Helmets are for stupid/smart people - Page 2

Sounds like you have a "crush" helmet. It's basically a one major impact and done helmet. By design. Several companies have multi impact helmets. Protec comes to mind. Any helmet that takes a big hit should be retired after that. Hopefully you'll survive.

Skid Lid
Brain Bucket
Dome Home
Labotomy Wantabee
CRUSH Helmet

Totally agree with this post. I think the bolded part is where some are diverging, mainly due to misunderstanding. My pet peeve is the way the newspapers write about a death. "John Doe died on Go Devil after hitting a tree. He wasn't wearing a helmet." Never mind that he impaled himself on a branch, or that he was going fast enough to turn his brain to jello inside his protective helmet.

It's the same thing they do with fatal car accidents and seatbelts, although I believe seatbelt use has a lot more data behind it as far as being a lifesaver.

I wear a helmet. My kids wear helmets. I know that helmets prevent a lot of injuries and deaths. But they won't prevent all of them. Make good choices!

My kid started skiing last year. The ski-school mandated she wear a helmet, or sign a form releasing them of liability... I know skiing has its risks, and reinforce this when skiing with her: "Keep it fun, not furious!" I haven't really learned from her whether she has a "false sense of security" because she wears a helmet... I know I don't.

As a few others have posted, the adjustment to wearing a helmet for me is the added weight. Although just less than a pound(lbs), I found my balance and timing distracted. Point is, it is enough of a change for me that I slow down. It's my first season with it... as posted, I chose to wear it both as a compliment to my kid, and stuff from above while skiing inbounds.

I am not convinced of the safety, so I won't say I'm safer with a helmet per se... but I will suggest to those who haven't worn one--especially youse who've skied a lot--that helmets require some getting used to, to overcome the distractions of added weight AND damped hearing.

I'd be really curious to know how a person adjusts to riding without a helmet, and MP3/iPod? Would s/he slow down, or take fewer risks? How would it effect the rhythm of the ride without a soundtrack, or overdub?

Smart people may do dumb things when distracted. As for stupid people, um, well... dunno: constant state of distraction?

rgds,
Dave

I want a leg helmet. SNAP!

Ooooo, bonni, I love the artwork. gonna hang it on the wall?
You really should have a trio.
This one
One with the hardware
One without the hardware and healed!

Ugh, that looks like an ugly snap. I've seen mentions of your recovery. Hope it is going well. Did you do that ski jumping over a tank full of sharks, alligators, and man eating lions???

Hmf, I think that if you've read my posts on the other helmet threads, you know exactly where I stand.:

One thing to know, that helmets do not protect against spinal cord injuries...only brain injuries. Two different things. Skiers I know that take high risk doing extreme comps, wear body armour to help protect their spinal cords.

Also, it is not necessarily how you ski/ride, it is the person that runs into you. Now that skiing/boarding is much more accessbile to people, especially in Colorado with the relatively inexpensive passes you buy. I feel that most of these people are not taking lessons and are just going on the hill balls out and not learning how to ride safely and within their means.

Personally, I don't want to be sitting in a chair, drooling on myself for the rest of my life!

Running gates the other night and caught a tip. I got spun around pretty quick and landed back and head first on Ontario hard snow. My neck was a little sore the next day, but my bean was A OK.

I love my helmet......lol

So, there you are. You DO believe everyone should wear a helmet!

Just that you keep that believe mostly to yourself, not wishing to impose it on others.

Science: I'm not convince of the safety margin helmets provide FOR ME. 1) I don't fall much 2) when I fell, I usually don't land head first. 3) Majority of my falls are in powder so I wouldn't be hitting my head too hard even if I do. 4) If I'm not wearing a helmet, I would most likely be wearing a hat which also provides a small amount of cushion.

So, combine the low likelihood of hitting my head on hardpack, even with the increased cushion of helmet over a wooly hat, it doesn't add up to much of a increase in safety margin.

I, too, found a helmet more comfortable and warm. So I wore it in the place of a hat. It may increase my safety margin by a infinitesimal amount, but that's not my concern.

Ty,

If I skied the lines you do, I would wear a helmet also.

You should see us attempt a turn...

Wow...did you ever. Thanks for the work and smart post; informative read.

Did not need to see that Bonni :

Bingo we have a winner here. To my surprise, I found everything in this post is true.

Especially number 5. I started wearing one after 9 stitches right on the very top of my head from a low branch. $500 for stitches, $100 for helmet.

Does a helmet give me a false sense of security? You betcha. Helmets are like condoms, there is no guarantee but they significantly reduce incidental risk.

Do I think everyone who does not wear a helmet is stupid? Well lets just say I ain't smart nuf to figure that one out.

Is that freedom rock man? Well turn it UP!!

I believe in the choice for adults.

Sooo.... What about kids? Mandatory until age...????????????????

?

