#21
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No Helmets Needed?
Peter Clinch wrote:
As Steve Scharf suggests, this is probably about insurance. In the UK various insurers have tried threatening cyclists with contributory negligence claims when they've been injured while not wearing helmets, but as yet none of these have been successfully pressed. The main cycling organisation here, the Cycle Touring Club, has quite rigorously acted against such claims. Well, bravo I say! This reminds of the gall one damned bitch-on-wheels had when I caught up with her after she swerved right in front of me to cut into a parking lot: she didn't even try to defend herself, she simply wanted to know why *I* wasn't wearing a helmet! Had to put her down when she started to say "****"...I asked her, pointing to her five kids in the mini-van, "you still want to ****? You haven't had enough yet?" Motorists don't know how lucky they are I'm only on pedal-power! Depends what sort of falling off. A sideways slide on gravel is at least as easy, where flying over the bars is very difficult. On average I find I don't fall off any sort of bike very often except a mountain bike, and that's more a function of the terrain I'm not doing a very good job of than the bike! Well, me too -- I fall off my bike like once every eight years (but when I do, it's so stupid...going really slow, too! And I still manage to draw blood...go figure) -- but, "all other things being equal," it seems like by being closer to the ground one simply puts one's foot down to stop any imbalance foreshadowing a fall. Helmets will work by load spreading and energy absorption. The latter will generally be far more effective than the former because there's only so much head you can spread the load over, and the neck will often take the whole lot at some point in any case. Polystyrene is actually pretty effective as an absorber, but it remains the case that in the sort of accidents that will get you killed it isn't good enough. Hell, forget about killed -- I'd always maintained that at least then my problems would be over! I'm worried about crippled, as in paralyzed or brain-impaired! Helmets have a track record of not doing anything much to rates of serious injuries in cycling populations, though I certainly wear mine if I go mountain biking because I expect to fall off and at the sort of low speeds the EN1078 spec is built to actually tangibly help. If you think you'll fall off wear a lid to prevent a nasty graze and a headache, but don't assume there's much chance of it saving your life. Natch -- didn't think so. Stronger in the sense of ability to break it in your hands, yes, but better capable of absorbing energy? Unlikely. Great point. Most helmets made of tougher stuff have quite a bit of absorbing material as well as the shell, or have a fair bit of extra room and a cradle to spread the impact (like a site or climbing helmet, where it's a pretty safe assumption a primary impact will come from above) Which kinds are these? If I'm gonna wear a helmet, it might as well be the best. BTW, I can see myself wearing a 5-lb. K-Pot on a bike (US Army kevlar helm). What's five pounds? I easily eat four or five at a rest stop. Nothing stopping you organise your own rides, of course. Sure -- I hereby announce the First Annual NYC ARBR Ed Dolan Memorial 'Bent Jamboree! You must bring a girl along, though, even if she's only your sister. And last one out is a rotten eggplant! One thing to bear in mind with 'bents is they have rather different performance characteristics to typical uprights. You'll typically be slower up hills, faster into headwinds and down hills. This can be a problem for all concerned if you're on a group tour on a hilly, windy circuit, depending on how much folk are happy to wait up and take it at a slowest pace. Lower machines can make life a little more awkward to speak to folk next to you, and the fact that other folk can't draft you can be an annoyance to some, though it'll depend on the group. Something to bear in mind if you're into group riding though. Many thanks for the wonderful insight. I am into group rides, but I don't do them since I don't wear a helmet and...I rather prefer to already know the people. Pete. -- Peter Clinch Medical Physics IT Officer Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637 Univ. of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital Fax 44 1382 640177 Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK net http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~pjclinch/ |
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#22
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No Helmets Needed?
