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.

Sure is - it has lasted 17 hours so far.

dave

I do have a strong opinion here - several strong opinions. The first is that this thread should be merged with the helmet thread in A&S.

I missed any comments about the effectiveness in bicycle falls.

But the effectiveness is "self evident". It is then surprising that racers (who, presumably, fall/crash much more frequently) don't already do it.

This goes back to what I keep saying. If you crash often, it might make sense to practice falling. If crashing is a very rare event, then it might not make much sense at all.

Racers, it would seem, crash much more frequently than normal riders.

****.

I just read the article. This opening statement should explain why helmets are such a debated topic:

Is this thread locked yet?

Actually, I thought the anti helmet guys in the WSJ article were pretty reasonable.

They didn't argue that helmets were not a good idea; rather that mandatory helmet laws are counterproductive.

The more strident anti helmet law posters in the A&S thread, are such zealots that they take what the majority of reasonable people would believe to be ridiculous positions.

So the article was at least better than the A&S thread.

As a non-helmet wearer and openly anti-helmet-law cyclist, I should have given that side more credit than my post did. The other side, on the other hand, doesn't deserve any extra ;-)

How rare the event, and the consequence of the event are the two equally important factors. You can't decide on the basis of either, without the other.

A case in point is the article showing up recently in this thread, where cyclists with a traumatic brain injury were about 50% more likely to have a more serious one (or a fatality) without a helmet. That is the correct interpretation - please don't go off on a tangent on how statistics cannot predict the probability of an event for an individual. I'll register your objection in advance. However, as extreme as the consequence may be, the article neglected to tell us what the chances of the TBI is in the first place. If there was a one in a billion chance of suffering the TBI on a bike ride, then that 50% risk of greater injury is mostly irrelevant. A rational person wouldn't bother with a helmet in other words. If it was one in a thousand chance on the other hand, any rational person would see that the avoidable 50% chance of greater injury is too much risk.

Since I've begun riding, I have a fall of some sort every 5,000 to 12,000 miles, trending to the lower frequency over time. Since the basic falling and rolling skills not only prevent head injury but also can reduce or eliminate broken bones and minor injuries in each of these falls, it is unquestionably worthwhile in my estimation.

These skills are more common than people perhaps realize, and perhaps that's why my question hasn't been formally asked in these studies. Nor answered here.

The consequences are (basically) the same for racers and normal riders.

A common argument here is that helmets aren't necessary because falls are extremely rare and, when they occur, the outcome is usually minor (this is without any fall practice). Some people go as far as saying they never fall (implying that they never will fall) and being common enough to make helmet wearing pointless for normal riders.

A related argument (also common) is that severe injuries (due to high-speed collisions with motor vehicles) are beyond doing much about.

How do you know this? It could be that many of them have also learned some form of martial arts or tumbling, possibly in the same proportion as other people. Or if not, it shouldn't be that surprising that bicycle racers lack other skills which may benefit them. There are probably any number of such skills.

Sorry. The mod team was out riding. Off to the helmet thread this goes. Carry on.

I don't know it. It seems to be supported by the lack of evidence that racers do actually practice it. (It's also a implied suggestion to look at what racers, if anything, do to practice falls.)

???

Without any actual data, one would presume the proportion would be the same as that for the overall population (for which you appear to be saying that fall practice is low).

Also, why are collar bone fractures common in bicycle falls/crashes if "many of them have so learned some form" of correct falling?

No one knows. If it was so "self evident", it doesn't seem that odd to expect that they would already doing something about it.

I am much moved by the logic of government campaigns in faovur of helmets. Basically, it's a "Wear a helmet or you will DIE!" campaign to encourage the safe and healthy activity of cycling.

I remember reading in Cycle, the CTC's magazine, some years ago, an article by Dr. Mayer Hillman/Hilman. He looked at the full autopsy reports of a large number of UK cyclists who had been recorded as dying from head injuries. He found that approx. 92% of them would have died from other, more slowly fatal, injuries.

Of course, there will also be those who, logically, would be saved from fatal head injuries but not sufficiently to avoid being put into a permanently vegetative state?

Maybe it's only self-evident to people who actually know something about it.

