The good old sports helmet has been around a while, and the first recorded use of a dedicated fitness helmet was probably designed for football – although British officers did use their pith or sun helmets to play polo in the 19th century. Today helmets are often called “brain buckets” as they do product the gray matter and much more.
And in the past couple of years a lot has been made of the importance of designing a better helmet, with MIPS AB being among those on the forefront of changing the way helmets should (rather than do) protect the head. As GearJunkie noted last week:
MIPS stands for “multi-directional impact protection system,” and the company touts its technology as mimicking one of the body’s natural defenses against trauma. The brain is surrounded by a “low-friction cushion of cerebrospinal fluid,” MIPS literature notes, adding that its technology imitates the brain’s way of protecting itself by giving the helmet its own “low-friction layer” between the outer shell and the liner. This layer, which is a plastic insert, absorbs energy created in a fall and better protects the brain, MIPS claims.
The point here is that helmets are designed to protect from blunt force, be it a baseball helmet that is hit by a ball or a bicycle helmet that meets the pavement when a rider crashes. MIPS takes this a step further and protects from glancing blows or falls that are more tumble than outright crash.
One of the new designs is the Scott Rove helmet for winter sports, and it features a built-in MIPS insert, which under force the helmet shell will shift but the lining and internal pads will remain in place, thus protecting from the rotational forces from a crash.
This seems like just another way that many helmet makers are seeing new ways of making a better brain bucket.
[Via Gearjunkie: New Type of Sports Helmet Mimics ‘Brain Fluid’ to Protect]