#61
|
|||
|
|||
Helmet News
On 6/20/2018 12:41 AM, jbeattie wrote:
On Tuesday, June 19, 2018 at 8:03:53 PM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote: On 6/19/2018 3:54 PM, jbeattie wrote: On Tuesday, June 19, 2018 at 10:11:48 AM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote: OK, aside from the crash caused by the tandem fork suddenly breaking off, my only other moving on-road fall happened like this: It was winter. I was riding home from work down a short steep downtown hill. (The grade is over 15%, the hill is only 200 feet long, and the road's since been closed to traffic.) There was lots of road salt on the surface so I was descending very slowly, less than 10 mph. I suddenly noticed that the patch of stuff just in front of me wasn't road salt. Instead it was broken glass. I swerved rightward to avoid it. My front tire slipped on the road salt and I fell. I scratched my knee and tore my windbreaker. I didn't say "That was an act of God." I didn't say "Nobody could have avoided that." Instead I said "Damn; I screwed up." I try hard to not screw up. I hit a submerged pot hole, went OTB, separated my shoulder, knocked myself out and cut my face -- but not my head or anywhere under my helmet, which was wrecked. I did not blame myself for being unable to see through standing water at night in a rainstorm. I suppose I could have walked home. I don't think Garmin makes sonar. I'll look into that. Good plan. You gotta be safe! BTW, low-side crashes (like my crash in the West Hills) can just happen and may or may not result in a head strike -- usually not, but they can. Yes, they can. Lots of things _can_ cause head strikes. Most have nothing at all to do with bicycles. But only for bicycles and motorcycles does "It can happen" translate to "so you really should wear a helmet." I'm not talking about a situation where you screw up, try to correct and then go down. You just go down due to loss of traction, often when traction was previously good. Yep. That's what happened to me in that incident I described. It felt like a judo throw. FWIW, it's also happened to me mountain biking off road, including at least once due to ice. Back in those days, I figured falling was a normal part of mountain biking, because I was trying to see what I could get away with on the bike. Sometimes that involved riding at "eleven tenths," as they say. But oddly, while I often wore a helmet mountain biking, I never hit one on anything other than twigs. Culprits can be invisible like oil or even a change in pavement surface, crack seal, black ice, etc. There is no warning, no nothing. I suspect I'm a much more conservative rider than you are. I suspect I was much more careful even back when I was your age. What would more careful look like? Using a walker? My "more careful" still includes 40 mph downhills, riding in groups, drafting, riding in city and suburban traffic, and a bit of riding in the woods, on gravel, etc. But for me, it includes lots and lots of "what if" anticipation and attention to the road surface. What if there's gravel around that downhill bend? What if that motorist tries to push into the roundabout while I'm in the circle? What if that puddle is really a deep pothole? What if the meeting goes late and I have to ride home in the dark? What if that squirrely rider suddenly weaves into my path? What if that mud across the bike trail is really slippery? I'm sure you do more miles than I do. (A recent health issue has all but stopped my riding for a while.) I'm positive you ride more miles in the rain than I ever will. But I still suspect that if I could match you mile for mile, I'd arrive a bit later than you, but with fewer crash tales. We used to have a dude here who bragged about riding drunk, about getting big air entering an intersection from a sidewalk, about riding wrong-way or riding at night without lights, etc. He claimed I didn't know as much as he did about riding because he had crashed a lot more. I think that logic is perfectly backwards. -- - Frank Krygowski |
Ads |
#62
|
|||
|
|||
Helmet News
jbeattie writes:
On Sunday, June 17, 2018 at 6:58:08 PM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote: [...] I believe in risk compensation. Yes, we know. So how does that work with getting hit by a car, wiping out on ice, going OTB after getting hung up in a dog leash? Basically all of my riding would be considered risk compensation. Exactly right. Not only all of your riding, but just about all of your waking activity involves risk compensation, which isn't a mental pathology, but just a fancy way of describing normal human behavior. Risk compensation becomes a problem only when our mental estimates of risk lose their base in reality. I suspect that neither you nor Frank have risk estimators that are too far out of whack -- the differences lie on the reward side. -- |
#63
|
|||
|
|||
Helmet News
On 6/18/2018 12:32 PM, Emanuel Berg wrote:
