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

Dermot Illogical

Boogietime wrote: »

Not to worry if you weren't taking the piss and you really meant what you said, I'll try to explain my opinion one last time a lil' bit clearer:
If your activity is prone to give you head trauma, you should wear a helmet.

Is that okay?

One really good example - being that condescending in real life.

smacl

Boogietime wrote: »

If your activity is prone to give you head trauma, you should wear a helmet.

Beginning to think I need to wear a helmet reading this thread so, it's seems like banging your head off a brick wall.

1750W

smacl wrote: »

Beginning to think I need to wear a helmet reading this thread so, it's seems like banging your head off a brick wall.

Don't argue with fools as they will only try to drag you down to their level and beat you with experience.

CramCycle

Boogietime wrote: »

Cool, I'd be glad if you could provide statistics that show that walking in public leads to more head trauma than cycling on public roads.

Not at hand but I was sure there was a link earlier in the thread with relative numbers of serious head injuries and I know Cycliing was behind driving and being a pedestrian.

Also, in my opinion, wearing a helmet when having a drink is like putting on a condom if you're passive.

I have never heard that expression in my life, I can guess what it means (ED sufferer?!?), I would presume a helmet (either of the cycling kind or a cap for the other) is a wise idea due to the increased risk of low speed collisions which could create a small mess which is specifically what they are designed for :eek:

Not to worry if you weren't taking the piss and you really meant what you said, I'll try to explain my opinion one last time a lil' bit clearer:
If your activity is prone to give you head trauma, you should wear a helmet.

And here is the point that shows you haven't read through the thread, cyclists are not "prone" to hitting their head or recieving head trauma, it happens but it happens far more in activities that do generally have helmet wear associated with them.

TinyExplosions

Boogietime wrote: »

Cool, I'd be glad if you could provide statistics that show that walking in public leads to more head trauma than cycling on public roads.

In 2011, 47 pedestrians were killed in Ireland, as opposed to 9 cyclists. Now, based on that statistic you should be wearing far more safety gear walking than cycling! (numbers from the RSA )

Boogietime wrote: »

My argument is not based upon the road regulations at the moment. The analogy with the race driver is merely there to underline the necessity of protecting yourself when others won't.

Your analogy is flawed then, as wearing a seatbelt because it's the law has nothing do do with personal safety (even if that is the reason the law was brought in), it is a law, and so proves (or indeed disproves) nothing.

Capt'n Midnight

CramCycle wrote: »

when you are under the weather and throwing up in a toilet (kills 8 people a year in America (2007, if memory serves correctly)),

TBH wearing a helmet while that drunk is more likely to lead to "death by misadventure" due to strangling as the child statistics show

TinyExplosions wrote: »

But currently, wearing a seatbelt is the law, wearing a helmet isn't, so your argument doesn't stack up in the slightest.

Wearing a helmet would improve your chances in a car collision.


Motor vehicles are the most common cause of injury death in the US. Excluding poisoning they are also #1 for each age group between 1 to 64 years.
For 65+ only falls kill more. For babies less than one only accidental suffocation and homicide kill more.
http://www.cdc.gov/injury/wisqars/pdf/10LCID_Unintentional_Deaths_2010-a.pdf

Cars are dangerous both to the occupants and to other road users.

Last year there were 162 deaths and 6389 injuries on our roads. Much of this could be prevented if motorists obeyed the rules and didn't take chances. It's the price we pay for motorists personal freedoms.

AstraMonti

I am tired reading the same argument over and over again. the reason you hit your helmet when you go down is because the helmet is MUCH larger than your head. In most of the circumstances your shoulders are there to protect your head. If that's not the case then chances are that your styrofoam hat is not gonna help anyway. On a bike it makes more sense to wear knee and elbow pads than a helmet for your safety but apart from the downhill guys I haven't seen anyone wearing them. With all these I am reading I am surprised petethedrummer survived the Evil spin without a helmet.

smacl

TinyExplosions wrote: »

In 2011, 47 pedestrians were killed in Ireland, as opposed to 9 cyclists. Now, based on that statistic you should be wearing far more safety gear walking than cycling! (numbers from the RSA )

Sorry, but no. You need to consider the total number of hours spent for each activity across the population being studied to ascertain the relative risk of one activity over another. e.g. if there was one cyclist spending an hour on the road for every 10 pedestrians spending 1 hour on the road, your ratio changes from 9/47 (cycling 19% as dangerous as walking) to 90/47 (cycling 190% as dangerous as walking). Similarly, if no one cycled, it would become entirely safe by that type of flawed analysis. I've no idea what the actual figures are, but the number of deaths per activity over time is meaningless without the amount of time spent doing each activity.

