Title: New Research Reveals Importance of Helmet Design for Equestrian Safety

Horse riding has helped children like Victor Liu build confidence and develop their coordination skills. Falling off a horse at high speed changes the impact to the rider’s head and the parameters for a quality helmet, according to new research from the Virginia Tech Helmet Lab. Equestrian sports account for 30 million rides in the U.S. every year — and 50,000 trips to the emergency room for concussions and other brain injuries.

The findings from researchers indicate that head impacts during falls at high speed generate unique head rotation, which in turn, directly affects helmet behavior. In other words, the rotational motion of the head is very important.

Falling off a horse at high speed can put a large force across the helmet and generate rotation in a different way compared with previous test results. This means that the helmets behave a little differently during low-speed and high-speed impact scenarios.

The new study builds on the lab’s previous work that documented video-captured falls in a wide array of equestrian disciplines, where riders fell from varying heights on the front, side, and back of the helmet.

The testing includes impact scenarios where the horse and rider are moving with horizontal velocity, which typically occurs in racing and cross-country events. The additional testing criteria were motivated by the Federation Equestre Internationale’s (FEI) technical report on new testing protocols for improved equestrian helmet performance, which included horse racing accidents.

In addition to various fall scenarios, the laboratory also performed a large computational modeling analysis of the head impacts to identify the best method for quantifying injury risk to the rider. Previously, ratings only incorporated one method of testing – either the pendulum impactor used for football helmets or the oblique drop tower used for bike and snow sport helmets. With the new study, this was the first time ratings have been generated using both tests and with 49 helmets tested, the lab’s largest study on equestrian helmets to date.

Ratings reflect the concussion risk associated with each model and are meant to inform consumer decisions about helmet purchasing. Helmets are rated on a scale of one to five stars, with a one-star helmet offering the least head protection, making it more likely for an individual to develop a concussion, and a five-star helmet offering the most protection and reducing concussion risk.

The research appears in the journal Annals of Biomedical Engineering, titled “Equestrian STAR: Development of an Experimental Methodology for Assessing the Biomechanical Performance of Equestrian Helmets.”