Frank Krygowski wrote: In fact, recent data showed an _increase_ of over 60% in bike-related concussions during the time when American helmet use greatly increased. Perhaps other things changed during that time as well? More people riding, traffic getting even more out of hand, and so on That's an issue you often see. People ignoring other changes, and not looking at the big picture. Or citing false data without references, as Frank did in this case, and has a long history of doing. Be very wary when you see statements like "Studies show," "some people say," or "data shows" without any reference to back up those statements. It's Faux News type journalism at its worst. I see it more often now with reports designed to promote the passage of a law or ordinance being full of unverifiable claims designed to promote the idea that there is some serious problem that must be addressed with the passage of a new law. I was tremendously impressed to receive a letter from a middle school class asking that some useless city laws on the books be repealed, since I'm so used to seeing requests for more laws to make everything safe for everyone. The real-world data is overwhelming. For example, in https://web.archive.org/web/20160507103722/http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/downloads/pdf/episrv/episrv-bike-report.pdf (PDF page 18, report page 16) it states: "Among the fatalities with documented helmet use, 97% of the bicyclists were not wearing a helmet at the time of the crash. Only 4 bicyclists who died (3%) were wearing a helmet. All child or teen bicyclists who died were not wearing helmets. Helmet usage is required by law for all children under 14 in New York." |
#64
|
|||
|
|||
Helmet News
On 6/18/2018 11:52 PM, Sepp Ruf wrote:
jbeattie wrote: People can crash just riding along -- even the mayor. https://bikeportland.org/2017/11/16/portland-mayor-ted-wheeler-breaks-ribs-in-bicycle-crash-254716 The mayor's statement indicates that his braking action could have been executed in a more careful manner. Just as a random $89.85 for a "quality" helmet could have been better spent on tires working well in Portland November, the 5.885 extra seconds (compared to a wet-weather hat) Mr. Walker spent adjusting his foam hijab would have been better spent to initiate his braking earlier. And, as this thread has already been driven deep into ribs helmet advocacy territory, I'll boldly claim there is a corresponding 85% chance Mr. Wheeler was not using the area of the road regularly cleaned by car tires in his maneuver. Well maybe that happens to your mayor. I have ridden with the Mountain View mayor Lenny Siegel, and Cupertino mayor Darcy Paul and in neither case did they crash. https://www.mercurynews.com/2018/02/01/cycling-siegel-to-offer-a-mayors-eye-view-of-mountain-view-streets/ |
#65
|
|||
|
|||
Helmet News
On 6/19/2018 5:05 AM, John B Slocomb wrote:
On Tue, 19 Jun 2018 13:09:01 +0200, Emanuel Berg wrote: Frank Krygowski wrote: Regarding helmet use and brain injury: Rare as it is, the needle isn't even moving in the right direction. How many excuses for the helmet mania can people make? Again, I'd like to see professionally conducted studies with tables, charts, and figures... One of the problems is that it isn't a simple A=B equation. Was the guy with (or without) the helmet drinking or taking dope? Were the helmet wearers (non wearers) obeying the traffic code? Was it night (day), did that make a difference? This isn't a helmet problem at all, almost every study I've read eliminated some variables in order to attempt to get a viable answer to the question of Why? Or, to be honest, in some cases to the question, "Is this going to show what I want it to"? There's also the question of whether you go with data solely based on crashes and look at the helmet versus no helmet data, which shows an overwhelming benefit to helmet use, or data that looks at the number of injuries or fatalities as helmet use has increased. The latter is more easily manipulated by including or leaving out contributing factors such as the changes in ridership due to various factors (weather changes, increases in mass transit availability, economic factors, etc.). In my own city we have seen a tremendous increase in unhelmeted cyclists but it's due to one huge company deploying thousands of bicycles for employee use. I was talking to someone from that company yesterday about the bicycles they use and he said that one reason for the single-speed bicycles was to keep speeds down. Some residents have complained that the lack of helmets sets a bad example, but when you look at the data the number of head impact crashes where a helmet would make a difference is pretty small, it's when you look at the ER data that you see the overwhelming advantages of a helmet. |
#66
|
|||
|
|||
Helmet News
On 6/19/2018 12:54 PM, jbeattie wrote:
