cowboy hat instead of goggles

[handlebar]

When I started riding my Radrunner, a helmet seemed vital. With the seat up in pedaling position, the angles from my hips down to the pedals and from my shoulders down to the handlebars were so steep that I could be thrown headlong. That changed after two months when I bought a layback seat post. Now my hands and feet braced me. Dutch bikes have a similar seating position. Two thirds of their trips are by bicycle. They don't wear helmets on that style of bike because they don't get thrown headlong.

I wore a helmet ten more months, but on freezing days I'd wear a knit cap, instead. With a year of experience, I felt qualified to say my risk of head injury was almost as small as it would be on foot. I quit wearing a helmet.

Usually I ride bareheaded, but if it's rainy or cold or the sun is low, I wear this.
https://amzn.to/3EbpLqd

After 30 years of wearing straw hats in summer and a Stetson in winter, I bought a cowboy hard hat in 2018 because it was heavy enough not to blow off, and it didn't need a rain cover. I don't ride over 25 mph, and that much wind won't knock this hat off.

It's better than a knit cap in cold weather because it keeps wind off my head, face, and neck.

Rain falls faster than I ride, so the brim protects not only my eyes but my face and neck, and that keeps water from passig under the collar of my waterproof jacket.

If the sun is low i grab my hat because the brim is an effective visor that can be precisely adjusted by tipping my head.

[Roverdrive]

If you hit something head on you are gonna go flying whether you are leaning forward or back.  Add to that the protection a helmet gives if one of your tires wash out and you go down sideways makes a helmet a pretty good choice.  It's like insurance though, if you never crash you can say you never needed to protect your noggin.  If you do need one, it would be good to be wearing one. 

[Tree]

With a year of experience, I felt qualified to say my risk of head injury was almost as small as it would be on foot. I quit wearing a helmet.

if you fall while walking, a serious head injury is unlikely. if you fall while riding, it's significantly higher.

I've been riding a bike for almost 50 years. It's that guy who's been driving his car for 60 years that i'm more worried about.

I literally wear helmet not because of my bike riding experience, but because of my experience knowing that people in cars are stupid. I wear it because I have almost no faith in those around me.

[Hehateme]

That hardhat is designed to protect from falling objects at a worksite. Very different from being thrown to the ground. Cowboy Hardhat might cause more damage than no helmet at all. Spinal/neck injury.  Maybe I?m wrong but you don?t wear bowling shoes to the golf course.


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[JimInPT]

I dunno, man.  That wide brim would be a problem if falling off a bike, I think, as it would contact first and possibly shift or remove the helmet, or your head, depending on speed.  And where do the shards go if it shatters?

Additionally, it's not super-great, but I think my noggin is still worth more than twenty bucks.

[Fionn]

I'm in the helmet wearing brigade. Always wore one, been riding motorcycles up to a while back and had several actually, since I got my Rad bike I always wear it, even for short spins.

Better to have it and not need it, than to need it and not have it.

[handlebar]

I dunno, man.  That wide brim would be a problem if falling off a bike, I think, as it would contact first and possibly shift or remove the helmet, or your head, depending on speed.  And where do the shards go if it shatters?

Additionally, it's not super-great, but I think my noggin is still worth more than twenty bucks.

To me, it not a question of impact protection. As this video shows, the secret to avoiding serious injury is to avoid falling on your head. The only person wearing a helmet is the one who needs it because of the kind of bike she's riding.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-a2v7V8EJw&t=9s

[handlebar]

If you hit something head on you are gonna go flying whether you are leaning forward or back.  Add to that the protection a helmet gives if one of your tires wash out and you go down sideways makes a helmet a pretty good choice.  It's like insurance though, if you never crash you can say you never needed to protect your noggin.  If you do need one, it would be good to be wearing one.

In November, 1969, I was returning from the Lincoln Country Club on a 270 pound bike, going  about 45. A German Shepherd and a Labrador Retriever came trotting across a large lawn to the road. To my amazement, they crossed in front of me so close that I didn't even have time to brake. Were they blind and deaf? Even with larger bikes and smaller dogs, such collisions kill a lot of motorcyclists. The impact turns the wheel to one side and the cyclist flies headlong. Helmeted or not, that's bad.

Thanks to my stable position, I kept the bars straight and hardly felt the impact. The Retriever landed on the lawn where it belonged. I saw it get up and walk normally. 

In 1970, perhaps half of American adults had ridden on a motorcycle. The NHTSA interviewed 1,000 drivers who had hit motorcyclists whom they said they hadn't seen. They had one thing in common. None had ever ridden on a motorcycle. I'll bet that Retriever had never ridden on a motorcycle, and that's why he was blind and deaf to me!

I hit other dogs and ran over two, with no harm to me and only a bit of unpleasantness to the dogs. The last was a Doberman, a close personal friend, in the 1990s. I would yell, swing a stick, and spray him with ammonia, but he thought it was all part of the game of biting at my front tire. Then, with a gross weight of 750 pounds, I ran over him with both wheels. In my mirror I watched him tumble over and over and end up in a ditch. He got up, walked normally, and no longer played that game.