Love my helmet. Feels weird without it and it has saved my noodle (which contains approx $100k in education money) from many unpleasant bangs.

As for my 5 yo. He knows it is as much a part of his gear as boots and gloves.

The only thing a hat has over a helmet is that it fits in a boot and it is machine washable. That's a small tradeoff for a $100,000 medical bill or funeral. Still, I choose not to wear one, but my kids will definately wear helmets before getting on a lift.:

Ooooo, you're one of those "do as I say, not as I do" people.:

"That was my skull!" Or would have been.

Yup, until you can find the grumpy old man emoticon with a helmet hehe I guess they will put "Daddy was an idiot" on my tombstone. He didn't wear a helmet and skied way too much on those old skinny skis.: Seriously though, I quit smoking when my kids were old enough to notice. Maybe I will start looking at helmets next season when they will be riding the lift with me:::

I guess I also was to be charged with the "do as I say, not as I do" since I made my kids wear an helmet as soon as I putthem on skis, of course they were already sort of used to wearing one by cycling...
Still the question was simple. I had to buy 2x helmets for them, 2x skis, 2x boots, and had to delay to buy an helmet for me, or delay skiing...

The parent child rational..............sorry if this steps on toes, but its how I think.............YES..........I do think!!!

It makes no sense at all to have your kids wear helmets, and enforce it with them, when YOU, the breadwinner and provider of their needs, are not assuming the same protection for yourself.
Is your child's security and safety not important enough for you to protect the primary provider of said security and safety?

I've been trying to get my wife to wear a helmet for the last couple of years. Was finally able to convince her as it would be a good example for our four year-old. And we found her one that looks cool.

Well, to be fair, the risks aren't necessarily exactly the same. It seems to me that we protect children in many ways that we don't adhere to as adults. I'm sure we'd all be safer strapped into five-point harnesses in our automobiles, but we only do that to children. And race car drivers.

Along these lines, does anyone use back armor for their kids?

I know, I know........but I still like to see parents take extra steps to a) be an example, and b) to protect the ultimate provider of security for the said children.

Next step........air bags

Also, my head is a LOT harder than either of my 4 or 5 year old kids. Just ask my wife...:

On the serious side, I can take a much stronger blow from an out of control rider (good luck for them). I'm far less likely to hook an edge and veer off nto a tree or pole, etc..

When I was first considering a helmet purchase, I asked several people if it was a difficult adjustment and what helmets they recommended. A snowboarder who I met on a lift at Steamboat pointed to a yellowish streak on his helmet and said this: "Aspen tree". That was enough for me. Since then, I have whacked my helmet against hardpack once and have bumped it more than once on branches and chairlift bars (not to mention the time my wife closed the tail gate of my Jeep as I was standing there).

Yes, helmets are great for many reasons. Oh, and I definitely found myself skiing more aggressively when I first bought it!

This is a silly point of view from one of the students at the school that I take skiing.
I was wearing a helmet, while some of the little kids who are just starting to ski are not,(yet).
This little girl (6 ish) looks up at me on the chair lift and says.
"I bet the reason I don't have to wear a helmet and you do, is because I don't have as far to fall"

There's a very big difference between having a belief and wanting to impose that belief on everyone else. I would be surprised if most of us here who advocate helmets wanted to go so far as to force everyone to wear one. To be sure, there are such people, but I think they're in a small minority

Is that true of all safety equipment, or just helmets? Do you suppose release bindings have the same effect?

Had a crash yesterday...

I was at seven springs PA yesterday on the upper part of the Gunnar black run. Since I like to take these slow and do wide arcs, I wait till things are clear above and below before starting my run, and if there's a lot of fast traffic overtaking me (Some people just ski straight down) I try to stop and wait for them to pass.

It was the end of the day on that side, I was stopped midway through the slope, looked up, everything looked clear except for a guy standing at the top looking down from at least 70 feet above (people tend to always stop at seven springs because it is built like steps and you can never predict what's below you).

Anyway, started doing my run, suddenly I hear a "wow" and the guy crashes into me hard from behind; my bindings release, I go flying all the way down, hit my neck fairly hard (still feel sore). I get up, the guy was like "wow, you cut in front of me". Like that answers anything; it's a very wide run, we're the only two people on the trail, he was at least 70 feet above me and could see the pattern I was doing and yet got to overtake me. Idiot. And then he's like: "Your ski scraped my lip"... I look and he's indeed bleeding. My guess is that it's not the ski (the edge would have taken his face off) but the goggle holder on my helmet.

Anyway, though the helmet didn't help with me landing headfirst, I am fairly sure it helped with the initial impact from him. I still had a slight headache and felt a little light headed (ski patrol said no concussion), but it sure beat getting his face and goggles straight down.

So, before you bought your helmet, you never wacked your head on the hardpack or chairlift bars? Or asked people why they had yellow streaks on their helmet/