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My 12yo son currently has a NutCase piss pot lid.
Gets used for rides into town, local xc trails & BPW once a month.
At BPW I chatted with the guides, and all their kids HAVE to wear a full face.
At BPW my son's currently on the blue routes only but could be ready to try out some red sections. Currently just wears shin pads, lid and gloves as protection.
Any recommendations on a possible do it all lid? Any recommendations on helmets with removable chin bars & their rating compared to a proper FF? Any FF recommendations? Any visibility issues?
I accept that ultimately it may need two lids & a set of goggles.
Looking at the cheaper end of the scale, not a carbon fibre work of art. And yes, I accept fit is everything & try before you buy.
Ta
Personally, I think a full face is over the top for blues/reds at BPW. Full facers are for downhill racers.
Too damn hot for one thing. But then again, if you wanna protect the little'un against all eventualities a full face should be used for all riding where it's possible to crash and land on yer chin!
Yea, for my riding, I agree. But he's pushing his boundaries & at some point that may go wrong with a front wheel landing / over the bars type crash. We both ride HT which BPW sees the most accidents on. Not sure if the guiding thing is just an insurance liability thing or instigated through experience.
For the money 2 lids is cheaper than one.
We ride XC, trail and DH....
for XC and trail he uses a Bell Super 3R.... it's really not a proper FF but its wearable when pedalling.... with the chin guard removed he can wear it for XC.
When he rides DH its a proper FF helmet... partly because it gives better protection but also because the Bell 3R will probably only take one minor scrape... but this gets worn when we are trail riding and the chin guard comes out of the backpack for blacks (or anything with potential)
Just in terms of protection though... everything has ended up being used...
The first day he got his FF he face planted a rock... the second he came off on a hard trail at high speed and bounced on his chin guard and knees and wrecked a set of Launch kneepads... without the FF he would have needed dental work... and without the kneepads I don't know if he's still be walking... he would certainly have spent a long time in hospital. As it was he got back on his bike and rode the next day. A year on he still has a scar where he took the skin off his leg where the kneepad stopped and he barely touched the trail.
A 3 weeks ago gran came to watch him do a DH... race. He finished without incident but gran thought he should have some body armour... and offered to pay. 2 weeks ago he had another DH race.. again without incident... then the next day he was just riding a blue DH (417) for practice whilst I was watching over his friend do the black .. we met him at the bottom and his new body armour is scratched to hell.... (the bike needed a few repairs as well)...
Now of course both of these incidents were preceded by the dreaded words you should NEVER EVER SAY.... both were "JUST ONE MORE RUN" .... the last one I don't think would have been serious... (at least not extended hospitalisation serious) but he rode away with barely a scratch or bruise and went to play on his friends bike in the Dirt Jumps whilst I fixed his bike up...
Just my observations with a 7-8yr old....
I'm currently veering towards a removable chin guard (without insight), he's definitely not DHing or racing. Could use the guard for BPW and without locally perhaps. Happy to be swayed.
Full face if he's pushing the limits to progress and theres a chance that what your riding could end up in a face plant. Kids don't need dentures!!
£50 on CRC gets you a Bluegrass FF at the moment.
Admittedly I've never been to BPW but I do wear a FF at other places, and my 9 year old has a 661 FF for wearing in the alps (les gets greens and blues) or if we're pushing it somewhere else.
My 10 year old wants to head to BPW in the next year or so, he'll be getting a fullfacer.
Can you imagine the earache I'd get from his mother if he crashed without one and needed his teeth sorting?
I’m currently veering towards a removable chin guard (without insight), he’s definitely not DHing or racing. Could use the guard for BPW and without locally perhaps. Happy to be swayed.
Non of Jnr's "equipment tests" (aka spectacular crashes) have been done racing and the blue at 427 is only marginally a DH as is the 1* one at FoD (Launchpad)... (Both are damned hard surfaces though) and he rides much more technical and challenging blacks and the 2* and 3* FOD...
All of them more or less happened at the end of the day when both tired and over confident... on runs he would consider easy.
I could have bought a VERY nice bike or decent used car with my own dental bills last year.... (on a not very savage black... just unlucky first of all coming off and secondly managing to find the only solid log to face plant into)
BPW is h a lot of hard slate....
There was a thread "analysing/recommending" different chin guard type helmets a while ago, but searching is impossible on this site, so I can't link it.