FWIW, I'm totally against compulsory helmet legislation, but at the same time many of the anti-helmet studies I've seen appear mathematically unsound and loaded with bias. YMMV.

Lumen

smacl wrote: »

Sorry, but no. You need to consider the total number of hours spent for each activity across the population being studied to ascertain the relative risk of one activity over another. e.g. if there was one cyclist spending an hour on the road for every 10 pedestrians spending 1 hour on the road, your ratio changes from 9/47 (cycling 19% as dangerous as walking) to 90/47 (cycling 190% as dangerous as walking). Similarly, if no one cycled, it would become entirely safe by that type of flawed analysis. I've no idea what the actual figures are, but the number of deaths per activity over time is meaningless without the amount of time spent doing each activity.

http://www.cyclehelmets.org/1199.html

"Two studies have sought to pull together international data to make a comparison of risk in walking, cycling and motoring (Wardlaw, 2002; Krag, 2005). Both of these studies have found that pedestrians face higher risks per distance travelled than cyclists.

Wardlaw, 2002 noted that on a risk per hour basis, the comparison of risk between cyclists and motorists gave greatly varying results depending on the country in question. For instance, cycling is safer per hour than motoring in France, but the reverse is true in Britain."

CramCycle

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

TBH wearing a helmet while that drunk is more likely to lead to "death by misadventure" due to strangling as the child statistics show

They start drinking young around your part of the country :pac:

Note: I know I shouldn't joke in such a serious matter but I misinterpretted it the first time and can't get it out of my head.

Cyclepath

smacl wrote: »

FWIW, I'm totally against compulsory helmet legislation, but at the same time many of the anti-helmet studies I've seen appear mathematically unsound and loaded with bias. YMMV.

I'm on the same page, pro helmet, anti-helmet law. I know that I cycle as fast as I possibly can and that my commute/leisure rides take in plenty of steep hills. I regularly exceed 50 kmph which is fast enough to kill you if you hit a car/wall.

I therefore choose to protect my head in a reasonably sensible manner. I don't trust that my shoulders/arms will take the brunt of a fall or collision because I have personal experience of that not working very well for me.

Looking at some of the other bizarre arguments; I also take my chances that the straps are not very likely to strangle me, as I'm almost 48 and know how to tighten them properly.

I also reject the notion that a helmet significantly increases the chances of neck-shear because, logically, it means that your head had to hit something hard in the first place to cause it...

Just as seat belts can give you nasty chest bruising, helmets can of course have some adverse side effects, but only in the process of offering you greater overall protection.

chakattack

Lumen wrote: »

http://www.cyclehelmets.org/1199.html

"Two studies have sought to pull together international data to make a comparison of risk in walking, cycling and motoring (Wardlaw, 2002; Krag, 2005). Both of these studies have found that pedestrians face higher risks per distance travelled than cyclists.

Wardlaw, 2002 noted that on a risk per hour basis, the comparison of risk between cyclists and motorists gave greatly varying results depending on the country in question. For instance, cycling is safer per hour than motoring in France, but the reverse is true in Britain."

Just pointing out the obvious...pedestrians don't get through too many kilometres in an hour.

Does the same apply per unit time I wonder? :cool:

Boogietime

CramCycle wrote: »

And here is the point that shows you haven't read through the thread, cyclists are not "prone" to hitting their head or recieving head trauma, it happens but it happens far more in activities that do generally have helmet wear associated with them.

I don't think the statistics are by percentage but by number of victims. On this line, if from 100 pedestrians two of them suffer head injury when crossing the street is a far lesser number (percentage wise) than if one in ten cyclists do. There are fewer of us who go on two wheels.

later edit: smacl offered a better view upon statistic interpretation than I ever could

My statement, once again, is that this should not be made as a law. It's just for your personal consideration, if you would like to keep your noggin safe.

Boogietime

TinyExplosions wrote: »

Your analogy is flawed then, as wearing a seatbelt because it's the law has nothing do do with personal safety (even if that is the reason the law was brought in), it is a law, and so proves (or indeed disproves) nothing.

Oh dear....