SMS wrote: Most of the junk science regarding helmets relies on a disconnect with logical thought. Invariably, the junk science (and not just as it relates to bicycle helmets) ignores legitimate control-group studies, Baloney - assuming you mean, as you usually do, the people using "junk science" are those who disagree with the Thompson & Rivara methods that predicted 85% benefit. Most of the people who _disagree_ with studies like T&R have looked into their methods and data far more deeply than those who agree with the study! How many pro-helmet people realize that T&R's "case" and "control" groups were different in many important ways beyond the presence of a helmet? How many people realize that the presentations to T&R's ER had a much higher percentage helmet wearing than the general population (meaning the people with helmets were _more_ likely to show up in the ER)? How many people realize that T&R's calculation methods also "prove" that helmets prevent over 70% of serious leg injuries? And most of all, how do those people explain the fact that the fantasy protection figure of 85% has never, not once, been approached in any jurisdiction that got lots of cyclists to wear helmets? There is a lot of "ignoring" going on, but it's not by the people you think. and looks solely at whole population studies without taking into account the myriad of other factors that can affect the whole population. You have yet to explain how (after a mandatory helmet law) helmet wearing can suddenly increase from 30% or less to over 70%, with no detectable benefit in head injuries per rider, unless the helmets are not working. Pretending "other factors" coincidentally wiped out all the helmet benefit in the very same year of the law seems delusional at best. A statement such as "cycling injuries/deaths went up after a helmet law was passed, so helmets are not necessary" shows a lack of understanding of correlation versus causation that a more educated person would not fall for. I've waited for years for your explanations to counter the points I made above. You've never given them. Perhaps it's because you "lack understanding" of those points? - Frank Krygowski |
#23
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No Helmets Needed?
["Followup-To:" header set to alt.rec.bicycles.recumbent.]
On 5 Jan 2006 12:19:15 -0800, NYC XYZ wrote: My suspicions precisely, though I also have to agree that they "can't hurt." Then I suspect you haven't read a great deal of the research. There are reasonably foreseeable mechanisms by which they could hurt (if, by that, you mean make the net injury in a given incident more serious than were the party involved not wearing a helmet). There are a number of easily foreseeable mechanisms by which they could make average net injury per mile cycled worse. Some of the statistical evidence suggests that they do (on average) 'hurt'. Quite a bit of the statistical evidence suggests they 'hurt' when compulsion is introduced. Or they might indeed not hurt, but it's not valid to say that they can't help but be better than not wearing a helmet. regards, Ian SMith -- |\ /| no .sig |o o| |/ \| |
#24
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No Helmets Needed?
Edward Dolan wrote: Folks who go cycling without wearing SOMETHING on their heads look like the jerks and dorks that they are. Like these folks? http://home-1.tiscali.nl/~edwinsel/misc_monuments.htm http://oregonfuture.oregonstate.edu/gallery/29.html http://www.ron-karpinski.com/ron-bio...-bicycling.htm http://www.travelexcel.ca/pages/main...bicycling.html http://tinyurl.com/b9prr How _dare_ they actually ride a bike without wearing the American sport cylcists' "full mating plumage"?? Admittedly, there's room for differences in aesthetic taste. But to me, the guys who think they look good with a day-glo styrofoam squid strapped to their head are generally a lot dorkier. I admit, I don't know anything about how Edward Dolan looks. But we have evidence that he's damned intolerant, and more than a little ignorant. - Frank Krygowski |
#25
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No Helmets Needed?
NYC XYZ wrote: Hell, forget about killed -- I'd always maintained that at least then my problems would be over! I'm worried about crippled, as in paralyzed or brain-impaired! From riding a bicycle? Forget about it. Before Bell had a commercial product to sell, and began (through Snell and Safe Kids) the big propaganda attack, nobody associated bicycling with serious head injury. Nobody worried about it because it essentially never happened. And indeed, if you dig for comparative data, you'll find that cycling is roughly 1% of the serious head injury problem. Riding in motor vehicles is about 50% of the problem. Falling around your own home is roughly 40% of the problem. And it's not just because people don't cycle much. On a per-hour basis, walking anywhere near traffic has more serious head injuries per hour than cycling. Riding inside cars is roughly equal to cycling in serious head injuries per hour. Helmet manufacturers, their trade associations, and the "safety" societies they donate big money to (like, for example, Safe Kids Inc.) have falsely portrayed ordinary cycling as a tremendous source of serious head injuries. Don't fall for it. - Frank Krygowski |
#26
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No Helmets Needed?
NYC XYZ wrote:
Maybe it also protects the clubs, etc., from negligence lawsuits, you think? An incredible case of chutzpah they're assuming, but then again, you really never do know -- say the families decide to sue, even if the fatality had signed all kinds of releases. It protects the officers of the club, it protects the ride leader, and in the case of our club protected the city that allowed us to use a meeting room, on the condition we had liability insurance. IIRC, we changed to the insurance from LAW because it was much cheaper than buying insurance on our own from an agent. This was sometime in the 1980's, when the liability insurance rates for allegedly dangerous activities went up. I remember the local Sierra Club Rock Climbing activity section losing insurance coverage through the Sierra Club, and having to make the club into a group that got together for meetings and parties, with all activities done not as official activities. Prior to the insurance company making the decision on compulsory helmets for the club, we had periodic debates regarding helmets. On one side, were the ride leaders, including myself, that thought that it should be a decision of the ride leader whether or not to require helmets, while on the other side we had the do-gooders that wanted to pass more rules to make everything safe for everybody. |
#27
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No Helmets Needed?