One morning in October, 1970, I was on a state highway half a mile from home, on my way to work, when the back of a car emerged from behind a tall hedge that extended to the edge of the road. My old-school BMW was incredibly adept at lateral movements. There was no oncoming traffic. Normally, I would have jumped to the other side of the road, but this car was backing up extremely fast and would reach the other side before me. I relied on my brakes with substantial assistance by the side of the car, a Falcon so old that the paint had lost its sheen.

Thanks to stable seating, I ended up astride my idling bike. I put it on the stand and checked my Earles forks. They were fine. However, unlike the dog, the car had given me enough of a jolt that my shoulders had snapped off my plexiglass windshield. That was okay because i?d been meaning to replace it. The old plastic was scratchy.

What kind of person would back blindly across a highway? I soon got the answer: the daughter of a woman who would have a high hedge hiding her driveway. She came out and asked for my license. Before giving it back, she went to the driver's window and asked, "Are you sure you're all right?" The driver's giggle told me she was a high-school girl, who drove away. After writing down my information, the mother handed me my license and immediately returned to the house, leaving me in the middle of the road trying to figure out where to stow my windshield. By having her daughter leave the scene without identifying herself, that mother had just orchestrated a hit-and-run.

A teenaged boy came from the house and offered to phone a tow truck to haul my motorcycle away. I said there was no damage except the windshield, and I was trying to figure out how to carry it. I removed the cover of a saddlebag, put the cover and the windshield in the bag, and rode to work.

The next day, an insurance adjuster phoned to ask what junkyard my motorcycle was in. I'd told the son my bike was fine, and he'd seen me ride off, and the mother still said it was totaled. These people didn't care.

I told him it was fine, and he spoke as if I had a legal obligation to prove it. The girl sent a piece of paper that said, "Estimate $50." She said I owed her that money. I said I didn't . Maybe she was soon made extinct by a cement truck. I wonder what fate her mother met. Maybe the insurance adjuster is in prison.

Except for dogs, that?s the only time I hit anything on a bicycle or motorcycle, and I never went flying. On my bicycle, I used to enjoy a daredevil stunt where the most fun was having my tires wash out from under me. In an empty parking lot, I'd pedal as fast as I could, obliquely toward the granite buttresses of a church, waiting as long as I dared to pull a u-turn toward the church. That forced me to lay the bike so far over that it felt as if my ear were almost scraping the pavement. It was great to see that I'd just missed the corner of a buttress.

Leaned way over, the tires would squall, and I'd scuff the sidewalls within a quarter inch of the rims. The real fun came from hitting a pebble the size of a pea, at that attitude. The bike would be gone from under me like a shot, and I'd somersault to a stop. That would save my clothes from abrasion unless I was wearing Wranglers. I preferred Dickies, but my mother, a former high-school teacher, insisted that I wear Wranglers to school because my violating the dress code was supposed to prove she was a cool mother. When my bike shot from under me, Dickies did fine, but the point of initial contact inevitably left a hole in Wranglers. I had to attend school in jeans with lots of holes.

Here?s another guy who took pride in the abrasion resistance of his Dickies.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8VUJ8Wqwzvw

A former choir boy, he's dressed for church, and that reminds me of the time my motorcycle tires washed out from under me. It was March, 1970. The weather was so mild that I was riding in shined shoes, woolen dress pants, a dress shirt, and no coat. As I banked hard in a corner, the bike shot from under me in a puddle, and I found that somersaulting from a 270 pound motorcycle was much easier than from a 25 pound bicycle. The bike matched my speed, the steel foot peg spraying sparks alongside me. I ended up three doors down the street, landing on my feet beside my motorcycle, and I was right by the window of an oncoming driver who had stopped for the show.

He asked, "You all right"

I said "Yep!" I went back and felt the bottom of the puddle. I'd forgotten that there was frost in the ground. Because of that, the bottom was ice. That might have been okay if it hadn't been covered by ball bearings of ice. To be heavier than water, they must have formed around sand grains. I'm glad I was riding when I hit that treacherous puddle. If I'd been walking I might have fallen on my head.

I picked up my bike and finished riding to church. Later, I examined the pants and could find no damage from the initial impact. Even dress pants are more durable than Wranglers!

The noise of somersaulting in a helmet bothered me. It would hit the pavement on every revolution, and at first those revolutions had been very rapid, like a blowout on the interstate. By the time I thought of trying it without a helmet, the ball bearings had melted, rendering the puddle useless.

[Altema]

The Dutch don't wear helmets because they have real bike infrastructure and bikes are a part of their city planning. We don't have that in the US.

For the record, I have been in three accidents with a head impact. Two of them would have been fatal without a helmet.

[rjp]

I had an accident and suffered a head injury. The fisrt MRI showed a brain bleed. After 6 hours in ER and a second MRI the results showed the bleed didn't get worse so i was able to go home. After a 2 week rest ( no bike riding) and a third MRI everyting looked good. Now Mr. invincible wears a helmet.   

