Sir Bradley Wiggins: Cycle helmets should be compulsory, and iPods banned while riding bike

@Sim1 - i wasnt suggesting he is ill informed. He is a much more experienced cyclist than me. I was just saying he has a different day to day cycling experience than the vast majority of cyclists and that will inform his opinion.
As far as Shane Sutton goes - neither he or his doctor knows whether his helmet saved his life - they are both speculating. Sutton rides without a helmet sometimes (he admits it and ive seen him). His 'accident' was caused by a stupid old driver not looking where he was going.
As i said - we should be focussing more on that sort of thing than what people wear on their heads.
And whilst im being patronising - do i *really* have to post up again videos of thousands and thousands of Dutch and Danish cyclists going about their business day in day out - none of whom are wearing a lid?

Bradley, much as I admire you as an athlete, you are wrong.

If you ban ipods for bikes then you should ban loud music in cars. No body is suggesting infringing on drivers' rights, so why should they infringe on cycists'?

Agree with comments above about cause of accidents being car drivers. This sounds like victim blaming, or at least gives drivers an excuse for when the inevitable collisions happen.

we are all entitled to personal choice on these matters.

funny how he didn't bother to say any of this before his 'fame', these are issues lots of us have been bothered about for years ....

There is a lot of over-confident mouthing off here about how little helmets help. But has anyone here actually had a full on crash ? I know 3 mates who have had massive smashes, with broken bones, hospitals stays, the lot. None of them had any cranial injury, all their helmets were smashed to buggery and all of them swear that the helmets saved them. A sample of three admittedly, but I have never met a serious cyclist in the last 15-20 years who does not wear a helmet. If anyone has had a serious smash without wearing a helmet and had no head injuries, feel free to correct me.

Big discussion!! My ears have saved my life more than once, I'll never ever use ear phones on a bike. A helmet has definitely saved my head from getting broken before, but I also had a crash without one and was glad I wasn't wearing one (due to angle I fell, on shoulder/neck: helmet would have put more angle on my neck... not good...).

Summary: Ear phones irresponsible and daft, helmets are a lottery.

Wesselwookie,

Yes, helmeted riders in the Netherlands are overwhelmingly either sports riders, or else foreigners (and then very often from english-speaking countries ).

They're a *tiny* proportion of cycled kilometres there, just as sports cyclists are a fairly small proportion of road users here (I don't have a figure to hand, I'd estimate very low %s - 2% or fewer). Yet, they account for >10% of cyclist hospital admissions.

Another interesting dutch cycling factoid (via Hembrow's blog): >50% (I think circa 60%) of fatalities are pensioners.

Just thought I'd link to this image: http://i4.mirror.co.uk/incoming/article1154794.ece/ALTERNATES/s1023/Brad...

Also I noticed last week Portuguese police on bicycles without helmets but with handguns. I reckon that would reduce the likelyhood of being knocked off in the first place.

The victim blaming aspect of the helmet debate really grinds my gears, but that said I do find the comparison between cycling with headphones in and driving with music on rather spurious. IMO there's not much about driving a car on the roads that's directly comparable to cycling, so it doesn't follow that if it's OK to do something while driving then it's OK for cycling- or vice versa.

If I'm driving I never find that people accelerate past to turn left in front of me, or to get to the lights in front of me, or try to get alongside me in the lane, or squeeze me into the curb or box me in to the back of a parked car. But on the bike those are common occurrences and I find the audio cues that they're about to happen quite useful, especially as I don't have mirrors.

Same goes for the observation that deaf people can and do cycle. Sure they do, but that doesn't say anything about whether or not giving up one of your senses is a good idea or not.

This isn't an argument of should you or shouldn't you wear a helmet (although it has, as usual turned into a load of hot air and anecdotal evidence of "i was once knocked off and..."

This is a discussion of whether or not helmets should be compulsory.

I don't care whether you choose to wear one or not, the issue to be discussed is "should all cyclists be FORCED to wear one?"