First, I said that the skills are more common in general than you probably think.

Second, I told you that I don't speak for racers, and I don't know (or care) how many of them know these skills. Neither do you. Why do you keep bringing it up?

You're going in circles here.

I would like to follow some of the discussion in this thread but it's tough to weed them out from all the other interleaved discussions/topics. It may have been suggested already, but I vote for a helmet forum rather than single thread. That would allow for different topics and multiple discussion on those topics rather than have everything interleaved and muddled.

Because, maybe, that's where you should look for your answer.

It's odd that you don't care.

If it's not a useful skill for racers, it's not a useful skill for normal riders.

And, if it was so "self evident", then it's surprising that it doesn't seem racers know about it (especially if "the skills are more common in general than you think").

Nah, you are just ignoring what I'm saying.

+1

Saw this blog post this morning. I know that most of this thread is rhetoric, but it is nice to see a skeptical analysis of numerous studies. This guy is pretty objective and thorough in all of his writing:

NeuroLogica Blog » Bicycle Helmets

It's obvious that many racers don't know how to fall (even if many others do), and of course that's why there are so many collarbone fractures. This should be easier to grasp for a smart guy like you.

I won't be asking "racers" who don't know much about the subject about how the helmet affects tumbling technique. I think I'll ask my 6th degree Sensie in the dojo next week, who probably would have some knowledge about the subject.

I apologize to those who think that it's irrelevant to question how the helmet may affect hitting your head on the ground when one has some training. Just put me on ignore.

If it was such a huge, obvious value, it's odd that racers don't do anything about it.

That might be a good idea. It's a much better idea than asking people here since many of the people here claim that they never fall.

It's an interesting question. It leads to another question, if it's useful, why racers don't do anything about it, since they seem to fall fairly regularly (opposed to the all the people here who think that helmets have no point because people basically never fall).

They should, but it's not odd if many, perhaps the majority, do not allocate training time and money to better crashing skills, beyond bike handling to avoid them. It's a matter of priorities - and you can't be fixated on crashing in a bike race. Nor are martial arts and biking commonly associated. So it's not particularly surprising to me.

It would be more surprising if it turned out that black belts in Judo and other martial arts spend years in practicing how to fall, if it really didn't matter. Or that it really has no obvious benefit when it's the most basic element taught in stunt training. Because bike racers don't worry about it? The most likely theories are that bike racers simply don't know any better, or they do realize it but for some reason aren't concerned enough about the potential of injury to take those measures.

Could be. If this is the case for racers, it's even more the case for normal people.

Falling is a basic element of doing stunts (much like it's a basic element of martial arts). In neither of these are falls exactly a surprise either.

That something has an "obvious benefit" as a way of handling falls where falls are routine doesn't mean it has an "obvious benefit" in situations where falling is rare and typically surprises (or, according to some people here, mostly something that never happens).

People in martial arts already have to practice "falling". It's likely that none of them specifically practice "falling" with a bicycle helmet. It sees likely that they are satisfied with the training they already do to handle bicycle falls. That is, for them, there is zero cost to whatever benefit there might be in handling bicycle falls properly.

It would likely be hard to convince martial arts peole who also cycle to train to fall with helmets.

That's likely true. As far as I can tell, falling from a bike is or can be exactly the same thing as the martial arts version. So I for one am not inclined to train to fall with helmets.

The question is, does the helmet make it more dangerous? I know that I can perform several of the basic falls with the helmet on with no problem. But I'm not going to do that perfectly 100% of the time, and sometimes I'm going to miss more than others. Just how much slack is there, before the two or three inches of torque arm become a danger? Maybe, at some level, you're better off without. Perhaps, a different type or shape of helmet is preferable. These are still open questions.

I would rely on the opinion of someone well versed in those techniques, and by the same token reject the opinion of someone who wears a helmet a lot but just falls giving the the usual advice of, for example, stay loose, spread the impact and don't stick your arms out.

Probably, not a question that can actually be answered.

I suspect that a round helmet is a generally better shape (the duck-tail that many helmets is for style, function).

How does the anti helmet crowd explain the fact that professional racers, club riders, and city and government sponsored riders are required to wear helmets? There must be a reason for it!!!!!