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An acquaintance on another forum lost a friend yesterday. The victim had an unspecified medical problem and simply fell off his bike onto the road - breaking his neck. His helmeted skull was fine.
This got me thinking about levels of armor and what we use on a daily basis and whether it's appropriate. You can find anti-helmet advocates (in the city cycling context, anyhow) arguing that helmets are useless and sometimes they'll jokingly say collarbone armor would be more useful. What if they are right? Maybe we should be protecting ourselves based on incidence of problems and not just severity of outcome. What really is the most common bike injury that PPE could prevent? In a MTB context, now, and acute injuries requiring a doctor. Should we be going around with Leatt braces, or Dianese airbag jackets like the MotoGP guys? Stiffer boots? Is that maybe more important than knee and elbow armor?
I don't think I have a position, it's just been something my mind has been chewing on today.
This got me thinking about levels of armor and what we use on a daily basis and whether it's appropriate. You can find anti-helmet advocates (in the city cycling context, anyhow) arguing that helmets are useless and sometimes they'll jokingly say collarbone armor would be more useful. What if they are right? Maybe we should be protecting ourselves based on incidence of problems and not just severity of outcome. What really is the most common bike injury that PPE could prevent? In a MTB context, now, and acute injuries requiring a doctor. Should we be going around with Leatt braces, or Dianese airbag jackets like the MotoGP guys? Stiffer boots? Is that maybe more important than knee and elbow armor?
I don't think I have a position, it's just been something my mind has been chewing on today.