I hit a submerged pot hole, went OTB, separated my shoulder, knocked myself out and cut my face -- but not my head or anywhere under my helmet, which was wrecked. I did not blame myself for being unable to see through standing water at night in a rainstorm. I suppose I could have walked home. I don't think Garmin makes sonar. I'll look into that. The helmet just mitigated a problem which you should have addressed in other ways. What is the PCI in the city in which you hit the pot hole? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pavement_Condition_Index. You should check the PCI of any city you expect to ride in. In fact Garmin should program in the PCI for everyplace in the world for which that data is available. It's often available for individual streets as well, and they should program that in too http://www.cupertino.org/home/showdocument?id=20763. It would also be a good crowd-sourced app for smart phones where a database of problem areas are maintained. If you've used Waze, it warns of potholes based on crowd-sourced data. I was recently on a ride with our Public Works director, and it went into San Jose from Cupertino. You immediately could tell which city is spending the money to bring their PCI up. San Jose is at 63, while Cupertino is at 78, but the average doesn't tell the whole story. The major bicycle route to downtown San Jose has some sections that are clearly below 50. Two years ago I could not even spell PCI and now I think about it often. |
#67
|
|||
|
|||
Helmet News
On 6/19/2018 1:35 PM, Emanuel Berg wrote:
John B Slocomb wrote: One of the problems is that it isn't a simple A=B equation. Was the guy with (or without) the helmet drinking or taking dope? Were the helmet wearers (non wearers) obeying the traffic code? Was it night (day), did that make a difference? This isn't a helmet problem at all, almost every study I've read eliminated some variables in order to attempt to get a viable answer to the question of Why? Or, to be honest, in some cases to the question, "Is this going to show what I want it to"? Nah, I think it is possible to conduct investigations that aren't biased and give a good enough indication. I think there are plenty enough of good researchers around the globe to carry that off. OMG, there have been endless studies, all that show a benefit to helmet usage to some degree. The problem is not a lack of studies, it's that those that are opposed to helmet usage will ALWAYS nitpick some aspect of even the most rigorous study, and proclaim that the results are invalid. |
#68
|
|||
|
|||
Helmet News
sms wrote:
OMG, there have been endless studies, all that show a benefit to helmet usage to some degree. The problem is not a lack of studies, it's that those that are opposed to helmet usage will ALWAYS nitpick some aspect of even the most rigorous study, and proclaim that the results are invalid. What is the hangup with claiming helmets do not help? Why isn't it enough just to not use a helmet oneself and ignore whatever anyone else is doing? -- underground experts united http://user.it.uu.se/~embe8573 |
#69
|
|||
|
|||
Helmet News
On Wednesday, June 20, 2018 at 6:56:08 AM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 6/20/2018 12:41 AM, jbeattie wrote: On Tuesday, June 19, 2018 at 8:03:53 PM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote: On 6/19/2018 3:54 PM, jbeattie wrote: On Tuesday, June 19, 2018 at 10:11:48 AM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote: OK, aside from the crash caused by the tandem fork suddenly breaking off, my only other moving on-road fall happened like this: It was winter. I was riding home from work down a short steep downtown hill. (The grade is over 15%, the hill is only 200 feet long, and the road's since been closed to traffic.) There was lots of road salt on the surface so I was descending very slowly, less than 10 mph. I suddenly noticed that the patch of stuff just in front of me wasn't road salt. Instead it was broken glass. I swerved rightward to avoid it. My front tire slipped on the road salt and I fell. I scratched my knee and tore my windbreaker. I didn't say "That was an act of God." I didn't say "Nobody could have avoided that." Instead I said "Damn; I screwed up." I try hard to not screw up. I hit a submerged pot hole, went OTB, separated my shoulder, knocked myself out and cut my face -- but not my head or anywhere under my helmet, which was wrecked. I did not blame myself for being unable to see through standing water at night in a rainstorm. I suppose I could have walked home. I don't think Garmin makes sonar. I'll look into that. Good plan. You gotta be safe! BTW, low-side crashes (like my crash in the West Hills) can just happen and may or may not result in a head strike -- usually not, but they can. Yes, they can. Lots of things _can_ cause head strikes. Most have nothing at all to do with bicycles. But only for bicycles and motorcycles does "It can happen" translate to "so you really should wear a helmet." I'm not talking about a situation where you screw up, try to correct and then go down. You just go down due to loss of traction, often when traction was previously