Personally, I think NO. I think it's unworkable, unenforceable and it's yet another stick to beat cyclists with.
I'm pro-helmet but anti-compulsion.

Wiggins is a muppet, just look at his hair. Just because he can ride fast doesn't make him an expert - I've been riding longer than he has, does that make my opinion more valid?

I wear headphones a lot when I'm riding around town, and I can usually hear not only cars, but quite often the music people are playing in their cars. Just sayin'.

i love it when i stumble upon an article that has comments sooooooooooooo long that they quadrouple the size of the article itself!

by th way. in the argument AGAINST wearing a helmet - on building sites we are taught that PPE (personal protective equipment) is the LAST line of defence. a proper risk assesment must have been done to eleminate the risk before the PPE is needed. the helmet is the last line of defence.
using these same risk assesments and applying them to the road would mean that a helmet is the last line of defence. the dangerous should be eliminated first.

encouraging more cyclists to wear a helmet is like going onto a building site and seeing bricks dropping from the scaffolding, and instead of stopping the bricks falling off, telling the pedestrians passing by underneath that the route they want to walk along is dangerous so they should don a hard hat!

crazy theory!

I'm all for safety and I wear a helmet when i cycle. but telling everyone who wants to cycle to wear a helmet is focusing on the wrong person. eliminate the risk, dont try and control the hazard!!!!

and, while im on my soap box, another problem with giving people protective equipment is that they feel removed from the risk. after a couple of "close shaves" where they learn the equipment they wear will protect them they become complacent and depend on the last line of defence (the glasses, hard hat, boots, whatever) more so.
giving someone a helmet theoetically makes someone feel safer and they COULD be more likely to take a risk.

apparently research has even shown that some drivers take MORE care driving past cyclist who do not wear a helmet. while this is WRONG it is also not helping wiggins request to make helmets compulsory.

something else that just popped into my head is that out of all th stories i have read about cyclists being killed by lorries and cars i dont know of any where a helmet would save their life!

stop the left turning HGVs killing people first. THEN focus on th cyclist wearing a bit of polystryrene strapped to their noggin! FFS

there, that feels better

Are the deaf legally allowed to ride bicycles? Of course they are. So the discussion on headphones and music can go no further than being 'advisory'. I would not 'advise' a deaf person to ride a bicycle, for example, across London. And I would advise anyone choosing to wear headphones and to listen to music while cycling anywhere to 'proceed with additional caution'. But that's it. If we ban headphones by the same logic we must also ban the deaf. Can't see a politician advocating that though. Nor even a Tour de France winner.

http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/48526

Please support our e petition, the Ryan smith foundation is to support a 16 year old sports mad young man who had an accident while cycling to work 5 weeks ago.
He is in a coma...he was not wearing a helmet and he had earphones on.
Please take a look at the Facebook page

https://www.facebook.com/ryansmithfoundation

fatty, take it from me enforcing this would never ever work, there are simply to many people on bikes who dont wear a helmet

Trotty and Boardman talk about training kids to ride confidently, but kids become adults who become drivers. Better to merge cyclist and early driver training in to a single 'road safety' course, so that cycle awareness is embedded all the way through and becomes a natural part of the driving test.

Helmets i would recommend wearing but not make it compulsory. I did a 4 day tour and didn't wear one. It took me back to the good old days. 99% of the time I do have a lid on.
Earphones definite ban on music but I too have used them - one earpiece for navigation apps. You need all your senses turned on when riding.

Interesting thought... Cars are semi sound proofed (on the inside) and have music players. Should we be driving with our windows open and music off? Maybe.

When I was a kid high vis vests weren't to be seen anywhere, whereas now they are worn by virtually everybody (in any walk of life, regardless of perceived risk), so these 'safety' things can filter through, albeit slowly... it would be a very long term societal attitude change with helmets - a generation at best - then it becomes more enforceable if the norm is to wear one (if indeed that were to happen, depends on choice vs forced debate now which influences the future)

Have Rapha got anything new out?

