HEADS UP

Whether you love ‘em, hate ‘em or don’t have an opinion on the matter because you are in a head-trauma-induced coma, helmets serve a purpose. While some riders are too cool to board in a bucket, others don’t need to get their bell rung to know what time it is. Terje, Walker, Dakides and other top pros sound off on this hard-hitting issue.

“I landed the jump and it was summertime slush. I was riding away and I caught my heel edge. I started to roll a few times and there was a tree sticking out of the snow. I caught the tree with the back of my neck, resulting in my last concussion.”

The above excerpt is from a SNOWBOARDER interview with Chris Dufficy that was conducted in 2001. JF Pelchat was an eyewitness to the tragic event that happened at Mt. Seymour on that fateful spring day. According to JF, “The day was going well and everybody was getting shot. It was Duff’s time to go and we were all looking down at him. I think that he did a switch backside 360 and landed it but kind of rode it out with his weight forward. Then after that, everything happened so fast—he dug his tail in and cartwheeled down the run-out, but everything didn’t look so bad until he hit the tree with his head. People were like, ‘Holy sh-t!’ and a second later we all ran down to him. When I got there he was out, and then a few minutes later, he started convulsing and his body went into shock. It took a few hours from when Duff hit the tree to the final rescue; it is a horrible sight to see your friend like that. He stayed in the hospital for a while because his brain swells kept causing him to be in and out of a coma. He suffered a severe head injury.”

After nearly ten previous concussions and three days in a coma-like state, doctors told Chris Dufficy the words that every snowboarder dreads most: “You will never ride again.”

A recent US Consumer Product Safety Commission report says that helmet use could prevent or reduce the severity of 44 percent of head injuries sustained by adult skiers and boarders. And, according to a 2004 NSAA (National Ski Areas Association) demographic survey of 123,000 alpine enthusiasts, 28 percent of respondents claimed to use helmets when participating in winter sports. This last figure was up 3 percent from the same survey conducted a year earlier. Statistics from an MIT study provided by R.E.D. Protection’s Product Manager, Aaron Stief, indicate that on average the helmet industry in the US has been growing 10 percent to 15 percent annually since 2001. The same information also estimates that the US snow helmet market is producing sales in the ballpark of $55 million a year with most of the clientele being males over the age of 16. However, women belong to the demographic that is exhibiting the largest growth.

The saturation of helmet use has even breached into the ultra image-conscious pro masses. Riders who formerly refused to compete in contests because of mandatory helmet policies now find themselves donning a bucket for everything from high-stakes film shoots to mellow laps on cruisers. Even Terje Haakonsen—snowboarding’s gold standard when it comes to skill and style—has converted: “I didn’t used to wear a helmet,” he explains, “but after a few hard smacks to the back of the head and now that I have kids, I definitely think it’s smart for me to use one.”

Still, other equally influential über pros forgo protecting their dome despite recognizing the benefits. Jibbing’s modern-day messiah, JP Walker, has certainly taken his share of hard knocks on the ‘crete yet he continues to hold out: “I don’t wear a helmet because I never have; and, I just don’t like the way they look or feel,” JP states. “But every time I smash the back of my skull into the pavement or ice when I lock up on a frontside boardslide through a kink, a helmet would probably be nice.”

Perhaps the two-highest profile examples of riders rejecting the use of helmets even with the apparent dangers would be Mike Basich’s leap from a helicopter hovering 100 feet above an Alaskan peak in 2003, and five-time X Games gold medalist Tara Dakides on an air miscalculation during a taping of the Late Show with David Letterman. Tara recalls, “When I went on Letterman to hit a scaffolding jump on the streets of New York, who would have thought I might fly off the jump entirely? I fell 20 feet to the concrete and although I landed board-first, I still fell back and managed to hit my head, knock myself out and had to get eight stitches. That would have been a good time for a helmet.”

So what keeps pros from switching over to helmet use even after a few close calls? Film pro extraordinaire, Mikey LeBlanc, reveals, “I don’t like the way it feels. I’m like an old hockey player; I think it makes you kinda soft to wear one, but I know it is really smart to do so. Like Dufficy and Shaun White, they are smarter than me—I know it.” LeBlanc adds to his reasoning by quipping, “When I wear a helmet, I automatically fall on my head.”

Mike Basich agrees with LeBlanc on the issue of feel: “I would wear a helmet if someone gave me one that fits, but I haven’t found a good one yet.”

Meanwhile, other more fashion-conscious riders like Marc Frank Montoya shy away from the headgear because of their aesthetic appeal or lack thereof. “I don’t wear a helmet because I don’t think I look good in one,” states MFM. Yet would he endorse and sport one if the price was right? “Yep, just show me a good check,” Marco assures.

Then there are pros like Todd Richards who endorse a helmet 24/7 but only put one on part time. Richards explains, “Personally, I think it’s really irresponsible for any pro to make an impressionable kid think safety gear of any kind is uncool.”

Current US Open Jib Jam Champion Leanne Pelosi feels the same way as Richards: “I think pro riders influence kids and if I could help anyone wear ‘em more often, I would. Kids need to protect their thinking caps! Seeing pro riders like Shaun White, Kjersti Buaas and Chris Dufficy shred with helmets is actually pretty cool.”

Presently, helmet use is most common amongst the younger generations of boarders. Riders who have been introduced to snowboarding in the post-Shaun White era don’t know of a time when helmets weren’t commonplace on the slopes or in the media. Hot shoes like Mason Aguirre, Pat Moore, Hannah Teter, Mikkel Bang, Luke Mitrani, Scotty Lago, Elena Hight, Fredrik Austbø and Tyler Flanagan are just a handful of the shredders who are 18 or younger and prove that helmets won’t be seen as a handicap when it comes to one’s pro career.

