Hello hello … this weekend is the International Helmet Awareness Day from Riders4Helmets and this year I want to reflect on how much there has been achieved in the last few years on the matter. This is my second year writing about this subject. You can see my previous post here.
Let me start with the small picture, in my case Mexico. I distinctly remember when I was a teenager and my mom forced me to wear a helmet. My reply was: ”but no one else is using it, specially at the shows!”. And that was sadly true, at the place where we were boarding at the time very few wore helmets and people even jumped without it. Jesus Christ let’s talk stupid!. And we can say well jumpers are jumpers, but in fact also the dressage riders were stupid. Almost no one wore helmets at shows and if some one put it on was because the horse was pretty dangerous, and that’s what it took for people to wear one: actual fear of a horse.
And then the ”dreadful” FEI Helmet Rule came (in Mexico we follow the FEI rulebbok and implement the changes every year with very few exceptions). And then people had to put helmets on, they were quite upset at first with lots of comments about it. Gradually the comments went away, but the helmet stayed. In fact many mexican professionals now are not only using helmets with their young horses, they are using them for almost all of their competition horses. The day I realized that my mind was blown, really. It felt really good, because the students of those riders are going to see them with a helmet and they themselves are going to put one on.
Now let’s talk big picture: A comparison about the 3 medalist countries almost 10 years ago in Beijing 2008 and last year’s Olympics.
BEIJING 2008 [VIA CHINA.ORG]
RIO 2016 [VIA OLYMPICS.ORG]
In 2008 none of the team medalist wore a helmet and in 2016 2/3 of them did. I know that with teams it is a matter of cohesion of the team, but still is a great change. The Chronicle of the Horse did a great piece asking riders at the 2016 olympics if they preferred helmet of top hat. They are some really inspiring answers, but my favorite is from Laura Graves:
It’s never a decision for me; it’s just a part of my uniform. Whether I’m showing or I’m schooling we wear helmets everywhere
Just loved it!
The sad part is that a few of them began to wear it because of a previous accident or a friend’s accident. Let’s try to spread the awareness so it doesn’t come to that.
Another part that I really helped make a difference: Charlotte Dujardin. I mean winning medal after medal and breaking records while wearing a helmet!. I truly feel that she helped take a lot of the stygma away from the ”if you are a profesional and go to the olympics your horse is going to be trained enough so you don’t need one”. She really made helmets look cool, chic and medal worthy.
Have you seen a shift of your community in the matter? Tell us!
Charlotte Dujardin is one of my favorite equestrians. I agree with you that it is never an option, and my kids know that it is part of their riding gear. I rode once bareback without a helmet just bringing Delight up to the barn from the field and prayed the whole time he wouldn’t do anything stupid. never again.
I feel like there was DEFINITELY a change around 2010, when companies started producing more ‘fashionable’ hats that weren’t so ugly and bulky. It obviously helped that the pros also started to wear hats and that Carl/Charlotte both compete in them!
Definitely having prettier helmets has help 🙂
I have always worn a HELMET it WASNt even a question as a child and still isnt a question to this day. The horse doesnt even have to do something silly it could just trip enough to throw you.
Totally agree, they are accidents for a reason
Intotally agree! You only get one brain and its ability to recover from traima is limited. It takes seconds To put on a helemt yet it has the potentialntonsave you from significant injury. I really struggle to inderstand any supposed aRgument For not wearing a helmet
Me too, I don’t understand why people resist wearing them