good. Yep. That's what happened to me in that incident I described. It felt like a judo throw. FWIW, it's also happened to me mountain biking off road, including at least once due to ice. Back in those days, I figured falling was a normal part of mountain biking, because I was trying to see what I could get away with on the bike. Sometimes that involved riding at "eleven tenths," as they say. But oddly, while I often wore a helmet mountain biking, I never hit one on anything other than twigs. Culprits can be invisible like oil or even a change in pavement surface, crack seal, black ice, etc. There is no warning, no nothing. I suspect I'm a much more conservative rider than you are. I suspect I was much more careful even back when I was your age. What would more careful look like? Using a walker? My "more careful" still includes 40 mph downhills, riding in groups, drafting, riding in city and suburban traffic, and a bit of riding in the woods, on gravel, etc. But for me, it includes lots and lots of "what if" anticipation and attention to the road surface. What if there's gravel around that downhill bend? What if that motorist tries to push into the roundabout while I'm in the circle? What if that puddle is really a deep pothole? What if the meeting goes late and I have to ride home in the dark? What if that squirrely rider suddenly weaves into my path? What if that mud across the bike trail is really slippery? Except for those who ride blindfolded, most of us DO plan ahead. BTW, I probably see more squirrely riders in a day than you do in a week or a month. I live among the squirrels. The number of cyclists on the cycletrack yesterday was positively Amsterdamish. I'm sure you do more miles than I do. (A recent health issue has all but stopped my riding for a while.) I'm positive you ride more miles in the rain than I ever will. But I still suspect that if I could match you mile for mile, I'd arrive a bit later than you, but with fewer crash tales. More miles in the rain and at night -- 35 years in PDX with different lights, most of which were (or are, i.e. my Luxos) useless on rain soaked streets. With glasses, it's like Braille riding. I suppose the conservative thing to do would be to drive. BTW, you equate low speed with safety, which is not always the case. This was my commute this morning -- https://tinyurl.com/ybfcd69h, spin around and look down the hill. This is an arterial. When its raining hard, you can brake to a stop on the polished aggregate near the top and continue sliding down the hill, particularly if its oily after a dry spell. I accommodate by carrying a little speed until the pavement improves, which some may view as "risk taking." The same goes with some trail spots on the way home or out on a ride where I avoid disaster by carrying a little speed over obstacles. Being overly timid can lead to disaster, particularly riding in a group.. -- Jay Beattie. |
#70
|
|||
|
|||
Helmet News
On 6/20/2018 11:40 AM, Emanuel Berg wrote:
sms wrote: OMG, there have been endless studies, all that show a benefit to helmet usage to some degree. The problem is not a lack of studies, it's that those that are opposed to helmet usage will ALWAYS nitpick some aspect of even the most rigorous study, and proclaim that the results are invalid. What is the hangup with claiming helmets do not help? Why isn't it enough just to not use a helmet oneself and ignore whatever anyone else is doing? It's because if others choose to use a helmet it implies that there is a benefit, and part of choosing to not wear a helmet is to promote the narrative that there is no benefit. Yet even some individuals that have spoken out passionately against the uselessness of helmets actually wear them! I also think that part of the narrative is to promote the unsupported claim that helmet use, either mandated or encouraged, leads to reduced cycle use. Even that is rather amusing because there is no data to support that claim. The fallback retort to data showing the benefits of helmet use is to claim that the rate of increase in cycling has been lower than the population increase in countries with all-ages mandatory helmet use. This claim is true, at least in some countries, though it's a stretch to claim that the reason that the population increased at a greater rate than the cycling rate is because of a mandatory helmet law. With or without helmet laws or helmet promotion, cycling rates vary for multiple reasons. |
Thread Tools | |
Display Modes | |
|
|
Similar Threads | ||||
Thread | Thread Starter | Forum | Replies | Last Post |
HELMET NEWS | datakoll | Techniques | 0 | May 7th 13 12:34 PM |
Cyclists' helmet cameras (BBC 1 News, 1pm) | brass monkey | UK | 0 | February 2nd 11 12:29 AM |
Great news on the helmet front! | Squashme | UK | 0 | May 15th 09 09:13 PM |
In the News: Sizing up the sports helmet market | Jason Spaceman | Techniques | 3 | July 28th 08 12:35 AM |
The anti Helmet on this news group | gareth price | UK | 17 | August 19th 06 04:32 PM |