Poll- Do you wear a helmet?

[topherbd16]

Always on my road bike or mountain bike. On my 'momma' cruiser w/ basket I don't. Usually I have a kid on the back (who always has a helmet) when heading to the store or pool. However, I feel guilty not wearing one when I make my kids where them. I should be smarter than that, but I'm not.

Most of my coworkers that ride to work wear helmets, but there are several that go with the busy traffic w/ no helmet. Now I think they are crazy.

 

[steve]

Always on my road bike or mountain bike. On my 'momma' cruiser w/ basket I don't. Usually I have a kid on the back (who always has a helmet) when heading to the store or pool. However, I feel guilty not wearing one when I make my kids where them. I should be smarter than that, but I'm not.

Most of my coworkers that ride to work wear helmets, but there are several that go with the busy traffic w/ no helmet. Now I think they are crazy.

I always wear a helmet!

 

[GREMLIN52]

I always wear a helmet. On our group rides if you do not have a helmet you do not ride. No exceptions.

 

[Big E.]

I always wear a helmet. On our group rides if you do not have a helmet you do not ride. No exceptions.

Thats fair enough, but surely it should be a matter of free choice?. After reading some of those replies I sometimes wonder how you guys over there get to pluck up courage enough to step outside!.

 

[bicycledick]

I'll never ride without a helmet again. I busted my skull pretty hard about 17 years ago. It took a long time to recover. I'm lucky to still be here. I would have been way better off if I had a helmet on.

I don't wear a helmet. Should I wait to bust my skull or get one in advance? I had one bad fall. A dog scared me and I wrecked. I went down on my shoulder. For the longest time when I would move the wrong way I would pull a muscle. I think I pinched a nerve or something. After 10 years it quit.

 

[bigtruckguy3500]

I've had my fair share of spills, but my helmet has never so much as gotten a scratch on it. For some reason only my arms and legs get the real road/dirt contact. But there was a short period where I didn't wear my helmet simply because it was inconvenient to carry around a helmet, but that was stupid. Luckily I never got into a serious wreck, but I always wear my helmet now, unless I'm riding only on campus, where there are no vehicles, and speeds are really slow.

 

[Beverly Stayart]

This is one of those questions with widely varying responses. People who have been injured without wearing a helmet have learned their lesson the hard way and probably will always wear a helmet in the future. People who go without a helmet should learn a lesson from this, and start wearing a helmet.

 

[Feltski]

I never ride without a lid on. Period. Maybe its that I feel like I have more to lose than the folks that dont wear them, maybe im scared to bounce my head off the pavement...really i dont know, but I never leave home without it. you can fix an arm, leg, etc. you only get one good knock to the noggin

Its funny though, here in Philly (probably all over Pa too) there is no helmet law for motorcycles. I always get a kick out of seeing just about everyone on a bike wearing a helmet, but RARELY see people on motorcycles with helmets on. It always erks me out when i see guys on motorcycles with their helmet strapped to the back while they ride. you have it...why not put it on. you may think its "not cool" to wear one, but its a hell of a lot cooler than being dead

 

[cyberlegend1994]

Absolutely. Protect your melon.

Fatal crash in my area last week, the victim was not wearing a helmet

 

[warnerma3]

I do not, although i really really should. I recommend that you do,, even if it is not the 'cool' thing to do. I can't tell you how many of my friends have been to the hospital, myself include, due to bike accidents, and while there were not head injuries, there easily could have been. Plus, if i did wear my helmet alll of the time it would ave me alot of grief from my coworkers.

 

[cram1960]

Yes. I always have.

Once I had a pedal clip break and my knee hit the bottom of my handlebars and flipped the bike....45 mph downhill....helmet cracked over the ear, but I was fine (mucho road rash, though).

I think of it as insurance...
better to have it and not need it, than to need it and not have it.

 

[Naphtali]

I have been in three wrecks on my bike; all during my teens. Two times I was able to just roll off on my side. I scuffed up my shoulder and the side of my knee a bit but I wasn't hurt. The third time I was going down hill in the rain at about 32 mph. The breaks were wet and utterly failed. The road ended in a dead end with a power substation in front of me which was surrounded by concrete pilars or a drainage ditch on either side of it. I chose the drainage ditch. As my wheel went down in the ditch I went over the handle bars and drove my head into the dirt wall on the opposite side of the ditch. When I got up and took my helmet off the styrofoam liner of the helmet fell out in two peices. The plastic shell had a huge gash down the center of it and there was a chuck of rock lodged in one of the vents. So yeah, my helmet saved me from a world of hurt if not death.

I have yet to hear a story so someone getting hurt by a helmet or how helmets impair safty; its usually a fashion or comfort issue with those who are against helmets. Not wearing one seems foolish. At best I hear, well I'm an experience rider. The best way to survive an accident is not to get in one. Or, I've been in several accidents and never hurt my head, you just have to learn how to roll through it. That reminds me of the people I talk to about wearing a bullet proof vest (I'm a security guard) and they say, "Well what if you get shot in the face?" Like a vest, helmets aren't perfect but they do improve your odds greatly.