Please disregard the fact that the seat belt is mandatory by law. All I am saying is that your own safety, in this matter, is important no matter how much of an expert you are. Because you're not the only one out there and others may not be experts so you can be hit without your own fault. In which case it's better to have a noggin case.

smacl

Lumen wrote: »

http://www.cyclehelmets.org/1199.html

"Two studies have sought to pull together international data to make a comparison of risk in walking, cycling and motoring (Wardlaw, 2002; Krag, 2005). Both of these studies have found that pedestrians face higher risks per distance travelled than cyclists.

Wardlaw, 2002 noted that on a risk per hour basis, the comparison of risk between cyclists and motorists gave greatly varying results depending on the country in question. For instance, cycling is safer per hour than motoring in France, but the reverse is true in Britain."

Wardlaw also noted that "Cyclists in Britain run a higher risk per hour than the other modes (of transport)" and cites biasing factors such as the predominantly young and male composition of the cycling population. Wardlaw also points out that per KM travelled, cycling is safer than walking, but then omits other faster forms of transport in the same analysis. To their credit, cyclehelmet.org does point out on the same page that "Comparison by risk per kilometre strongly favoured the traditional view that the motor car was much safer than either cycling or walking". (Though by that approach, sitting still is a sure fire way of getting killed)

Not that this suggests that cycling is particularly dangerous, or that if it was, wearing a helmet would be of benefit. Just that to my mind the information presented on cyclehelmets.org as largely conclusive often seems less so on closer examination.

Edit: It also shows that for many of these studies, it is relatively easy to grab a few nice quotes to support any argument you care to make.

TinyExplosions

Boogietime wrote: »

later edit: smacl offered a better view upon statistic interpretation than I ever could

And some people don't know the meaning of facetious!

THough as Lumen points out, injuries per km are lower in cyclists than pedestrians, so it all depends on how you look at the numbers. You can turn any facts to suit any agendas really.

Boogietime wrote: »

Oh dear....
Please disregard the fact that the seat belt is mandatory by law. All I am saying is that your own safety, in this matter, is important no matter how much of an expert you are. Because you're not the only one out there and others may not be experts so you can be hit without your own fault. In which case it's better to have a noggin case.

But you can't disregard that, you're likening apples to oranges by tying to use the example of something that's required by law as somehow equating to something that's a personal choice.

CramCycle

smacl wrote: »

Edit: It also shows that for many of these studies, it is relatively easy to grab a few nice quotes to support any argument you care to make.

On behalf of the scientific community:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hf5FRPfGiC8

chakattack

TinyExplosions wrote: »

And some people don't know the meaning of facetious!

THough as Lumen points out, injuries per km are lower in cyclists than pedestrians, so it all depends on how you look at the numbers. You can turn any facts to suit any agendas really.



But you can't disregard that, you're likening apples to oranges by tying to use the example of something that's required by law as somehow equating to something that's a personal choice.

Injuries per km is a ridiculous measure when comparing walking and cycling.

The pedestrian safety argument is nonsense.

doozerie

11 pages in and still some people are trying to bend others to their will with their arguments of "my helmet saved my life, YOU SHOULD WEAR ONE TOO MR. STUPID". No room for discussion, no room for reason, no willingness to acknowledge anything that might challenge their "logic".

If such peoples' helmets really did save their lives it would seem a terrible irony that their helmets essentially contributed to their apparent campaign to sap other peoples' will to live through their incessant and patronising lecturing. See, helmets kill, but in a deviously long-winded way, the insidious polystyrene bastards.

CramCycle

chakattack wrote: »

Injuries per km is a ridiculous measure when comparing walking and cycling.

It could be argued that so is time, as over short distances you will spend alot less time on the bike.

Comparing anything to walking is difficult though, as it has to be done, to get to your bike to get to your car etc. So there will always be more time for injuries in the general population, over distance it will most likely loose as well. Should we only include walks that are possible by other modes of transport.

I always thought the fairest way would be to accept that these either average out or are unimportant and it should be done by per population method. ie how many serious injurise per 100,000 pedestrians, against how may serious injuries per 100,000 cyclists, against how many serious injuries per 100,000 motorists. But even this falls down in some studies, as injury rates in Canada in terms of numbers remained approximately the same as numbers went down in terms of cycling, making it look more dangerous by this mode of comparison etc.

If we did go down this route, do you include the stats on the chances you will be victim of physical assault while using this mode of transport, I presume pedestrians are more at risk in general, cyclists second, followed by motorists unless they are in rush hour traffic.