wrote: And indeed, if you dig for comparative data, you'll find that cycling is roughly 1% of the serious head injury problem. Riding in motor vehicles is about 50% of the problem. Falling around your own home is roughly 40% of the problem. Frank is this the current data? If so can you provide the source? And don't you see a bit of a logical problem with the data if it is current? Since one can safely assume that the % of cyclists that wear helmets is much higher than the % of motorists or folks hanging out at home one possible interpretation of such data would be that helmets were successfull in yielding an extremely low serious head injury rate. I'm not claiming that is so, just suggesting a possible interpretation frrom the snippet you present. And of course the rates would have to be normalized for the amount of time etc in each activity. I think we can all agree that on average the average person spends more time in the house than riding a bike and certainly the vehicle miles per person and/or vehicle hours per person are highr than similar rates for cycling. |
#28
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No Helmets Needed?
"Mike Rice" wrote in message ... On Thu, 5 Jan 2006 12:53:50 -0600, "Edward Dolan" wrote: [...] Many subjects are so simple that not much if any science is required to come to a sensible conclusion. When all else fails, rely on good old common sense. Also, case histories are not out of bounds either. So very many cyclists have stories to tell about how their helmets have saved their noggins. It stands to reason that some protection is better than no protection. Case closed! [...] Those noggins have been saved mainly from scrapes, cuts, and bruises. H*lm*ts are made to a laughably low standard. [...] That is good enough for me! I do not want to have my noggin scraped, cut or bruised. Again, case closed! Regards, Ed Dolan - Minnesota |
#29
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No Helmets Needed?
"NYC XYZ" wrote in message ups.com... Edward Dolan wrote: Pete has fallen on his head too many times and is now as screwed up as his signature. Folks who go cycling without wearing SOMETHING on their heads look like the jerks and dorks that they are. Since you have to wear something on your head, it might as well be a helmet. And who knows, it might just save your life some day. Can't hurt, I know. So, back to my oddly-shaped head: what do you do for that? I have a flat back of the head, and these helmets don't fit in the manner they're supposed to in order to be effective. I dunno. I'll just wear them Kraut helmets like the Hell's Angels. I like to wear a horse riding kind of helmet for my recumbent cycling. They look sharp, you can fit them perfectly and they are not expensive. Most bike helmets these days are for racers and look just awful. Esthetics count after all. Listen to old Pete here and you will end up posting a signature like he does and babbling about being a Medical Physics IT Officer. There is just no way this idiot can possibly be connected with a university. I strongly suspect he is the janitor there and is just using their computer for some free Internet access. Well, there definitely is such a thing as Medical Physics in health care, and Officer is an offical title, though I don't recall the IT part (could it really just be Info Tech?). Yeah, but who cares - and who needs to know any of this? It has nothing to do with recumbents and/or cycling. He is doing nothing but crowing about himself. Furthermore, he is not Great like I am. See my signature to know who I am. Regards, Ed Dolan the Great - Minnesota aka Saint Edward the Great - Order of the Perpetual Sorrows - Minnesota |
#30
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No Helmets Needed?
wrote in message oups.com... Edward Dolan wrote: Folks who go cycling without wearing SOMETHING on their heads look like the jerks and dorks that they are. Like these folks? [...] Admittedly, there's room for differences in aesthetic taste. But to me, the guys who think they look good with a day-glo styrofoam squid strapped to their head are generally a lot dorkier. I admit, I don't know anything about how Edward Dolan looks. But we have evidence that he's damned intolerant, and more than a little ignorant. I gave up on the esthetics of bike helmets years ago. They are designed with racers in mind, not tourists like myself. I like to wear the kind of helmets that are designed for horse riders. I think they look quite elegant, they fit nicely and they are not expensive. What is not to like about them? However, I think they will only work for recumbent cyclists, not upright cyclists. I maintain that you have to wear something on your head when you go cycling. Therefore, it might as well be some kind of helmet. Regards, Ed Dolan - Minnesota PS. Yes, I am intolerant of the kind of ignorance that is daily displayed on Usenet. |
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