A proposed change to the regulations of Cycling Time Trials (CTT) that would have made it mandatory for cyclists to wear helmets while participating in events it sanctions, including hill climbs, has been defeated after it did not get the two-thirds majority required.
CTT is the national governing body for time trials in Great Britain, with its remit also extending to hill climbs, many of which attract strong fields and hundreds of spectators and have a rich history – the Catford Hill Climb, for example, was first contested in 1886 making it the world’s oldest bike race.
Ahead of today’s annual general meeting of CTT’s national council in Daventry, Northamptonshire, CTT’s Scotland District Council tabled an amendment to its regulations that, had it been passed, would have made helmets compulsory in all events.
As we reported on Thursday, under its current regulations only riders aged under 18 or classified as Juniors are required to wear a helmet while taking part in events.
> Helmets to be made compulsory for hill climb competitors?
The amendment, which aimed to “enhance competitor safety,” needed to achieve a majority of two thirds of the delegates voting at today’s meeting but fell 10 votes short of the 49 needed, with 39 delegates in favour of it and 34 against.
A separate amendment requiring competitors to have a rear light on their bike while competing in order to make them more visible was passed, however.
That change will apply to all CTT events, including hill climbs, so for all you weight-savers out there, look out for a feature on lightweight rear lights on road.cc at some point …
29 thoughts on “Proposal for compulsory helmets at all Cycling Time Trials events – including hill climbs – defeated”
I wasn’t there (thank fuck),
I wasn’t there (thank fuck), but there were two motions on rear lights. The Scotland DC motion (19) specifically excluded hill climbs and closed road events. The South East motion (20) did not make such exceptions.
SteppenHerring wrote:
which means what, that you must have a rear light during the day for any time trial event and in the SE you must have a rear light for hill climbing and closed road events?
Good.
Good.
I ALWAYS used a flashing rear
I ALWAYS used a flashing rear light when time trialling as it just made me feel a little more conspicuous – fact is a flashing light draws the attention more and might just attract the attention of that numpty nuts who is driving with undue care an attention, even during daylight hours. I now use when on the road bike, whatever the weather for the same reason.
Cant see the necessity for a closed road event, but for any open road event, especially when riding as individuals (I.e. no bunch) O can’t see a reason not to. It might just help…
As for helmets on hill climbs, oh please, how on earth did it get a majority even if it didn’t get the 2/3rds it needed? Come on, at least show some stats to justify why riders should, oh they can’t, funny old thing eh?
PP
Pilot Pete wrote:
Fact is you have zero evidence of that, you’re working on ‘common sense’ thinking, sadly that’s not how it works out, inattentiveness, tiredness, distraction by in car gizmo etc means no matter what you have someone is going to hit or near miss you. A driver that is paying attention/driving to a normal standard will see you no matter what, daylight or otherwise and not get anywhere close to you, even less so on a dual carriageway/bypass road during offpeak hours which is when the vast majority of TTs occur.
Too many TT riders have been struck when having a rear light, and all it does is cement the thinking that armouring up is the solution to the problem and as I’ve said elsewhere, all it does is then push responsibility of safety onto the vulenrable party. If a rider then doesn’t have a light and gets struck they’re then looked at as being partially to blame because of the culture of having to have lights, it’s a vicious downward spiralling circle that never ends in better safety but does create a victim blaming culture.
Pilot Pete wrote:
It’s funny, but that phrase is one of those that really winds me up.
Like when my wife uses “But it’s common sense…” for something I’ve done or failed to do and with which she disagrees (if it really was common sense, I wouldn’t have failed to do it, would I?).
“It might just help” if I wore head-to-toe body armour and a motorcyel helmet, spray painted my frame with reflective materials, and lit it up with enough lights to guide an airliner in to land… but I have no intention of doing so.
Pilot Pete wrote:
How is it that mandating a rear light ‘might just help’ but mandating helmets is beyond the pale and demands stats & evidence to back?
what happened to ‘cant see a reason not to might just help…’
Pilot Pete wrote:
I wish everyone drove at such a high level!
Those driving without due care and attention are the ones with which we need to be conerned. 😉
@CyclingInBeastMode
@CyclingInBeastMode
You start with :
“Fact is you have zero evidence of that, …”
Then you make assertions without a single shred of evidence.
I’m wondering if you see the paradox ?
Krazyfrenchkanuck wrote:
He is thinking in beast mode?
