One day I rode my bike to the grocery. After I'd returned my cart, a
man I passed on my way back to my bike said "I see that you are
wearing a helmet. I wear a helmet too. Helmets are very important."

I hear "helmets are important" a lot, but on a list of important
bicycle safety equipment, helmets would come in no higher than
twentieth.


(1) First and foremost among safety equipment is correctly
tightened nuts and bolts. A bike that falls apart while you are
riding it can ruin your whole day.


A number of second-place items, in the order that I happen to think of
them:

(2) Handlebars firmly connected to your front wheel, so that you
can steer the bike.


(3) Brakes: check that they are present, appropriate, properly
adjusted, brake blocks not worn clear off.


(4) Leather-palm gloves. Sooner or later, you are going to fall,
and when you fall, you are hard-wired to put out your hand to save
yourself. Even ordinary road grit embedded in your palm can make it
difficult to continue, and Murphy guarantees that you'll land on the
only piece of broken glass in ten miles. Glass will slice right
through leather, but probably will be slowed enough to save your
tendons. (Gloves should fit very tightly to prevent "glove stopped,
hand didn't" abrasions.)

Gloves also protect you from the handlebars.


(5) At least two bottle cages. The first sign of dehydration is
stupidity, and sometimes stupidity is fatal. (On a flatfoot/crank
forward bike, one cage will suffice.)


(6) Bottles. Empty cages don't help much.


(7) Fresh water in the bottles. You must see to this before
every ride, no matter how brief. Take the first sip as you are
rolling out the driveway -- this sets the proper rhythm, and also
notifies you that you forgot to clean the bottles while you can still
go back and do something about it.


(8) Properly-built wheels. You don't want to be stranded out in
the boonies with a broken spoke.


(9) Properly-mounted wheels. A wheel with a missing spacer can
roll just fine until you stand up on the pedals to evade some danger.


(10) Tires in good condition, properly mounted. *Usually* a failed
tire is only an inconvenience but if an improperly-mounted front tire
blows off the rim at a critical moment . . .


(11) Spare tube, frame pump, and a tube-repair kit. Mostly just
saves you annoyance, but can save you from a long walk if you flat
where there is no taxi service.


(12) Sound drivetrain: pedals, chainwheels, cranks, cogs, etc. You
know that if a drivetrain fails, it's going to fail when you're
pushing extra hard, and that's not likely to be a convenient time to
lose power.

Luckily, it's very rare for a correctly-installed chain to break.

(Not impossible, though. You'd be amazed at how far a road bike can
draisine up a hill even though one can use only one foot to propel
it.)


(13) Visible clothing -- *please* don't go out after dark dressed
all in black.


(14) Reflectors, white in front and red in back. Even if you don't
plan to go out after dark, you might be delayed, and reflectors are a
cheap back-up. Get real reflectors from an auto-parts store; special
bike reflectors often reflect only in the middle third.

Reflectors on the sides of a bicycle are purely symbolic. Reflectors
work only when headlights are aimed directly at them. If you are
side-on to a headlight beam and far enough away that the driver can do
something about having seen you, you will be out of the headlight beam
by the time he gets there.


(15) A white light in front and a red light in back. If you want
to be seen from the side after dark, or if you want a driver to know
that he is about to pull out of a side road into your path, you *must*
glow with your own light.

It is also important that the lights be the correct colors so that
other operators can tell which way you are going without waiting to
watch you move. A yellow light can be seen from farther away, but you
need a red light too -- and make sure the red light isn't a tight beam
pointed straight back. A red light is most important when seen from
the side, so make sure that it *can* be seen from the side.


(16) Rear view mirror. Don't get one until *after* you've mastered
the art of looking back. A mirror can't tell you when it's safe, but
knowing when it's *not* safe is very valuable information.

Well, the helmet sneaks in early -- a helmet is the most-convenient
place to put a rear-view mirror. It also helps to distinguish you
from a pedestrian in the minds of passing motorists, so I guess it
sneaked in even earlier under "visible clothing".


(17) A luggage rack, preferably fitted with panniers. This is
particularly important on a child's bike: if you don't give a child a
safe way to carry things, he's going to carry things anyway, probably
in his hand, or tied to his handlebars where they interfere with
steering.


(18) -a dime- -a quarter- a cell phone.


(19) and for close-up calls for help: if you can't scream real
loud, carry a whistle. When you need help, scream (or whistle) in
sets of three. "Did I hear something? Yes, I did. And it's coming
from that direction."

Three is the smallest number that can be equally spaced and therefore
unmistakably a signal, so three is nearly always a feature of official
distress calls. One yelp will be dismissed as children playing, two
yelps are random noise, but three equally-spaced yelps, repeated over
and over, mean Something Is Wrong.

On an off-topic but related note: When you find someone lying on the
ground, there are three steps to take: (1) Look around to make sure
that whatever got him won't get you. (2) verify that he isn't just
taking a nap. (3) shriek "help help help" as loud as you can.

*Then* you can start to render first aid.


(20) And yes, if you should happen to bump your head, it's probably
a good idea to have a piece of foam over it -- even better if there's
a stiff shell over the foam to spread the force over a wider area.

The most-important part of a helmet is the chin strap: It doesn't
matter how good the helmet is if it isn't on your head.

Proper fit is also essential -- no chin strap can keep a loose helmet
on your head, and if a helmet is too small, it won't be on your head
in the first place -- a foam fascinator perched on top won't do any
good, unless maybe it deflects a wrench somebody dropped while you
were walking under a ladder.

Then you must put the helmet on in such fashion that your brain is
inside it -- too many "helmets" merely decorate the back of the head,
leaving the most-important parts of the brain fully exposed. The brim
of a helmet must be level when you are standing straight, and you
should be able to see the brim by rolling your eyes up.

Chin straps slip, so a child's helmet should be inspected at intervals
to make sure it still sits on the head properly. Be aware that a
child sometimes thinks it kewl to help a chin strap slip.

If you use a helmet-mounted rear-view mirror, your helmet gets checked
for proper alignment every time you look back. If you don't, put your
helmet on in front of a mirror whenever one is handy -- shop windows
frequently serve -- and roll your eyes up to look at the brim whenever
it occurs to you that you haven't used a mirror recently.


--
Joy Beeson
joy beeson at comcast dot net