Regarding experience level of those injured, I would hazard a guess that a substantial majority of the serious injuries were to experienced riders. As much as we...
Regarding experience level of those injured, I would hazard a guess that a substantial majority of the serious injuries were to experienced riders.
As much as we all like to think that we are "good enough" to avoid mistakes that lead to injury, statistics from other areas indicate differently. The better a rider you are the more likely you are going faster or riding less forgiving terrain/ features. When something goes wrong it happens faster and harder, that makes the injuries more severe. Clipping a tree at 5mph is very different than clipping one at 15mph.
With more skill and experience, the frequency of injury should go down but the severity likely goes up.
Professional race car drivers have similar accidents rates in normal driving to average drivers.
I actually think the opposite, your more stable at high speeds and less likely that your front wheel will hang up and send you OTB. A...
I actually think the opposite, your more stable at high speeds and less likely that your front wheel will hang up and send you OTB. A more advanced rider is also less likely to freeze up and try to correct the situation. I lived in Whistler for quite a while and the more serious injuries I heard of were mostly intermediate riders (partners of an advanced rider were common) riding trails outside the bike park.
I think you are partially correct, you point out some of the reasons experienced/ higher skilled riders get injured less often. The frequency of injury goes down as the skill/ experience level goes up. The problem is that when something bad happens whether it is a momentary lack of focus or a mechanical failure or other issue, because the better rider is going faster the risk for serious injury is greater.
I'm making some absolutely huge assumptions, so I could be completely wrong.
I wear ALL the protection I can when I ride park. Drives me crazy to see people not even wearing knee pads! Eventually they will, or they will not be riding (or at the very least as often as they could). Most older riders seem to wear more amour than younger riders, which I wonder if this is just more "experienced" riders wearing more protection because they have learned the lessons.
I would love to see mandatory neck braces (and more body amour, etc) at the World Cup, Enduro, Rampage, etc, level just to see what impact it would have in a few years. I think the influence would be hugely positive. The augment that a neck brace break collarbones is one of the dumbest things I have ever heard, who would trade a broke neck for a broke collarbone?? I have had so many crashes that I have walked away from without a major injury because of the protection I am wearing. When my wife broke her back she was wearing a neck brace and body amour and wouldn't be walking today if she wasn't.
I trail ride with a full face and chest protector (local areas are pretty gnarly). I also crash a lot and am often limping along with niggling injuries despite all attempts to minimize my injuries and still push my limits.
I also would never ride a motorcycle without a helmet, ride in the front seat of a car without a seatbelt but will free solo, skydive and cliff jump.
Speeds may be higher on modern bikes, but I believe they are quite a but safer than the bikes of the 90's with their super short frames and super long stems that seem well optimized for OTB crashes. Make no mistake about it though, we were hauling serious ass on our ridiculous bikes in the 90's too. My Cateye computer told me so, and I often was pushing to beat personal top speeds attained on some sections of trail. But I see far less OTB wrecks these days than in the early days. There is also a heck of a lot more traction than there used to be. Also way more people participating in the sport than there used to be. Is it dangerous? For sure. So is skiing, climbing, auto racing, surfing, unprotected sex with stangers and binge drinking, not to mention soccer, football, and the monkey bars at the playground where people get bonked on the head all the time. So much of the fun stuff comes with real risk. Its worth discussing but also falls into the "sometimes ya gotta pay to play" and "proceed at your own risk" category.
One thing I do sometimes ponder is the decrease in use of body armor. Racing DH all through the 90's, those of us that could afford to or were willing to pay usually wore suits made by Dianese. These were modelled after road moto racing suits. They had huge back plates, shoulder pads, elbow pads, knee pads, shin pads, and small hip pads. That back plate saved me from massive hits directly to the spine several times on OTB crashes. Those big shoulder pads saved my shoulders countless times. The pads I see in the pro DH field these days are tiny in comparison. Just an observation- I am in no way suggesting you or anyone else should do it one way or the other- proceed at your own risk.
I also agree with the points about flow trails made above. Flow is often fast. The jumps these days are frickin huge even on green and blue park and flow trails. The potential for heavy crashes on these things is the same as the size of the jump- big. You go OTB on a flow trail table or easy double and for sure the potential for a head plant or spinal compression fracture is real.
