Okay I’ll admit it I only ride with a helmet when I film. Thats it. I might start wearing one this year though I’m still thinking about it.
Wow! Only on one ride in 10,000? Assuming you ride once a day, every day, including Christmas, Passover, Easter, Eid, Ramadam, and Diwali, you only wear your helmet one day every 27 years and 4 months?
Can I borrow it?
I used to not wear a helmet Because I thought they looked really stupid(my own folly) Well I was doing trials on some like 20" pallets and was going to gap about 4 or 5 Feet over to a 19" box…Well I Made the jump except landed leaning slightly back…tipped over, fell off the back of the box head first(Oh I had taken my helmet off because it was cold and I wanted to wear a stocking hat) and caught myself on my hand with my head about 2" away from brain damage. And then had my unicycle roll over me…No actual damage done thank goodness, But I wore a helmet if I did any jumps over 12" after that, Or unless I didn’t have one. Fortunately My sister bought me the Bell wicked helmet for Christmas. It’s a black skate helmet with blue flames all over, so now I don’t look stupid AND have head protection so it’s all good! (oh the only thing is I haven’t been able to use the helmet at all because I got it 5 days after I broke my leg) Oh well…the Moral of this story…Wear a helmet if you’re gonna do anything remotely dangerous. You can ask Tommy or Memphis Mud, They will tell you I was pretty crazy…AND the only one to NOT wear a helmet. I would much rather protect my beautiful head even at the expense of having a helmet looking dumb and being annoying.
Oh yeah…I used to wear no protective gear. Now I wear: Helmet, Leg armor and Full finger bike gloves…I have found no reason so far to wear arm armor.
I didn’t wear a helmet very often until I started posting here. This argument has come up many times, and I’ve always felt that the reasons to wear a helmet have outweighed the reasons not. So I do.
I don’t wear one when riding to work (about a mile), but I’m mainly on local streets and I don’t try anything crazy. Just commuting. For freestyle I usually don’t unless I’m learning something new; then I really gear up with leg armor, gloves, and helmet. I wear my gloves almost all the time because my hands feel more comfortable when wearing them, and I’ve had enough UPD’s when I fall off but my hands touch down that I know that the gloves feel nicer hitting the ground than my hands.
As for the argument that wearing a helmet makes you try crazier things, in my case that’s true. I feel more indestructable while wearing my helmet. But without wearing a helmet, I ride at such a timid level that it’s not very fun. Wearing one makes me want to play more (and I still don’t do much crazy stuff).
One problem. When I ride in the winter, my ears get painfully cold unless I’ve got a warm hat on. The helmet prevent this. Is there anything I can wear to protect my ears while riding so I can still wear my helmet?
What kind of helmet do you have? If a regular bicycling helmet, then you can either wear a balaclava or there are ear protectors that will attach to your helmet straps. If you have the round full helmet, it is not so easy because you have to have to have a helmet large enough to put a balaclava underneath.
This is the one I have and it works really well.
There are ear bands (head bands) that are designed to be worn with bike helmets that will help keep the ears warm.
Performance has some on sale.
Fleece earband
Windproof earband
Ear warmer
I have the Performance fleece ear band. It works OK. There is no real need for a windproof one at unicycling speeds.
Other than on maybe 4 or 5 occasions I always wear my helmet. Although I have never hit my head, I’d rather not take that chance. Even if it’s just a ride to the store. I can’t just ride. There is always that chance to hop up a curb and misjudge something and bang, I’m getting stitches in my head or worse. Although I’ve been lucky so far with only the sprained ankle in 3 years of riding trials and muni, there is always the chance for a disaster. I’d rather avoid it if I have the means to. The ankle is bad enough.
Re: Helmets
On Wed, 21 Jan 2004 11:37:17 -0600, Mikefule
<Mikefule@NoEmail.Message.Poster.at.Unicyclist.com> wrote:
>chirokid wrote:
>> *I wear a helmet on .0001% of my Unicycle rides. *
>
>
>Wow! Only on one ride in 10,000? Assuming you ride once a day, every
>day, including Christmas, Passover, Easter, Eid, Ramadam, and Diwali,
>you only wear your helmet one day every 27 years and 4 months?