[Tree]

If you hit something head on you are gonna go flying whether you are leaning forward or back.  Add to that the protection a helmet gives if one of your tires wash out and you go down sideways makes a helmet a pretty good choice.  It's like insurance though, if you never crash you can say you never needed to protect your noggin.  If you do need one, it would be good to be wearing one.

The noise of somersaulting in a helmet bothered me. It would hit the pavement on every revolution, and at first those revolutions had been very rapid, like a blowout on the interstate. By the time I thought of trying it without a helmet, the ball bearings had melted, rendering the puddle useless.

the gist of your post was a whole lot of mumbo jumbo not related to head injuries.

the fact of the matter is that if you don't want to be "bothered" by the noise of somersaulting in a helmet, then don't wear one. After the first knock on your dome from the pavement, you're probably not going to be bothered by much of anything.

you've got one brain and one life. you lose one, you lose the other. protect it, if not for yourself, than for your loved ones.

[handlebar]

the gist of your post was a whole lot of mumbo jumbo not related to head injuries.

the fact of the matter is that if you don't want to be "bothered" by the noise of somersaulting in a helmet, then don't wear one. After the first knock on your dome from the pavement, you're probably not going to be bothered by much of anything.

you've got one brain and one life. you lose one, you lose the other. protect it, if not for yourself, than for your loved ones.

Sorry, I did not anticipate that you would be unable to comprehend me.

"Don't wear a helmet" is a recommendation, not a fact. i remember the first knock of my dome on the pavement. It was September, 1958. There was a steel pipe along one side of the concrete patio. I suppose it was 7 feet high. I couldn't reach it standing, but I could from my bicycle seat. I discovered that I could grab the pipe from a moving bicycle to swing out of the saddle and let the bicycle park itself.

The next day, I demonstrated for friends. That's when I discovered that if you're riding too fast, your feet will swing up higher than your head, and at that point  you'll lose your grip. If my feet were higher than my head, my head was higher than the bar. I was going to fall on my yead from more than 7 feet, and on my back, I couldn't break the fall. Three feet is considered the height from which it's fatal for a skull to hit concrete.

I awoke to the prodigious laughter of my friends, who sobered up when I opened my eyes. You might have bought a helmet so you could continue to fall on your head. Maybe you would have bought a helmet and continued putting on these shows. Instead, I decided not to fall on my head again. Since then, I haven't knocked my dome on pavement on a bicycle crash. My mumbo jumbo is related to avoiding head injuries by maintaining control.

[Hehateme]

Mr. Handlebar,
After reading your writings, I change my stance. With certainty, wearing a cowboy hardhat is a splendid choice.  Taking safety precautions does not lead to warmly crafted anecdotes. I applaud you and your fine contributions to humanity.  Just say Yes to bowling shoes on the golf course.


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[Tree]

the gist of your post was a whole lot of mumbo jumbo not related to head injuries.

the fact of the matter is that if you don't want to be "bothered" by the noise of somersaulting in a helmet, then don't wear one. After the first knock on your dome from the pavement, you're probably not going to be bothered by much of anything.

you've got one brain and one life. you lose one, you lose the other. protect it, if not for yourself, than for your loved ones.

Sorry, I did not anticipate that you would be unable to comprehend me.

"Don't wear a helmet" is a recommendation, not a fact. i remember the first knock of my dome on the pavement. It was September, 1958. There was a steel pipe along one side of the concrete patio. I suppose it was 7 feet high. I couldn't reach it standing, but I could from my bicycle seat. I discovered that I could grab the pipe from a moving bicycle to swing out of the saddle and let the bicycle park itself.

The next day, I demonstrated for friends. That's when I discovered that if you're riding too fast, your feet will swing up higher than your head, and at that point  you'll lose your grip. If my feet were higher than my head, my head was higher than the bar. I was going to fall on my yead from more than 7 feet, and on my back, I couldn't break the fall. Three feet is considered the height from which it's fatal for a skull to hit concrete.

I awoke to the prodigious laughter of my friends, who sobered up when I opened my eyes. You might have bought a helmet so you could continue to fall on your head. Maybe you would have bought a helmet and continued putting on these shows. Instead, I decided not to fall on my head again. Since then, I haven't knocked my dome on pavement on a bicycle crash. My mumbo jumbo is related to avoiding head injuries by maintaining control.

despite your attempts in style, you're not Hunter S. Thompson. It's still mumbo jumbo.

I'm not wearing a helmet because I lack faith in my skills. I wear a helmet because I lack faith in the skills of others.

[JimInPT]

Instead, I decided not to fall on my head again. Since then, I haven't knocked my dome on pavement on a bicycle crash. My mumbo jumbo is related to avoiding head injuries by maintaining control.

I didn't know I could avoid injuries by just declaring that.  I suppose I should have done that years ago, but thanks for the tip!