Pro cyclists wearing helmets

[Rebel Ian]

A while ago on here I'm sure someone posted some stats about incidents or injuries since pro cyclists were forced to wear helmets. Can anyone remember where it came from?

 

[ufkacbln]

Is this the one?

 

[Rebel Ian]

Is this the one?

Yes, thank you!

 

[tigger]

Be careful with those stats if you're looking in relation to head injuries and helmets. It wasn't actually until after Paris-Nice in 2003 when Kivilev died of head injuries, who wasn't wearing a helmet, that the UCI made it mandatory. Bear in mind increase of speed and the use of EPO too.

What you need is a list of the riders included in those stats, their cause of death and whether they were wearing a helmet or not.

I haven't bothered looking in too much detail, but for instance:

Galvez died of internal bleeding
Galetti heart attack

Needs a lot more analysis I suspect??

 

[Red Light]

Be careful with those stats if you're looking in relation to head injuries and helmets. It wasn't actually until after Paris-Nice in 2003 when Kivilev died of head injuries, who wasn't wearing a helmet, that the UCI made it mandatory. Bear in mind increase of speed and the use of EPO too.

What you need is a list of the riders included in those stats, their cause of death and whether they were wearing a helmet or not.

I haven't bothered looking in too much detail, but for instance:

Galvez died of internal bleeding
Galetti heart attack

Needs a lot more analysis I suspect??

All done. Heart attacks etc were all elminated and every one has a name against it and was checked. Yes 2003 was the year they were made mandatory but the change started after Casartelli's death in 1995. The trend lines are indicative and you could suggest visually there is a transition region between 95 and 03 but the data numbers are too small to claim that as any more than a suggestion in my opinion. There is no data I have on helmet wearing other than in the 1991 when UCI tried to make them mandatory there was a rider strike that forced the UCI to abandoned it so at least then and before modern helmet wearing (as opposed to the leather bunch of bananas) was low

 

[ufkacbln]

Interestingly the present standard for UK helmets (EN1078) is now outlawed for use in racing in the US as it is considered entirely inadequate!

If helmets are going to be of any use in the UK we seriously need to start looking at toughening up on protection, revisingthe present standards to something that does have some function in real life

 

[david k]

id support that

 

[tigger]

All done. Heart attacks etc were all elminated and every one has a name against it and was checked. Yes 2003 was the year they were made mandatory but the change started after Casartelli's death in 1995. The trend lines are indicative and you could suggest visually there is a transition region between 95 and 03 but the data numbers are too small to claim that as any more than a suggestion in my opinion. There is no data I have on helmet wearing other than in the 1991 when UCI tried to make them mandatory there was a rider strike that forced the UCI to abandoned it so at least then and before modern helmet wearing (as opposed to the leather bunch of bananas) was low

When you say "all done". What's all done and by whom?

Lets see the list of names of the fatalities logged on the graph. The graph is useless without it. When you publish the names and look at the actual causes of death I think you'll find the graph becomes even more useless in terms of trying to establish a link between increased use of helmets by pro cyclists and increased deaths through head injuries.

 

[tigger]

id support that

+1 without saying

 

[Red Light]

When you say "all done". What's all done and by whom?

Lets see the list of names of the fatalities logged on the graph. The graph is useless without it. When you publish the names and look at the actual causes of death I think you'll find the graph becomes even more useless in terms of trying to establish a link between increased use of helmets by pro cyclists and increased deaths through head injuries.

Tell you what, why don't you repeat the exercise yourself as an independent verification. There are only 15 people on my graph so it shouldn't take you long. If you come to the same answer we can be reasonably sure we're right, if not we can explore which ones we've disagreed on and why.

 

[Red Light]

Interestingly the present standard for UK helmets (EN1078) is now outlawed for use in racing in the US as it is considered entirely inadequate!

If helmets are going to be of any use in the UK we seriously need to start looking at toughening up on protection, revisingthe present standards to something that does have some function in real life

So lets write down the design and testing specification for a helmet that should protect a cyclist in a motor traffic accident. As it was your proposal, you have the honour of first draft. Of course part of the problem is we don't know whether its a problem of it not being protective enough, it making the head a larger and heavier target, or behavioural factors like risk compensation. So even if you have a perfectly protective helmet it may fail on the other two factors.

As a starting point though you might like to use Lewis Hamilton's helmet and look at how you would beef that up based on the comment from the UK's main helmet test house:

"In many legal cases I have studied where a cyclist was in collision with a motorised vehicle, the impact energy potentials were of a level that outstripped those that we use to certify Grand Prix motor racing helmets."

 

[tigger]

Tell you what, why don't you repeat the exercise yourself as an independent verification. There are only 15 people on my graph so it shouldn't take you long. If you come to the same answer we can be reasonably sure we're right, if not we can explore which ones we've disagreed on and why.

Its your data. The onus is on you. Lets not waste anymore time and agree it is thoroughly useless shall we?

 

[ufkacbln]

So lets write down the design and testing specification for a helmet that should protect a cyclist in a motor traffic accident. As it was your proposal, you have the honour of first draft. Of course part of the problem is we don't know whether its a problem of it not being protective enough, it making the head a larger and heavier target, or behavioural factors like risk compensation. So even if you have a perfectly protective helmet it may fail on the other two factors.

As a starting point though you might like to use Lewis Hamilton's helmet and look at how you would beef that up based on the comment from the UK's main helmet test house:

"In many legal cases I have studied where a cyclist was in collision with a motorised vehicle, the impact energy potentials were of a level that outstripped those that we use to certify Grand Prix motor racing helmets."

There you have it.... helmets will not be the only answer

We could simply beef up the standards to where they were twenty years ago when helmets offered far greater protection, do we remove the snag points that cause rotational injuries and can cause the helmet to come off in an impact.
Or we could take the adviceof the medical profession?


Headway the pro-helmet charity are quoting a paper from the British Dental Association which points out that 2/3 of head injuries in cyclists are facial ones and that the Dental Profession has a responsibility to ensure that helmet design offers greater facial protection

The dental profession could: play an active role in promoting cycle helmet use; support calls for the compulsory wearing of cycling helmets, particularly for children; press for modification of helmet design and standards to increase protection of the face.

So for a start should we be observing their advice and looking at full face helmets?


The other option is to look at the impacts and what can be done.

There are vehicles on the roads that are demonstrably going to cause greater injuries than others.

Should we also be looking at the design of vehicles and why some are allowed to be more unsafe than others?

 

[Red Light]

The other option is to look at the impacts and what can be done.

There are vehicles on the roads that are demonstrably going to cause greater injuries than others.

Should we also be looking at the design of vehicles and why some are allowed to be more unsafe than others?

There is a strong argument for cyclists to be included in NCAP ratings. At the moment cars are designed for pedestrian impacts only but cyclist impacts are quite different in nature

 

[tigger]

I'd definitely like to see improvements in helmet protection.

How about the list of names?