No, only one ride in 1,000,000; you missed the %. So I guess you could
borrow the helmet until the year 4740, but it’s not a full face one.
Klaas Bil - Newsgroup Addict
I have a feeling you might need two points of contact with the ground for such a thing to work? Or at least training wheels on the front and rear. - John Foss commenting on a picture of a one-wheeled vehicle he saw on RSU.
I’ve noticed that I don’t duck low enough for some branches when MUni-ing with a helmet, too. I reckon this is precisely because I’m wearing a helmet! You have no sense of how tall your head is when wearing a helmet and hence don’t duck low enough. I used to keep my bike under the house and would regularly hit my helmeted head when stepping in or out of the low access door.
I'm not putting this forward as a reason not to wear a helmet, merely an observation.
–Tony
I only wear a helmet when im trying new stuff that is dangerous. Also, I try to wear one whenever i am riding bacwkards. I hit my head on black top once. since then i’ve been wearing the helmet.
I do appreciate the helmet when I smack a low branch with my head. It’s not protecting me from serious brain injury, but it is protecting me from a bleeding scalp. A cut on the scalp is no fun with blood in the hair and all that.
The branches that give me the most problem are on the uphills. For uphills you need to stand up tall in order to do the climb. It is very hard to duck and climb at the same time. It’s easier to duck down and climb on a bike so the bikes don’t have a problem with the low branches except for one spot. There was a blow-down this winter and the tree is now leaning across the trail at head height for a bicyclist. There’s a bright florescent yellow sign on the tree now that says “watch thy head”. This particular trail is designed to be technical and challenging so the low hanging branches don’t get cleared away. They’re usually left in place to add a new challenge on the trail.
I’ve had some good smacks where the extra height of the helmet was not the problem – I didn’t even come close to ducking far enough so even if I didn’t have the helmet on I’d have gotten a good smack on the head. I’ve also had glancing blows where the extra height of the helmet may have been a factor, but it’s hard to know.
I’m just glad for the helmet when I smack large branches with my head. I don’t want a bloody scalp, and I certainly don’t want stitches on my scalp.
Re: Re: Helmets
Egad! The shame.:o 
I had the same problem, so I went to the hardware store and bought a pair of those ear-muff type guys designed for construction workers. They are warm and inconpicuous and since they are designed to work with a hard hat, they go around at the base of my neck and stay out of the way. Plus they were about $15 CAN… cheap.
http://www.gorgonz.com/pages/productGLPreview.asp?prodID=370&lineID=382&catID=384
i wear mine cause i fell off a few times and hit my head on stuff(like my mom’s car) so i wear mine. i also like the way it looks w/ the graphics on it.
helmet
I wear one all the time. Mine is an old Velo helmet that I have had for over 10 years but most of the new ones are not flat enough on the front to let you wear a headlight on the front. That is why I stick with my “retro” helmet.
Carey
I wear an empty 5-gallon bucket with eye-holes cut into it, and a bungee cord wrapped around my neck to keep it on. Saftey first.
Always.
I believe my head is worth at least the $29.99 my Ryan Nyquist Bell cost.
WEar a helmet! my cousin was on vacation with us and we were going down a senic drive, BIG HILL:D with lots of sharp turns. well he kindof lost controll flipped over the handlebars landed on,his head. bounced. and flipped over on his arm, broke it in two spots. the helmet was cracked completly in half so the only things that was holding ot together were the fastning straps.
ive also broken helmets pretty bad but i was just stupid:D
Helmets Wearing
I rode for more than half a year without a Helmet or guards. I learnt to ride and rode a lot of asphalt roads and cross country. In the past two months I have started doing a lot of Muni on Single tracks with rocks and trees and roots. I have also started doing a lot of trials, and going down stairs. I bought a helmet and Elbow and Shin guards when I started with the heavy duty muni. Now I wear the protective gear whenever I muni and to trials. I don’t wear the gear when riding on the road or doing cross country. I wear only the Shin guards when working on new tricks.
Unicorn