 

[kdelong]

While I think that it should be a choice rather than a law(I don't like being told what to do), I always wear a helmet. Just last weekend I was riding a local trail after a rain storm. There was a limb hanging low on the right side of the trail, about head high for me on my bike. Since there was oncoming traffic on the left side of the trail, I attempted to duck under the limb but mis judged it by an inch or two. I got my bell rung pretty good but I didn't go down. I did have to stop and move off the trail for a couple of minutes to let the cobwebs clear. Note to self: make Tylonol part of my riding kit. It took three miles to develop but I got one heck of a headache. Anyway, the bright side of it all is that now I get to go helmet shopping as the plastic on my old one has a nice little split where it hit the limb.

 

[bigtruckguy3500]

While I think that it should be a choice rather than a law(I don't like being told what to do), I always wear a helmet. Just last weekend I was riding a local trail after a rain storm. There was a limb hanging low on the right side of the trail, about head high for me on my bike. Since there was oncoming traffic on the left side of the trail, I attempted to duck under the limb but mis judged it by an inch or two. I got my bell rung pretty good but I didn't go down. I did have to stop and move off the trail for a couple of minutes to let the cobwebs clear. Note to self: make Tylonol part of my riding kit. It took three miles to develop but I got one heck of a headache. Anyway, the bright side of it all is that now I get to go helmet shopping as the plastic on my old one has a nice little split where it hit the limb.

Funny thing about it being a choice. I'm from Texas, and we passed helmet laws years ago, and then with our conservative culture, everyone got up in arms about it for a similar reason as you, that the government shouldn't control you. So helmet laws are always going back and forth between being strong laws (apply to all) and weak laws (only apply to those under 18 or 21 years). And in the years when the laws are strong, doctors notice that there is a drop in available organ transplants. But if a young conservative wants to be reckless and ride without a helmet, the government better not tell him what to do, right?

 

[kdelong]

Funny thing about it being a choice. I'm from Texas, and we passed helmet laws years ago, and then with our conservative culture, everyone got up in arms about it for a similar reason as you, that the government shouldn't control you. So helmet laws are always going back and forth between being strong laws (apply to all) and weak laws (only apply to those under 18 or 21 years). And in the years when the laws are strong, doctors notice that there is a drop in available organ transplants. But if a young conservative wants to be reckless and ride without a helmet, the government better not tell him what to do, right?

I understand where you are coming from, the government mandating that everyone do something for the common good and all. But to me, there just seems to be something wrong with the nanny state passing a law to protect me from my own stupidity. And yes, I have heard that when someone is injured and ends up in the hostpital, it costs us all, but Obama is going to change all that. I could go on and say that whether or not someone wears a helmet is just natural selection, cleansing of the gene pool and all. But this is sounding like a topic for "My Bloody Soapbox" rather than "Road Cycling" so I am not going to hijack the thread anymore for my own political agenda. And anyway, those organs(whether from a conservative, liberal, or moderate, young or old) just might save the lives of some really smart people.

 

[alienator]

I don't see the problem with helmet laws. There is no innate or stated right for someone to be able to use a road for their car or bicycle. For a car, you have to be licensed and have to follow the laws. As a cyclist, you have to follow the laws. Sounds fair. If someone doesn't want to wear a helmet, they can just skip pedaling on the roads or where ever the helmet is required. There's always mountain biking or cyclocross.

Every time I hear "nanny state," it's in the context, 9 times out of 10, some sort of complaining or whining. The use of "nanny state" is an exaggeration in itself. But that's politics and a topic for some other forum.

 

[AndiG]

Since starting out again riding, about 3 weeks ago (Not cycled in about 10 years before hand) I always wear my helmet, my high grip gloves and my rear light is always attached in case of a downpour that reduces visibility.

 

[SourDieseL]

I always wear my helmet when I ride! I just took a horrible spill this passed weekend, without my helmet I'm sure I would have been knocked out.

 

[BikeyGuy]

ALWAYS !
18 years ago I was decending a hill at 40 mph. A dog ran out in front of me and in a split second I hit the dog and was launched over the bars. Landed on my back and my head "slapped" the asphault. Helmet crushed. Total road rash...EVERYWHERE.
Went to the hospital and NO broken bones. Doc said without the helmet I would have been a gonner. 3 days later the top of my head (about a 5 inch diameter circle) was a deep purple and elevated about 1/4 inch. Called the Doc and he said all will be fine. Ya know I never even had a headache.
The road rash took weeks to heal.
I type here because...."I WORE A HELMET" and still do.
Remember, live to tell your stories.........."Safe cycling"

 

[mapof65]

Aboslutely!!!!!!!!!!!!I'm also a trauma nurse. Helmets save lives! I live in Portland, and I've seen a few old school idiots and hipsters wearing nothing. That's why they end up in the hospital brain dead or they will never walk, feed themselves, or wipe their own butt again.