{"id":288187816,"date":"2014-02-18T12:10:16","date_gmt":"2014-02-18T12:10:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/?p=288187816"},"modified":"2014-02-18T12:10:16","modified_gmt":"2014-02-18T12:10:16","slug":"chris-boardman-helmets-not-even-in-top-10-of-things-that-keep-cycling-safe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/?p=288187816","title":{"rendered":"Chris Boardman: &quot;Helmets not even in top 10 of things that keep cycling safe&quot;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>British Cycling policy advisor says it&#8217;s time to stop distracting helmet arguments and concentrate on real safety issues<br \/>\nby John Stevenson, Road CC<br \/>\n&#8230;<br \/>\nTalking to road.cc at the London Bike Show, Boardman said, \u201cI think the helmet issue is a massive red herring. It\u2019s not even in the top 10 of things you need to do to keep cycling safe or more widely, save the most lives.\u201d<br \/>\nYou\u2019re being shot at, put on body armour<br \/>\nBoardman returned to an analogy he has made before, and which even he admits is a bit melodramatic, though it gets the point across<br \/>\n\u201cIt\u2019s a bit like saying \u2018people are sniping at you going down this street, so put some body armour on,\u2019\u201d he said.<br \/>\nGovernment encouragement to wear helmets was therefore \u201ca big campaign to get people to wear body armour, by the people who should be stopping the shooting.\u201d<br \/>\nWidespread use of helmets, he said, sends the wrong message.<br \/>\n\u201cOnce you see somebody wearing body armour, even if there\u2019s no shooting, you think \u2018Christ I\u2019m not going down there if they\u2019re wearing body armour to go down that street.\u2019 It scares people off.\u201d<br \/>\n&#8230;<br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/road.cc\/content\/news\/111258-chris-boardman-helmets-not-even-top-10-things-keep-cycling-safe\">https:\/\/road.cc\/content\/news\/111258-chris-boardman-helmets-not-even-top-10-things-keep-cycling-safe<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>British Cycling policy advisor says it&#8217;s time to stop distracting helmet arguments and concentrate on real safety issues by John Stevenson, Road CC &#8230; Talking to road.cc at the London Bike Show, Boardman said, \u201cI think the helmet issue is a massive red herring. It\u2019s not even in the top 10 of things you need &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/?p=288187816\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Chris Boardman: &quot;Helmets not even in top 10 of things that keep cycling safe&quot;&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"1","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-288187816","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biking-elsewhere"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288187816","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=288187816"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288187816\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=288187816"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=288187816"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=288187816"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}