All-Star Cheercussion Cheerleading Helmets?

[StuntMonkey]

It's all about the accelleration -- or decelleration in this case.

When your head hits a hard surface it decellerates to 0 m/s almost instantly (ok, you have some rebound effect and whatnot but let's simplify things). The fluid inside your skull provides a medium for a tiny bit of cushioning before the brain contacts bone. Mind you, water (and many fluids that are primarily water) is non-compressible so that fluid doesn't do much to absorb force.

Now, put any soft object between the head and hard surface. As the soft surface (for example the floor mats we use) compresses it both absorbs force and decellerates the head more-slowly. If the cushion is thick enough then the decelleration is gradual enough so that the brain does not end up being too banged around. That's good.

Take a motorcycle helmet. These things are designed to reduce the impact of your head hitting concrete while going quite fast. It's by no means a guarantee of safety but it does increase the odds in your favour. The exterior of the helmet is a hard shell, while the interior is lined with foam that 'crushes' when your head impacts it. This is a one-way trip for the interior foam. To maximize the cushioning effect the material is damaged in the process and then is no longer of the same cushioning factor afterwards. So toss that helmet after you've whacked it into the pavement or face more serious consequences next time it happens.

Now in the sports realm you have training headgear for people who do martial arts, and you will see them wearing it in olympic boxing. The added cushion around the skull will lessen the force of the opponent's blows. Again, this is only a mitigating factor and you can still get a concussion with one of these if you are hit hard enough while moving into the blow. But considering that the goal is to try and hit each other in the head the trade off of a more limited field of view and a 'heavier head' makes it a good choice for training purposes where you will have to absorb a lot of blows.

Now I don't have an opinion yet of whether helmets are a good idea or a bad one for cheerleaders. I can think of the "bad old days" of first teaching girls to do full-twisting layout basket tosses and the number of times I took elbows, knees, whatever to the face and head (I wouldn't have minded the helmet so much back then). Since that time I've become much better at teaching progressions in skills and other than the occasional, fluke catch things are good now. Being more focused on perfect basics rather than rushing forward for a new skill is a much better recipe for avoiding concussion than slapping on some head gear and just chucking it. So there, I guess I'm not an advocate of helmets and have an opinion after all.

 

[codycheerbabex]

I wouldn't wear one simply because I wouldn't be able to wear a bow.

 

[Jess_Pascale]

This is a step towards safety. Cheerleading is a dangerous sport and this is something being done to reduce the injuries that cheerleaders get every year. However, I would NEVER wear a helmet cheering because that would be ridiculous. You couldn't wear a bow or do your hair. You would have "extra weight" jumping, tumbling, stunting, etc.

 

[WinstonsGirl]

I can see the positives in these in practice situations, learning new skills, but you should know your skills well enough to compete them without the helmet at competition. While thing go weird every once in a while, if you're not consistently and cleanly hitting your skills about 9/10 times before competition, they shouldn't be in your routine.

I will mention that I routinely wear my mouth guard on certain skills when we were first learning them (clear and originally from another sport). Mouth guards can also help with concussions and I felt safer catching the newer skills while wearing it. Now that we've perfected the skill, I don't feel a need to wear it anymore. Another base also wears a hard face mask with some skills to protect a previously broken nose. I see these possibly being used in a similar fashion, though not in competitions

 

[iCheer247]

Athough it would save me about an hour for doing hair (and maybe makeup) @ comp, I would not want to wear it to compete/practice. I feel it would encourage athletes to throw skills they aren't ready to throw and would just lead to more injuries. Anyways, I'd be THAT athlete that would get her uni or something caught on the helmet and compete with like my arm stuck to my head haha.

 

[omgitssydthekid]

As someone who has had seven concussions and is extremely prone to them now, I love the idea of this device. Concussions are scary and a lot more serious than people seem to think. I would have worn this over a bow in a heartbeat if it would have prevented any of my concussions. And I'm a flyer, and most all of my concussions came from either flying or spotting a new stunt (catching flyers).