I've always found the concept of "gaps" in jumps that could easily be made into tables to be stupid.
There's this weird mindset that I've never understood in this sport that, just because there is a gap between the lip and landing, it's somehow cooler (I guess because its more risky?). But you could still fill in the gap, make it a tabletop (or whatever) and the distance from take off to landing would still be the same....The majority of injuries I've seen (thankfully none too major) happen when someone doesn't quite make the gap and gets bucked, and I'm speaking as someone that hits both doubles and gaps (within my limits)....but I just think that the general risk to everyone could be reduced so much by just filling in the gap...
TLDR: My opinion is that making a double a table, doesn't make the jump any less impressive, but that's just me.
Obviously, I get that not all gaps can be filled etc.
Doubles and gaps are made to save time, effort and dirt. It is substantially less work and that why you usually see it on hand built trails.
The gap also means less maintenance as punters don’t roll the lip and ruin the shape. It also filters out people who should not be hitting it. You could see more injuries on a table than a gap, albeit potentially less serious.
That being said, people case tables all the time and bounce to their face in the bottom of the tranny.
Once you get to a certain size jump a table makes no real difference over a case pad if you are actually jumping it. No casepad (especially a really hard surface like a log) is certainly more dangerous on the other hand. But tables take an insane time to build (and take a shitload of dirt) and no one should be riding on the majority of it.
On smaller jumps a little technicality is a lot of the fun.
I found out recently that over summer we had an older man break his neck and become a quad, he lives in town and is familiar with the trails. It wasn't on a fast, flowy jump trail but riding the machine built trail up the hill, his front wheel dropped off a low bridge and he went head first into the ground. He ended up in Vancouver at the hospital. Backs up my idea that more of these types if accidents happened going slow by less skilled riders because if your going fast you slide, if your going slower you stop.
I've been riding mountain bikes since 1992 (over 30 years! 😬).In 2021 I managed to crush two vertebra going OTB at MSA. I'm back to riding...
I've been riding mountain bikes since 1992 (over 30 years! 😬).
In 2021 I managed to crush two vertebra going OTB at MSA. I'm back to riding now because I got lucky and didn't damage my spinal cord. I have three observations:
1. there are way more "flow trails" and purpose built trails now than ever before. these scare me the most, as the speeds you can reach are dangerously high, and the skills required to ride them "safely" take a long time to to develop. like I said, I got lucky with my injury, and my 30 years experience didn't help me. I was on a flow section of trail, hitting a section with three relatively small tabletops in a row. all it took was one moment of inattention, and in the blink of an eye (that felt like an eternity), I went otb, folded in half when I hit the ground and broke two vertebrae, my coracoid process, and 3 ribs in multiple locations.
2. bikes are way more capable then they ever were, and it is really easy to get into situations where the bike has more capability than the rider.
3. since the pandemic there are waaaaaay more new riders than there has ever been. coupled with points 1 and 2, this is a recipe for disaster imo.
Not sure what my point is, but I agree with the person above that would like to get data on type of trail and rider experience. I feel like land owners and public authorities are building mostly blue "flow" trails believing they are safer, while my gut feeling is that they are not. (as an aside, I think these types of trails also have a higher potential for conflicts with other users because of the higher speeds).
It seems that the higher speeds facilitated by flow trails could likely result in more severe injuries. I guess that's why I like to ride steep, technical trails where there's quite a thrill, but the speeds are low enough that the risk is reduced.
I think you are partially correct, you point out some of the reasons experienced/ higher skilled riders get injured less often. The frequency of injury goes down as the skill/ experience level goes up. The problem is that when something bad happens whether it is a momentary lack of focus or a mechanical failure or other issue, because the better rider is going faster the risk for serious injury is greater.
I'm making some absolutely huge assumptions, so I could be completely wrong.
I wear ALL the protection I can when I ride park. Drives me crazy to see people not even wearing knee pads! Eventually they will, or they will not be riding (or at the very least as often as they could). Most older riders seem to wear more amour than younger riders, which I wonder if this is just more "experienced" riders wearing more protection because they have learned the lessons.
