within the helmet.

I'm currently looking at some and POC seem to have a great rating specifically POC trabec race

https://www.bike-discount.de/en/buy/poc-trabec-race-mips-mtb-helmet-209589?delivery_country=71&varid=209591&gclid=CjwKCAjw_dTMBRBHEiwApIzn_Clv2zqv9ycF-ZTAWtvcj6Y6Yx6JGKbluKRSAYj2CVUTGvuuvnfaWBoCbRwQAvD_BwE

I'm not interested in the pros v cons on helmets my mind is set and not for turning.

Just on this, would it be worth starting a thread on which helmet (and why), mine was cheap enough but I'd certainly be interested in hearing some good reasons why the more expensive ones may, or may not be better.

Chuchote

I have a MIPS but have never (touch wood) have to test it. I don't know if it's its mipsiness, but on hot, close days like today I find myself absent-mindedly leaving it in the basket rather than putting it on and boiling.

buffalo

I was at a wedding last week where the dinner conversation turned to injuries - one person had fallen down the stairs and required a few stitches in their head, someone else had come off the bike but been okay apart from bruising. Which was asked if they were wearing a helmet? (no prizes)

I was met with stunned looks at pointing out this somewhat illogical response, and horror for my shameful admission that I don't always wear a helmet.

[Deleted User]

buffalo wrote: »

horror for my shameful admission that I don't always wear a helmet.

Don't mind them, hun - I rarely wear my helmet at weddings these days either.

I love Sean nos

buffalo wrote: »

I was at a wedding last week where the dinner conversation turned to injuries - one person had fallen down the stairs and required a few stitches in their head, someone else had come off the bike but been okay apart from bruising. Which was asked if they were wearing a helmet? (no prizes)

I was met with stunned looks at pointing out this somewhat illogical response, and horror for my shameful admission that I don't always wear a helmet.

Take a look at this graphic from the Guardian. On the right in red it contains numbers for both deaths from cycling and also from falls on steps. Pretty big gap between the two. Print it out for the next wedding you attend. Eventually you'll stop receiving invites, which is gravy.

Taken from this article.

magicbastarder

I love Sean nos wrote: »

Take a look at this graphic from the Guardian. On the right in red it contains numbers for both deaths from cycling and also from falls on steps. Pretty big gap between the two. Print it out for the next wedding you attend. Eventually you'll stop receiving invites, which is gravy.

utterly pointless as a debating tactic, though. every single person who can walk deals with steps in their daily life.
in fact, you'd be undermining your own argument trying to use that in any serious way.

I love Sean nos

magicbastarder wrote: »

utterly pointless as a debating tactic, though. every single person who can walk deals with steps in their daily life.
in fact, you'd be undermining your own argument trying to use that in any serious way.

I wouldn't be having such a debate in the first place as I don't have or use a bicycle. Anyone who started banging on about helmets or some other such waffle in a conversation with me would receive a swift WTF in response.

tomasrojo

https://www.bikebiz.com/news/malta-scraps-lid-laws

Malta is set to repeal its cycle-helmet compulsion law. The island is the only EU country to compel all cyclists to wear helmets, but it has found that such a law discourages cycling. Malta Today also reports that helmet compulsion puts a dampener on bike-share schemes.

doozerie

I was reminded of the helmet "debate" (it's hardly ever an actual debate though!) again recently while listening to a news report on RTE Radio. They were discussing alcohol, and its abuse, and one of those being interviewed cited a horrific statistic for the number of deaths in Ireland each year that are directly attributable to alcohol abuse. I couldn't recall the actual number afterwards, it seemed so unrealistic at the time that I assumed it was simply wrong anyway and I didn't retain it.

But it wasn't wrong. As a few moments searching online quickly confirms, you can pick whatever ridiculous number you like and you'll probably still fall short of the reality: LINK

The harmful use of alcohol is especially fatal for younger age groups and alcohol is the world’s leading risk factor for death among males aged 15 to 59, according to the WHO. In 2012, about 3.3 million deaths, or 5.9% of all global deaths, were attributable to alcohol consumption. Harmful alcohol use is the fifth leading cause of death and disability worldwide, up from 8th in 1990, and every 10 seconds somebody dies from a problem related to alcohol and many more develop an alcohol-related disease.

There are three deaths every day in Ireland due to alcohol consumption.

88 deaths every month in Ireland are directly attributable to alcohol.

One in four deaths of young men aged 15-39 in Ireland is due to alcohol.

There are many many reasons why the obsession with helmets is not just misguided but downright unhealthy. So here is yet another one, it's one that has been cited time and again but like the others it seems to utterly fail to dent the widespread fixation with the theoretical dangers of cycling and the theoretical life-saving powers of helmets. But here it is anyway: they are many more prominent sources of death and harm in our society that many of us wilfully ignore, one of them is alcohol abuse, but we prefer to focus on bits of polystyrene.

Funnily enough, much like many people seem to believe that I have no right to contribute to the helmet "debate" because I often choose not to wear one, I'm also often not welcome to contribute to the alcohol abuse debate because I don't drink alcohol. Consistent ignorance is at least consistent, I guess.

Anyway, next time someone starts lecturing me on how I'm socially irresponsible by not wearing a helmet every single time I ride a bike, I may ask them whether they themselves are being socially irresponsible in their consumption of alcohol. After all, if they drink beyond the recommended limits (which seems to be a national past-time) that risks placing a massive burden on their families, and the health service, and therefore all us tax payers, etc., if/when it all goes horribly wrong. I'm sure they won't see any similarities between the two arguments, so they'd just assume I'm a contrary and weird hoor (as well as being reckless of course) and stop talking to me, which would be its own successful outcome.