Cycle helmets, are they important?
The issue of cycling helmets - whether to wear on or not - is always a hot topic.
Reasons for:
- They protect your head!
Reasons against:
- They won't help in a serious crash, or stop you breaking your neck, they are just not strong enough
- In the heat, there is a risk that they cause heat exhaustion
- Pedestrians and car passengers are as likely to suffer head injuries and no one suggests they should all wear helmets
- They look daft and cost money
People tend to fall into one of three camps:
1. No one is going to tell me what to do so I am not going to wear a helmet
2. I wouldn't leave home without it - any help with safety is important and worthwhile
3. I wear a helmet on busy roads or on group rides where it is obligatory, but not otherwise.
Now I am going to take the side of the helmet wearers here, although I understand the objections. I suspect that for some people the objection is that they don't want to look silly. If none of your friends cycle, or wear helmets when they do, you feel a bit of a prat. Same as wearing cycling shorts the first time. Another objection is that personal skill and ability will prevent an accident occurring.
Yet another objection is that a helmet will often not help at all, which is true. There are many situations where wearing a helmet won't even protect your head sufficiently - but the point is, there are also circumstances where it will help. And very few real downsides to wearing a cycle helmet.
In fact there is a third, more serious objection. Studies showed that motorists were much less cautious when overtaking cyclists who wore helmets, and left much less space between their car any your bike. Similarly, there is a possibility that wearing a helmet makes a cyclist more confident when cycling, and more likely to take risks.
However skilled you are, you can fall off. Near where I live recently a lorry had spilled some fine gravel on the road. Same colour as the road, on a long, slightly downhill stretch where I am usually doing 35-40 kmh. Someone had swept most up, leaving a strip two centimetres deep and two metres wide. When I hit it I didn't fall off, just skidded spectacularly, but I could easily have fallen. So could you, it was completely invisible until I was on it.
If there is a 10% chance or even a 0.1% chance that in a cycle accident you avoid death or serious injury, that sounds good enough reason to me.
I do have a lot of sympathy with the desire to remove your helmet when you are cycling up hill on a hot day. But I cycle mostly in southern France, and it can get pretty hot, and I have never felt that the helmet is adding to my over-heating. I think avoiding having the sun beating on your bare head outweighs the disadvantages.
I don't much care if anyone else wears a helmet or not, and would not suggest to someone else that they should. But a little anecdote. For a while I rode every week with a group of four or five cyclists. When I first joined them, none wore a helmet on 'casual' rides, except me. Then after a week or two, one of the others started, and within six weeks everyone was wearing a cycling helmet. I think a lot of people would like to wear a helmet but don't want to be the first in the group to start, in case it doesn't look cool.
Have you ever had a car come unexpectedly out of a side road right in front of you, or slipped on some gravel, or had a squirrel hop under your wheels? Or had the bike in front of you in a team event suddenly brake unexpectedly? If not yet, you will one day.
So overall, I suggest you should wear a cycle helmet - they are light and airy nowadays anyway if you haven't tried one on recently. Ignore what anyone else might say, but don't preach to others about the importance of cycling helmets if they haven't made the decision themselves - a lot of people cycle for the 'free and easy' feeling it gives them and really do object to restricting that with a helmet. Their choice.
Comments
You may be the best, safest cyclist in the world, but there are far more idiots in cars.
Helmet helmet helmet every time.
Simon made an extremely valid point - you might be the safest cyclist out there, but there is no accounting for other road users. Would you not much rather suffer a few broken bones and live to tell the tale, than be a vegetable for the rest of your life...?
i was knocked off my bike a couple of weeks ago, the main impact being on my thigh as i managed to take some avoiding action....but then i went over the bonnet of the car and landed on my head...i was wearing a helmet...
so...wear a helmet....
Wear a helmet
Now I always wear one, though do find that on hills on a hot day that my head is about to explode. I even had to stop on one occasion because of this. I really thought I was going to pass out on what was a busy road during peak time.
It's tricky to get right.
But then I tried to stand up but the pain was so bad i could not stand up straight I had compressed my spine and bent it out of line i was laid up for 6 weeks to recover.
I still suffer some really bad back ache and a bit of sciatica but i am still here thanks to my helmet i even get my 3 year old dude of a son to wear one everytime he comes out with me because you can not replace whats in your head once the damage is done its permanent.
So does it really matter what you look like its not a fashion show its your life as the saying goes
"ONE LIFE SO LIVE IT"
My son had a similar experience to Hugh Bonner above - a dog ran out from nowhere and he hit it full on the side, went over the handlebars and bounced on his head. Thank God he was wearing his helmet. Now he says he feels very worried for any cyclist he sees without one.
Neither turned out to cause serious accidents (for me, less sure about them) but they could have done - reminders that however careful we are there's always something hiding in the bushes waiting to pounce!
I also snowboard and the group of friends all thought helmets uncool until the first of us got concussion. Now we all wear them and try to peer pressure our ski friends who don't - as they are just as likely (ok, maybe not quite as likely) to fall over on their head at some point. I'm pretty sure my snowboard helmet has saved me from a broken eye socket or worse and a friend went end over end and banged his head about 5 times - fortunately he was shaken but his helmet prevented more serious injury...I think there's a generation thing in the uk - 20 years ago no one wore them and they were very uncool - now it just makes you look more "serious".
Some accidents will kill you no matter what your wearing, some accidents wont, wearing a helmet reduces the number that end up with your friends and family in black suits crying at your funeral saying "if only he wore a bloody helmet"
Injuries! I will definately wear a helmet on the roada s for one the idea of speed and tarmac sends a chill down my spine compared to the relative safe feeling of dirt! Also riding the roads around dartmoor is a nice challenge but the way people drive is mental!
So without a doubt helmets are of massive importance cool or not!
*I was unable to do basic mental addition and subtraction for a few weeks afterwards. Just about back to normal, or at least I'd like to think!
I was close to finishing my daily commute to work on my beloved Moda Rubato on probably the safest part of the journey yesterday when all of a sudden a car pulled out from a blindspot making me slam on my brakes.
In turn resulting in me going straight over my handlebars while still clipped I went head first into the tarmac.
The helmet was cracked through but luckily my head wasn't!
Now you can never of predicted what would of happened if I wasn't wearing a helmet but the best outcome would of been my head split open...Now that would of been best case scenario. The likely situation would of been extremely serious resulting in a vegetated state...:cry:
THANK F**k I WAS WEARING A HELMET!
Before everyboday screams at me, I have a helmet now, but prevously had fours heav accidents on a bike every time involving a car and not wearing a helmet. Three of the times I was exceeding 40km/h when hitting into car. What saved my life all four times was doing athletics, rock climbing and other sports where I've learned good coordination and how protect yourself in a fracture of a second.
Yes, I was also lucky but marks on my shoulders shows a pattern that my body repeated all four times to protect head and back. There are more thngs one can do to protect lives and lets not depend just on technology.