Stats will always tell you how close you are to what you want to hear in a specific set of circumstances in anything that has a grey area. Helmets are a grey area (LOL because thats what they are meant to protect, I am so funny sometimes), I can't see a way of taking a definitive answer on the subject, so I think, let people make up their own minds on this one. Numbers wise (not statistics, just number of injuries), it is not that dangerous to need a push for or against, if you believe it makes you safer, wear one, if you don't, don't buy one unless you need one for other reasons (see Mother in law/Cycling Ireland Insurance).

smacl

CramCycle wrote: »

I always thought the fairest way would be to accept that these either average out or are unimportant and it should be done by per population method.

Problem is that the populations aren't in any way homogeneous. e.g. from Wardlaw again;

In contrast to driving and walking, cycling in Britain is mainly the preserve of children and young males, groups hardly noted for aversion to risk.
The mean age of serious cyclist casualties (killed/seriously injured) is 24, while for drivers it is 34.

A statement like 'Cycling is dangerous' is conflating a large and disparate group of people and activities into a single homogeneous population. It's too broad (what is cycling in this context?) and too general (how do you quantify 'dangerous'?). Throwing in comparative notions against other broad and general ideas doesn't really help. Discerning unbiased scientific study from rather biased opinion pieces also seems fraught.

I can't see a way of taking a definitive answer on the subject

Yep, quite possibly because there isn't one.

doozerie

CramCycle wrote: »

Helmets are a grey area (LOL because thats what they are meant to protect, I am so funny sometimes), ...

You would have earned bonus humour points if you'd contrived to have the sentence refer to the topic of helmets being a "grey matter"

rollingscone

doozerie wrote: »

You would have earned bonus humour points if you'd contrived to have the sentence refer to the topic of helmets being a "grey matter"

But then he would have had to punch himself in the face.

Spook_ie

Diarmuid wrote: »

I presume you learned your lesson and always wear a helmet to the pub now?

Or maybe he learned his lesson and just doesn't drink as much

Spook_ie

Dermot Illogical wrote: »

It is for their safety, and that of anyone else they may be catapulted into on impact.
Whereas wearing (or not) a helmet on a bike doesn't affect anyone else but the cyclist. Not that you would think that from the amount of people who seem determined to interfere. I can only guess they possess the potent cocktail of pathetic skills with a dash of belief that those skills are as good as it gets, and as such are projecting their perception of risk onto others.
Wobble off the lot of you.

By that same logic, then if someone is alone in a car then wearing a seatbelt only affects them!

tomasrojo

Cyclepath wrote: »

I also think it'd be difficult to find anyone who would say, post-accident, "I wish I hadn't been wearing that bloody helmet..."

CramCycle has already fielded this better than I could, but I read this case a while ago:

http://www.canberratimes.com.au/act-news/insurance-for-cyclists-would-limit-pain-and-hurt-20130413-2ht1w.html#ixzz2QVB9oYqJ

''It is unlikely I'll walk one day,'' said the 65-year-old Mr Kerec, who takes half a cup of drugs a day. He was nearly garrotted by the strap from his own helmet after he believes it became tangled in the other bike and yanked his head back.

blorg had a painful but non-life-changing neck injury because of straps, I seem to remember him saying some time ago.

However, Mr. Kerec's case is a freak accident. In fact, cyclists rarely suffer severe injuries, those cycling non-competitively even more rarely, helmeted or otherwise.

As mentioned before (I think in this thread), the cycle helmet probably could do with a fundamental re-think. The only really radical departure I can think off is the Hövding, which probably should be mentioned in this thread, seeing as it's the definitive helmet thread. Frequently derided, including by me, it has performed considerably better in standard linear impact tests than the standard helmet. Maybe will turn out to have its own unexpected safety issues. Who knows.

Capt'n Midnight

Spook_ie wrote: »

By that same logic, then if someone is alone in a car then wearing a seatbelt only affects them!

replacing the drivers airbag with a harpoon would improve the safety of other road users.

Dermot Illogical

Spook_ie wrote: »

By that same logic, then if someone is alone in a car then wearing a seatbelt only affects them!

Not if they are expelled at speed. Think it through.

Spook_ie

Dermot Illogical wrote: »

Not if they are expelled at speed. Think it through.

I did they are probably going to cause as much damage as a cyclist flying off his bike, do you propose belting cyclists to their cycles?

Dermot Illogical

Spook_ie wrote: »

I did they are probably going to cause as much damage as a cyclist flying off his bike, do you propose belting cyclists to their cycles?

At what speed do you think these cyclists are to be thrown off their bicycles then? If it's to be the same speed that expels occupants from vehicles then perhaps Strava better put the lawyers on a retainer.