I would love to see mandatory neck braces (and more body amour, etc) at the World Cup, Enduro, Rampage, etc, level just to see what impact it would have in a few years. I think the influence would be hugely positive. The augment that a neck brace break collarbones is one of the dumbest things I have ever heard, who would trade a broke neck for a broke collarbone?? I have had so many crashes that I have walked away from without a major injury because of the protection I am wearing. When my wife broke her back she was wearing a neck brace and body amour and wouldn't be walking today if she wasn't.
I trail ride with a full face and chest protector (local areas are pretty gnarly). I also crash a lot and am often limping along with niggling injuries despite all attempts to minimize my injuries and still push my limits.
I also would never ride a motorcycle without a helmet, ride in the front seat of a car without a seatbelt but will free solo, skydive and cliff jump.
Speeds may be higher on modern bikes, but I believe they are quite a but safer than the bikes of the 90's with their super short frames and super long stems that seem well optimized for OTB crashes. Make no mistake about it though, we were hauling serious ass on our ridiculous bikes in the 90's too. My Cateye computer told me so, and I often was pushing to beat personal top speeds attained on some sections of trail. But I see far less OTB wrecks these days than in the early days. There is also a heck of a lot more traction than there used to be. Also way more people participating in the sport than there used to be. Is it dangerous? For sure. So is skiing, climbing, auto racing, surfing, unprotected sex with stangers and binge drinking, not to mention soccer, football, and the monkey bars at the playground where people get bonked on the head all the time. So much of the fun stuff comes with real risk. Its worth discussing but also falls into the "sometimes ya gotta pay to play" and "proceed at your own risk" category.
One thing I do sometimes ponder is the decrease in use of body armor. Racing DH all through the 90's, those of us that could afford to or were willing to pay usually wore suits made by Dianese. These were modelled after road moto racing suits. They had huge back plates, shoulder pads, elbow pads, knee pads, shin pads, and small hip pads. That back plate saved me from massive hits directly to the spine several times on OTB crashes. Those big shoulder pads saved my shoulders countless times. The pads I see in the pro DH field these days are tiny in comparison. Just an observation- I am in no way suggesting you or anyone else should do it one way or the other- proceed at your own risk.
I also agree with the points about flow trails made above. Flow is often fast. The jumps these days are frickin huge even on green and blue park and flow trails. The potential for heavy crashes on these things is the same as the size of the jump- big. You go OTB on a flow trail table or easy double and for sure the potential for a head plant or spinal compression fracture is real.
I've always found the concept of "gaps" in jumps that could easily be made into tables to be stupid.
There's this weird mindset that I've never understood in this sport that, just because there is a gap between the lip and landing, it's somehow cooler (I guess because its more risky?). But you could still fill in the gap, make it a tabletop (or whatever) and the distance from take off to landing would still be the same....The majority of injuries I've seen (thankfully none too major) happen when someone doesn't quite make the gap and gets bucked, and I'm speaking as someone that hits both doubles and gaps (within my limits)....but I just think that the general risk to everyone could be reduced so much by just filling in the gap...
TLDR: My opinion is that making a double a table, doesn't make the jump any less impressive, but that's just me.
Obviously, I get that not all gaps can be filled etc.
Doubles and gaps are made to save time, effort and dirt. It is substantially less work and that why you usually see it on hand built trails.
The gap also means less maintenance as punters don’t roll the lip and ruin the shape. It also filters out people who should not be hitting it. You could see more injuries on a table than a gap, albeit potentially less serious.
That being said, people case tables all the time and bounce to their face in the bottom of the tranny.
Once you get to a certain size jump a table makes no real difference over a case pad if you are actually jumping it. No casepad (especially a really hard surface like a log) is certainly more dangerous on the other hand. But tables take an insane time to build (and take a shitload of dirt) and no one should be riding on the majority of it.
On smaller jumps a little technicality is a lot of the fun.
I found out recently that over summer we had an older man break his neck and become a quad, he lives in town and is familiar with the trails. It wasn't on a fast, flowy jump trail but riding the machine built trail up the hill, his front wheel dropped off a low bridge and he went head first into the ground. He ended up in Vancouver at the hospital. Backs up my idea that more of these types if accidents happened going slow by less skilled riders because if your going fast you slide, if your going slower you stop.
It seems that the higher speeds facilitated by flow trails could likely result in more severe injuries. I guess that's why I like to ride steep, technical trails where there's quite a thrill, but the speeds are low enough that the risk is reduced.
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