At the age of 18, Shaun White is arguably the most popular and successful rider in the game today. Shaun has spent the entirety of his ten-plus years in the pro shred spotlight with a brain bucket on his head. “I wear a helmet because I have been wearing one my whole life. My mom started me off in a helmet and it feels natural for me to wear one now,” states White. “When I was young, I was hitting a jump and some guy came out of nowhere and clipped me in the head. My helmet was absolutely ruined; it saved my life.”

White’s Burton teammate, Mason Aguirre, also learned the value of helmets at a young age: “I fell off a chairlift when I was 11. If I wouldn’t have had the dome piece, I would have died for sure.”

While some of the elder statesman of snowboarding are too stuck in their ways to commit to helmet use fulltime, they take the Do as I say, not as I do approach when it comes to their own offspring. Todd Richards, a father of two, leaves little doubt as to his stance on the matter: “Cam and Reef [his kids] will wear helmets from day one. I am old and stubborn.”

Mike Basich even believes that having children might change his own behavior: “If I had kids, I would be wearing one myself!”

So what role does the media and industry play with regard to the portrayal of helmet use in snowboarding? A common misconception is that snowboarding publications such as SNOWBOARDER have a bias against running photos of riders in helmets. According to Leanne Pelosi, “I definitely feel there is pressure to not wear one because it’s perceived to not be very cool. Shots with them rarely appear in magazines, too!”

Pro-Tec’s Product Manager, Lisa Gergen, is especially critical of the print media: “You rarely see any riders in the mags wearing helmets. It all helps to promote the bad stigma that comes along with wearing a helmet. It’s sad, you would think the snowboard media would want to help promote the longevity of riders in the sport.” This opinion, while easy to understand, is a misguided one. SNOWBOARDER ran a feature in its December 1998 issue titled “The Helmet Kids,” which highlighted the emerging dominance of riders like Abe Teter. Since then, SNOWBOARDER has never steered away from any editorial opportunities based upon a rider’s chosen headwear.

When Danny Kass took over duties as Guest Editor in October of 2002, he chose a photo of himself for the cover in which he happened to be wearing a helmet. Having been a Guest Editor himself, Todd Richards has witnessed the inner workings of a magazine from ground zero: “It’s not like the media is not going to run a photo of someone wearing a helmet. It’s more about the ‘cool guy’ factor.”

R.E.D.’s Sam Paschel sees a change on the horizon: “We are just in a transition period where I think you are going to see more and more pros who are less helmet resistant and actually want to wear them to stay on top of their game. As that happens, I think you will see a shift in the way helmets are portrayed in the media.”

So even as a majority of snowboarders agree that the proliferation of helmet use is a positive trend in winter sports, do the statistics back this conclusion? Not entirely—the NSAA-sponsored site, Lidsonkids.org states, “The latest data on ski helmets shows that while usage is up, head injuries have not decreased, and the severity of head injuries is significantly greater among the helmeted population than the non-helmeted population.”

While this phenomenon could be caused by several different factors, many attribute it to an inflated sense of security a helmet provides. MFM feels this transformation when going under the lid: “I do think they actually make me more confident in contests and sh-t.” Yet this is but an illusion because while the head may be protected, the rest of the body remains just as vulnerable. Furthermore, the amount of protection a helmet does provide becomes diminished at speeds greater than 15 mph. Last season when Travis Rice and Romain De Marchi hit the now infamous “Chad’s Gap” in Utah, a monster backcountry booter yielding 150-foot plus flights, both of them did it without a helmet.

“I can’t believe they don’t have that [helmet laws] in the States, since people like to sue each other so much there,” is how Terje feels about the subject of a law mandating obligatory helmet usage. “But I think it’s not a good idea. For some riding, you really don’t need it.”

Even most of the helmet manufacturers agree that the solution to the helmet issue is one of maintaining choice while increasing education. Paschel explains: “A universal helmet ‘mandate’ would be great for the helmet business, but I do not feel it is anyone’s place to dictate what equipment a person has to use to participate in our sport. Whether you use a helmet or not is a personal choice. I obviously support and advocate helmet use, but I think a ‘universal decree’ or legislation that forces people to wear the product is not consistent with what snowboarding is all about.”

Gergen is more pointed in her assessment: “The universal decree is coming, more and more countries in Europe are requiring helmet use on the slopes; it is only a matter of time before the US follows suit. I would hope riders would become smart enough to want to wear helmets for their own safety, but soon enough they will be required to if they want to keep riding.” As of now, only a handful of states, including Colorado and New Jersey, have introduced legislation pertaining to mandatory helmet use. (None of these proposals have yet to make it into law.) In a 1999 article on Firsttracksonline.com, Dr. Jasper Shealy, Chairman of the Department of Industrial Engineering at the Rochester Institute of Technology, states that enforcing a nationwide law mandating helmet use would cost the winter sports industry between $50 million to $100 million a year to maintain.

In the fall of 2001, a little more than a year after doctors told him he would never ride again, Chris Dufficy was featured alongside his Forum teammates in the snowboarding epic, True Life. That same December, Duff was featured on the cover of SNOWBOARDER sporting a helmet. During the content gathering for this piece, Duff was asked if he could give us an example of a time when he benefited from wearing a helmet. “Earlier this year riding rails, I bailed down the stairs and flipped over. The first thing that hit was my head, and I am so glad I had on my helmet—you just never know.” The best reason anyone can give for ever using a helmet is “you just never know,” especially when it comes from someone who does know.