Helmets are designed to mitigate a very narrow range of injuries. They may be of use to people falling off their bicycles onto flat surfaces with no other vehicles involved.

They are probably useless for accidents with enough energy to cause concussion and worse injuries.

If people want to wear them, please do. But please don't start baseless "Shane's Law" type petitions forcing those of us that have made an informed decision against wearing them from doing so.

While I have sympathy, as a father, for the family here I have absolutely no respect for their decision to try and force others to wear helmets.

I agree with Wiggo. You have to look after yourself. I've had several crashes and not hit my head,but I still alwats wear a helmet because yiu never know, the next one might be the tine when my helmet saves me from being a cabbage, or worse, for the rest if my life

ipods and bikes don't mix it's plain common sense!

Crazy motorists....... well that's a whole different matter!

Most injuries sustained while cycling either:
1) don't involve the cranium
or
2) would not be prevented by a thin polystyrene hat full of holes.

I'm pro-choice.

Helmets are a good idea. Landing on your head is always going to hurt.
Compulsory wearing of helmets is not.
In NZ, the introduction (a knee-jerk reaction) of helmet-wearing laws saw a near-immediate reduction in cycling numbers of something like 30%.
Personally, I hate helmets with a passion. I've tried so many, but have yet to find one that is comfortable. I have the worst-possible reason for saying no to helmet laws - I've been cycling, sometimes competitively, for 40 years. Of course I have come off, and been knocked off, my bike. To hear the proponents of helmet law speak, you'd think I was a unique case but we know that isn't true.
Besides, how else am I going to dry my hair on the way to work in the morning?

The construction of the cycling helmets made today are tested to a lower standard than that of the 80's - strange but true. The European standard that superseded the old British standard is far less stringent.
The material used for std road helmets will not deform on impact and therefore will transmit the whole force of the impact directly to the brain. Its basic engineering, cycling helmets do not have crumple zones. The best you could hope for is a reduction of contusions to the top and possibly back of the head. Have a friend hit the top of your helmet while you wear it and see for yourself, you will feel the full force.
My last big road crash with a car (>20mph) resulted in face grazing with no impact to the helmet. The substantially worse injuries were to my knee and elbow.
I do wear a helmet when riding hard etc, they make a good place too keep you glasses and cam.

Same (or similar) arguments used in the get motorcyclists to wear helmets!

I will wear a helmet because it will help save my head in some instances. I have face-planted during a taxi vs bike incident and, whilst the helmet didn't stop me getting gravel rash to the face and a nasty case of whip lash, the damage to the helmet suggests that I could have more injuries. It won't help if I get run over by a bus, but if I slightly head butt it....

I'm pro reducing injury.

You can do what you like. It doesn't matter to me!

Impressive the number of comments that a Sir Wiggins commend will generate. Although I have to agree with his thoughts on iPods. Cyclists who can't even hear an "on your Right" are dangerous!!!

If you think headphones are ok, where do you stand on eyepatches? I've got a bit of a pirate thing going on at the moment, one eye open should be enough though?

Always an incendiary one but I will always argue against mandatory helmets as it allows the safety discussion to be obfuscated. Take the most recent accident: it would appear that the medics believe a helmet would have helped him so the focus is moved on to the fact that he wasn't wearing one, away from the fact it is not safe to ride on our roads without one. I don't know the facts of the accident but being knocked off your bike by a vehicle is something most cyclists avoid at all costs and I am sure that was the case for young Ryan.

Press coverage can not focus on the primary cause of cycling accidents, i.e. bad driving (as borne out by statistics) as it is sub judice (so as not to prejudice the facts of any case that might be brought). The net result is that the press move away from the primary cause of accidents to the consequent results (injury caused) and focus on uncontroversial facts (helmet or not). The real controversy is that so many appalling accidents happen on our roads and we tolerate driving that falls well below safe standards.

For what it's worth I wear a helmet and don't listen to music.

I am genuinely sorry to hear of another young life so terribly affected by a cycling accident but the focus on helmets in my opinion is the wrong point to home in on.