Heads up

March 17, 2010

There are two topics on this most-festive of days. This first link (below) is a long one, and although it's not bike-related, it's  interesting---especially when you think of what you think of when you think of lemmings. You'll get something out of it.
I came to this from theonlinephotographer.com, a great site whether or not you take pix. Scroll down a bit and it's the article titled "Picture Perfect."

http://www.audubonmagazine.org/incite/incite1003.html

The other topic is heads--something dear to us all---and helmets.  Now and then I've mentioned the phenomenon called "risk compensation" as it relates to riding bikes, and now it has another name.

I'm surprised that so far we've not been scolded for videos with helmetless riders. It's never the plan. Jay and Vaughn do those on the way home and the way in, and that's how it ends up.

I own about five helmets and always wear one at night, and sometimes  in the day when it's raining, but never without mixed feelings. I'm always more careful without one, and that's probably because my head is more vulnerable without one. But when you combine "more careful" with "more vulnerable" you may get "less likely to crash."

Of course if you DO go down, you want that helmet on you, I'm sure. Although even then, it's not as cut-&-dried as it seems, and as we'd all love it to be.

Shortly after  Hollywood actress Natasha Richardson died in a skiing accident, I was reading an article in the NYT about head injuries, and it seems there has not been a dramatic decrease in head injuries since people started wearing helmets. The same is true of head injuries among cyclers.

I don't have at my fingertips all the studies, but this is a blog, not an academic paper. I've read that many times, in many places, and from sources I can't recall in an instant, but who seemed to be in a position to say.

One thing also that happens with bike helmet mandations, probably not with skiing helmet ones, is that ridership goes down. Adults don't seem to mind, but teenagers do. Teenage girls in particular, don't want to buff up their hair for half an hour in the morning, then put a helmet on it and ride to school. It's a looks thing and a thing about what the helmet will do to their hair. (My 15-year old...doesn't spend that much time on her hair, and knows not wearing a helmet is not an option, and wouldn't be even if were allowed by law, which it isn't.)

As for the skiing article, a head injury specialist said the helmets helped when you bonked a tree, but not as much when you hit hard snow---because with a helmet on your head is bigger, and bigger heads don't penetrate as deeply into the snow, so your head stops more suddenly.

If you lie down on your side on a floor or the road, resting on your shoulder, and then you try to smack your head against the ground, you won't be able to. If you do the same with a big helmet on, you will. Helmets hit before heads hit, and sometimes when heads wouldn't. The fore-and-after headsmack test favors the helmet more, but the point here is: A smaller diameter may, in some circumstances, be better.

That makes sense, doesn't it?

And helmets that stick out in back are more likely to get caught and twist your neck. Forget the caddy helmets.

Then there's the Peltzman deal--which you can read about soon. There's a link to it in one of the articles linked below.

And on a purely shallow vanity photographic level, helmets tend to dominate photographs. It's not as noticeable in the Tour where most riders wear them and the whole thing is Las Vegas in the Alps anyway, with the follow cars and banners and hoopla and all. But when you see a super-vented red-white-or-yellow long-finned helmet in the ferny forrest, it looks like a robot has entered Eden.

Some helmets are way better in that way than others. The ones I'm liking these days are, in no order:

Bell Metro
Bell Faction
Bern (most)
NutCase (most)

They have rounded shapes. Most (not the Metro, or whatever it's called these days) have simple strap arrangements, where the straps are riveted to the helmet and not adjustable.

THAT'S GOOD. They don't swivel around and lost adjustment when you hang them on your handlebars, as people do. The helmet makers may not be the Stephen Hawkings of the manufacturing world, but by Buddha they know where to attach straps so they fit heads, and I say leave it up to them to do it.

The riveted straps stay put and are much easier to deal with. The "multi-purpose" helmets made for bike-n-skate tend to be rounder, less catchy, and less robotlike. I like that better, too.

For city riding, put reflective tape all over them, and go bright. I like the Nutcase Gumball helmet, although I don't have one. And I'd  plaster tape over the gumballs anyway. You can make round spots with reflective tape.

If you ride at night, even if you hate helmets, think of the helmet as nothing more than yet another place to plaster reflective tape, and cover it like crazy. A well-reflectorized rider at night is way, WAY more visible than a normal rider during the day. The triangles we sell are fantastic. Day or night, I don't ride without one, and in the day they're about a hundred times more visible than a blinky light. At night, they're even better.

Anyway, here's something about risk compensation, the Peltzman effect, whatever. It's not anti-helmet; it's pro-thinking:

http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/05/freakonomics-radio-super-bowl-edition-what-happens-to-your-head-inside-the-helmet-after-a-nasty-hit/

Here's another helmet thing, here. A pdf that may help you make your helmet cooler and more visible.