I've seen two threads today about crashes that have left riders with spinal injuries.

Do any of you use spine protectors when riding / racing and do they make much of a difference? I must admit I'm far too jey a rider to justify anything more than a normal helmet, but I'd be interested to hear what your thoughts are on spine armour.

: P

no.
i used to wear armour but it made me overheat and fatigue faster which made me make mistakes

I use full safety jacket (dainese) for racing or DH uplift. I often use a smaller kidney belt/lower back protector for normal riding, (DH and large Jumps).

I've had a serious crash while wearing full armour that resulted in a fractured back. There was some minor nerve damage. Doctors were undecided if the armour helped. The accident was a hyperflextion injury, not direct impact. This is the kind of injury the dainese armour is designed to reduce the damage in such cases, infact the only full armour I'm aware of that is designed as such. Most back protectors are only going to protect from direct impact, not over flexing.

I have a body armour suit with one built in. Only ever wore it downhilling, but at my speed of downhilling, I probably don't need it anyway! It'll be on ebay soon enough…

As daft as it sounds, I feel my back pack offers a little protection. Not a lot, granted, but it feels it would cushion/deflect some of the impact.

made me overheat and fatigue faster which made me make mistakes

This is why I almost never use it if powering myself under my own steam. A good kidney belt provides alot of protection for the back if there is a risk but without the flesh protection of a full jacket.

i think whether or not people wear protection depends on the decapline, XC = yeah i fall off but 95% of the time i get back up and im just cut and bruised, IT'LL NEVER HAPPEN TO ME syndrome !

Swedish brand POC seem to make some interesting and versatile looking kit.

No experience of it myself, never felt the need…also have a slightly unfounded idea that once you start wearing it you'd become 'dependent' on it, and not ride as well when you left it at home? Just a thought.

Obvioulsy I always wear a helmet (Giro Xen)…and like most folk I know it saved me from savage situations.

What's a kidney belt?

trail riding/xc – no but i have a dakine hydration backpack and feel this offers protection from direct impacts.

dh – yes – unless i've got my backpack with me.

most stuff in the uk seems pointless, im going to get a spine protector for portues du solie.

I wear a 661 core saver when out on the DH bike, nothing for xc stuff.
As said, a spine board (as with all body armour really) will only protect from 'impact type' injuries not hyper-extension/flexion (they may 'help' slightly in this, dependant on design) or compression type injuries, so you could still quite easily damage your spine whilst wearing one.

I fractured/compressed 2 vertebrae in my spine last year as a result of crashing head on into tree, had to have an instrumented spinal fusion, not nice. Since this has happened I've also started to wear a leatt neck brace, did a lot of reading up on em before deciding to wear one tho.

As i've said in previous threads, body armour/protection is a very personal choice and only you can decide what you think is necessary or not.

😀

What's a kidney belt?

Like this

My one has a hard plastic plate on the back of it. Last weekend it proved useful for me. Had a fast crash on my local 'easy' dh and a friend crashed into me, the plate took all the impact that hit my back.

two years ago a mate of mine went over the handlebar in a very steep rocky switchback/steps section and got really good protection from his hydration backpack while landing on the back …his camera was smashed (was in the main compartment of his camelbak)..but he was just fine .. and tried it again later…

used to wear my dainese full safety jacket but only for DH uplift..for myself it is just too much for anything else…in the sense like jedi wrote…overheating, fatigue causing…

I use one of the Deuter hydration packs with built in CE certified baqck protection. It's very comfortable and feels just like any other hydration pack. I haven't tried out it's protection levels yet though (touches wood)!

How are most spinal injuries caused? If it's from compression (Which I believe causes the most serious neck injuries – may be wrong) then they provide not protection don't they?

The deuter packs seem like they could be a good compromise. I wear spine protection on the motorbike but I figure I'm not all that likely to slide into a kerb at 70mph on the pushbike.

A mate of mine does wear a pressure suit for all of his riding, it seems a bit mad but it works for him. I've no doubt that you can ride fine with it but it just gets down to what I guess you could call a heirarchy of injury… You can wear so much armour without suffering much ill effect but eventually it all gets a bit too much for most people. So what parts do you want to protect? Serious spinal injuries are fortunately pretty rare for regular mountain bikers, and of those that happen many probably couldn't be prevented with a back protector anyway, so it seems to me that it should be a low priority.

I wear my coresaver whatever. If you don't want to then don't but if you do, then well, do.

I do a lot of DH guiding and like Jedi said I find armour makes me overheat making me fatigue..

but i am now considering the back only protection, plus camelback…

Instead of a full armour jacket just buy the separate spine protecter.
There is a new type of Camelbak with a spine protecter incorporated into
the bag.

Gave in and bought a Dainese suit after a similar hyperflexion injury to Solamanda. Soft tissue damage in my case – still **** hurt and the physio to sort it out was several times more than the cost of the suit. I kinda figured it was good insurance.

I wear it when I'm doing DH/FR/jumpy stuff. It's comfortable to the point I can completely forget I'm wearing it when riding, unless there's any climbing involved. Not sure if I've made much use of the spine board specifically, but the elbows, shoulders, and in a couple of cases the chest plate have definitely saved or minimised the effects of a fair few stacks.