OT: Player Safety via VT Helmet Study
I know this is on the WWL but I think it is a topic that is in great need to be brought to the forefront. The issues of concussions and player safety has to be of great concern for everyone in the Michigan Football Family.
The scariest thing in the article is that the second worst rated helmet was the most widely used in the NFL and college football. I hope players stop worring about "what looks cool" and equipment managers start really pressing student athletes to wear the most protective helmets available to them.
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=easterbrook-110719_virg…
Why would you put this decision in the hands of young athletes? Of course they will pick what looks good because they are still of the mind set that they are invincable. Plus if your helmet has wings it will look good no matter what style you pick. Problem solved.
In every helmet I ever wore we had "fitting days" there would be different styles of helmets the team had. If a player says "this one fits best" the equipment person goes with it. I think there needs to be a better way of fitting and getting players into the proper helmet.
My high school hockey team had a bit different method than your football team did. They got us all together freshman year and said something to the effect of: "your class is going to be wearing Bauer model x in color y, we expect you to have it for practice next week."
My hockey team did the exact same thing, football was slightly different. But hockey is very similar (same with gloves, pants etc.)
Yea after I posted that I started thinking that hockey helmets are pretty adjustable, and I have no idea how true that is with football helmets.
you can fill them with air and adjust the chin strap, add some more padding to get it tighter. so they are adjustable - but not all that much. Usually, you'll just need a tighter helmet.
The part about a tight fit sort of concerns me - my face is small but a bit long, an awkward size. So I never had a helmet that fit perfectly. I played football for 6 years, through senior year of high school (~8 years ago) and play on a poorly funded amateur team now. I've loved every second of it, but I hope I'm not anybody's burden down the road.
different brands/models fit different size/shape heads, which is why most still recommend to go with fit over looks... and it's why I think any travel/high school team that requires a certain brand/model is ignorant. Of course that doesn't stop top junior/pro leagues from signing exclusive contracts with particular gear manufacturers that require all of their participants to wear that brand exclusively (AHL and Reebok for everything, OHL and Reebok for helmets/gloves, etc).
Same!
I remember Wayne Gretsky once explaining why he wore that cheap, almost pad-free helmet throughout his career: "It's been part of my look since my rookie year." Athletes can be very, very dumb.
I can say from experience as a former athletic trainer at a DI-AA football program it is very difficult to get football players to wear helmets that are more protective. The athletic trainers and equipment managers are in full support of better helmets......no matter what they look like. Problem is the players go to the coach who goes to the AD or the VP who will almost always back the coach. Its an uphill battle. Hopefully as more research is completed and the concussion institute at BU makes more progress it won't be such a tough hill to climb.
Your experience corresponds to the following quote from the originally linked article:
"My equipment manager has wanted to get rid of the VSR4 for years," says Goforth, the Virginia Tech trainer. "He has long believed the new designs are safer. Finally, he has research to back him up."
keep getting bigger and stronger, injuries will occur more frequently and they'll probably be worse too. Here are some other articles I've read before from PopSci about the research and development of new helmets. I found them pretty interesting, I figure you might too.
http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2009-05/burn-notice
I wonder if the NFL will test the new helmets in games or practices or what
You can't put the decision in the player's hands. To the "invulnerable" football player, injuries are what happens to the other guy. And if a player complains about a headache, he is a "wuss." Until toughness isn't equated with ignoring injuries that can have severe consequences down the line, it won't get any better.
Well my senior year I wore the lowest rated helmet they tested.. makes me feel nice.
So did I, I also got a concussion my senior year. At the time the Riddell Revo's had just come oout and we only had about 10 for team.
We didn't have a Revo speed on the team. I think we only had about 5 revolutions too.
The right fit and the right helmet, regardless of cost which is virtually nothing compared to what is spent on these players and the importance of minimizing injuries, particularly head injuries.
The studies coming out show that 10 years of organized football is all it takes to start showing symptoms of CTE.
The players in these studies didn't have the benefit of the modern safety philosophies and equipment. It wasn't until just the past couple of years that the whole, "Concussion symptoms? You sit till you feel better plus two games" thing started happening. I believe in another decade we'll see we're already well on the way to player health.
sometime back, discussing a new concept in motorcycle helmets. The new helmet was covered in a sort of elastic skin, layered over a pliant gel. When a crash occured, the skin would stretch, allowing the helmet to glide smoothly instead of rumble and roll back and forth. This was said to reduce intracranial shearing, a primary cause of concussions and brain damage. I wonder if something similar could be done for football helmets.
http://www.lazerhelmets.com/innovations/superskin/
That's the company selling the new helmet technology. Seems interesting. Not sure if football collisions are fast enough to take advantage of it.
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/01/31/110131fa_fact_mcgrath
These guys sacrifice a lot to entertain us. Sometimes their spinal cords.
And then we criticize them for their play. But then again they earn a lot of money.
Some helmets are better than others, but a major portion of the injuries sustained would be cut back if the helmets were worn properly. When I watch football, I notice how loose most of the helmets are. Then, half of the time, the helmets aren't strapped up properly. Injuries will continue to be prominent until the equipment is worn correctly. It's like wearing a cup on your nose, it doesn't do your balls any good!
but at least Kelso can still form coherent thoughts as an analyst. He went to the College of William and Mary so he may be more of a thinker than most NFL players.
I had read another study some time ago that one option the researchers thought about was going back to leather helmets or none at all. They looked at Rugby among other sports and concluded that many of the brain injuries were the result of players using their helmet as another body pad. If a player's noggin was gonna take the brunt, then they probably wouldn't use it in such a manner.
I know we'll never see that happen, but I did find it interesting that "safer" helmets are actually part of the problem. Thank goodness we don't see as many neck injuries as we once did in the 80's.
The new rules will be introduced as a growing amount of research suggests that limiting full-contact practices may be among the most practical ways of reducing brain trauma among football players. According to a study of three Division I college teams published last year in the Journal of Athletic Training, college players sustain more total hits to the head in practices than in games.
What kind of helmets to Michigan players wear? And has anyone written to DB to get his response to this article?