Krazyfrenchkanuck wrote:
The difference is, he’s not mandating something on someone as a result. Plenty of people have also made the assertion that hi-vis makes drivers ‘notice’ us more. By that rationale, everyone should be forced to paint their TT frame dayglo orange and wear a flappy yellow hi-vis vest on their club ten…
Krazyfrenchkanuck wrote:
And even when peer reviewed scientific research papers are referenced E.g:
https://www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD003438.pub2/abstract
Authors summary:
“Visibility aids have the potential to increase visibility and enable drivers to detect pedestrians and cyclists earlier. Biomotion markings, which highlight the movement and form of the pedestrian, showed evidence of improving pedestrians’ conspicuity at night. Public acceptability of various effective strategies which improve visibility would merit further development. However, the effect of visibility aids on pedestrian and cyclist safety remains unknown. A cluster randomised controlled trial involving large communities may provide an answer to this question. It would, however, be a challenging trial to conduct. Studies that collect data of road traffic injuries relating to the use of visibility aids also warrant consideration.”
Everyone gets to pick out the factoid that supports their point of view.
Personally, my experience as a driver is absolutely clear that although I am well prepared to stop at all times within a safe distance with reasonable awareness for the unexpected, I’d much rather be aware of a cyclist or ped in the road at multiple times that distance and lights / reflectives especially of the biomechanical kind are really effective.
Krazyfrenchkanuck wrote:
It was a fact that no evidence was produced for the claim, if you have some to suggest having lights for TTers makes them or even others more safe, please produce them.
We do know for a FACT that forcing people to wear certain garments and have lights on during the day weakens the position overall, we know for a fact that when police investigate KSIs they are focusing less on the drivers actions and more on what the cyclist was doing to prevent the incident, Michael Mason’s death is a prime example of that. Victim blamed for not having a helmet and despite a bright light under bright stre lights in full view of pedestrians the police blamed him for his death for not wearing a helmet and absolved the killer.
I’ve read of incidents where the police have essentially blamed the cyclist for not having a bright enough light despite it exceeding the legal minimum.
These are facts, we know that shifting the onus of staying safe onto the vulnerable is a thing and that in the UK that shift is massively discriminatory compared to everyone else in our society and leads to more misery, more criminals getting off with no charge or ridiculously light sentences.
But yeah, crack on making matters worse by ignoring what is not just factual but blindly obvious to anyone who cycles and reads about the injustices.
Forcing helmet wearing and lights makes matters worse, not better!
“Now listen up now, Sonny…”
“Now listen up now, Sonny…”
To all you Marginal Gainers..
To all you Marginal Gainers…..Do the regulations specify how big the light is? What the lumens need to be? Where does it have to be mounted? Does it need to be switched on? Does it need to be in working order? What happens if the light ‘falls’ off the bike? What happens if the battery fails somewhere out on course?
A small red LED cake decoration weighs in at 6grams…bit of tape under the saddle….sorted.
You just need to have a think…..
Merchant of Cool wrote:
“Look out! He’s got a thermal detonator!”
Randomised controlled trial
Randomised controlled trial looking at efficacy of daytime lights for cyclists here:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0001457512002606?via%3Dihub
TLDR: There is evidence that daytime lights reduce accident rates.
Rich_cb wrote:
Interesting, I must read that properly. I have spent a great deal of time trying to work out whether daytime lights are worthwhile or just something to make the rider feel safer.
I can’t find the link now but there is one study about daytime lights that has been contradicted / rebuffed / discredited in some way but unfortunately I cannot find the reference. And I’m not say that to undermine the above study’s credibility.
What a smug, condescending statement! You’re obviously not trying to win anyone over to your point of view with comments like that.
Point is we are all perfectly
Point is we are all perfectly capable of deciding if we want to use certain measures that may or may not save lives. The compulsion is wrong. Same as seatbelts or m/c helmets.
Only evidence from the first
Only evidence from the first result of a search, from NASA Ames Research Centre no less, regarding flashing lights frequency effect on the brain…
https://colorusage.arc.nasa.gov/flashing.php
The difference between flashing rear lights for TTers and helmets for hill climbers is that I don’t know of any hill climbers (at all) who have died due to not wearing a helmet, whereas I know of two TTers personally who have died when being hit from behind in TTs without a light on. And there are many more whom I don’t know.
