Originally Posted by
njkayaker
If it's is so self-evident, it should be self-evident to many more people. No one here (beyond myself) has participated in the discussion of training to fall.
I don't think that helmets are "absolutely essential". Anyway, I doubt there is much evidence for the effectiveness for training for bicycle falls.
I know bicycle racers sometimes practice wheel touching. What do they do about training for falling (beyond getting people not to put their hands out to break their fall)?
Actually a number of people have mentioned the effectiveness of the skills of rolls and falls in this thread. All of them, and myself, having at least a moderate degree of formal training. Of those who have expressed skepticism, only you (some, years ago you said) claimed to have any experience.
I think that it's more likely that people who don't have the skills or formal training probably aren't in a good position to comment about it.
Regarding racers practicing wheel touching and little else, I can't speak for them. I have seen a lot of poorly executed falls in videos, but of course that doesn't mean that all racers have poor skills in that regard. They might have falling training camps for all I know. Regardless, I wouldn't lend much credence to the notion that they'd know more about crashing. I probably had more high-speed tumbles from a motorcycle before I was 19 than most bicycle racers have in their entire career, and I'm far better off now almost 40 years later than I was then.