Who’s to say that a flashing rear light hasn’t had the effect pointed out by NASA Ames above and caused a cyclist to be seen (who hadn’t been otherwise) and thus avoided? We can all argue that the route cause is inattentive drivers, but no matter what you do they will always exist, so feel free to carry on making yourself as stealthy as you want and I’ll continue using my flashing rear light and we’ll all be happy…
PP
No, not trying to win anyone
No, not trying to win anyone over, just stating that I’ll continue what I’m doing as I believe in its efficacy. If others don’t then I’m fine with that, but I’m making an informed decision rather than just shouting ‘you’ve got no evidence’ and pointing out the obvious ‘if drivers were better’ etc etc. Ive posted one piece of evidence and work in an industry which has studied the effect of lights, both steady and flashing on visibility and attracting attention, so I KNOW that a flashing rear light increases my chances of being spotted by a following driver – be they attentive or not. Doesn’t mean I won’t ever be hit from behind, but it is a simple, low cost measure that I’m happy to take.
If you think that’s smug I don’t really care, it makes no difference to my safety on the bike. Others can continue doing what they do and shouting down those who don’t agree with them and that also makes no difference to me.
PP
oh and p.s. I’ve never said that driving standards shouldn’t be better, victims not blamed for not wearing IPE, and sentencing should be stronger. It’s just all the while that’s not the case (and if I’m honest probably even if they change) I will continue using a flashing rear light.
“statistics from eight
“statistics from eight European countries over a 15-year period show that road fatality rates dropped faster in non-DRL countries such as Austria, Belgium and the Netherlands than DRL countries such as Finland, Norway and Sweden.”
And specifically for people riding bikes. Not only due to motorists having DRLs but more cyclists running lights during daytime, despite ZERO increase in journeys, more infra/infra changes to make cycling safer …
CyclingInBeastMode wrote:
DRL were only made mandatory on new cars.
So there would only have been a slight increase in the proportion of cars using them after 2011.
That proportion has increased gradually every year so that by now they make up a large percentage of cars on the road.
So with the numbers of DRLs increasing every year what has happened to the cycling casualty rate?
It’s back down to 2011 levels.
(https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/754685/quarterly-estimates-april-to-june-2018.pdf)
Which doesn’t really fit with what you’re suggesting does it?
Rich_cb wrote:
“statistics from eight European countries over a 15-year period show that road fatality rates dropped faster in non-DRL countries such as Austria, Belgium and the Netherlands than DRL countries such as Finland, Norway and Sweden.”
And specifically for people riding bikes. Not only due to motorists having DRLs but more cyclists running lights during daytime, despite ZERO increase in journeys, more infra/infra changes to make cycling safer …
— Rich_cb DRL were only made mandatory on new cars. So there would only have been a slight increase in the proportion of cars using them after 2011. That proportion has increased gradually every year so that by now they make up a large percentage of cars on the road. So with the numbers of DRLs increasing every year what has happened to the cycling casualty rate? It’s back down to 2011 levels. (https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/754685/quarterly-estimates-april-to-june-2018.pdf) Which doesn’t really fit with what you’re suggesting does it?— CyclingInBeastMode
DRLs were already on the increase before the legislation, you would know that of course but ignore that fact.
So you account for reductions all down to DRLs, hilarious, you use stats like you do for pushing helmets! I guess 15 years of data went right over your head, maybe not if you’re wearing a plastic hat as it’ll snag you on the way past.
CyclingInBeastMode wrote:
You have, unsurprisingly, missed the point.
If DRLs have a negative effect, why has their increased use not led to a sustained increase in casualty rate?
CyclingInBeastMode wrote:
Honda introduced permanently on lights for some motorcycle models in 2004. But we don’t know whether daylight collisions involving vehicles with lights on is reducing as the number of vehicles being driven with lights on in daylight increases.
Also, the number of cars and motorbikes with DRLs doesn’t help us understand whether daytime lights are effective for cyclists.
DRLs and using dipped headlights in daylight can easily obscure our view whatever may be behind or between them so that an unlit vehicle may appear less visible to the observer than when the other vehicles are also unlit. Add to this the slower movement of a cyclist or pedestrian and it’s a recipe for SMIDSY.
I’m also not completely convinced by the 1 study cited above. In other areas we’ve seen a single study appear to demonstrate something but it has been contradicted and sometimes later shown to be unrepresentative or inaccurate. Until it is corroborated I’m struggling to jump off the fence on this.
In the PDF linked by Rich_cb (quarterly estimates for June 2018) they have recorded 5,620 child pedestrian casualties. Although that is 6% fewer than 12 months previously will someone be mandating helmets, hi-viz and daytime lights for these road users as well? For their own safety, of course. Meanwhile none of the ‘road safety’ lobby is shouting about helmets for car occupants despite the 96,370 casualties in the same period.
Simon E wrote:
Don’t worry, they’re already on it.
Rich_cb wrote:
Idiots, they deserve to die.
Of course Hi-Viz and flashing
Of course Hi-Viz and flashing lights work……