Your Noggin

When I first heard there was some big Trek announcement happening on 3.19, my first theory was that Trek was releasing a semi-aquatic Mer-bike.  It was just the sort of winter we were having - storm after storm after storm...just an insane amount of water.  Every trail around here had at least 3 inches of water flowing down it.  I thought - and I stand by this idea - that a submersible bike capable of just riding the Rivanna (the river itself, not the trail) would be a hot ticket in this climate we had seemingly wandered into while the EPA was blackout drunk.  

That was 3 weeks ago.  Turns out the announcement was, in fact...

Helmets.

It seemed a little anti-climactic at first, but I think that's just because I was expecting a Mer-Bike.  And it hurts to be wrong sometimes.  But looking at the reality of it now, I'm pretty into it for a couple of reasons.

1) Enduro bikes - and shit, all bikes really at this point - are just really stupidly fast now.  Like, fast enough to be potentially lethal to the consumer, even without cars getting involved.   35 MPH and one tree, and if you do the math about what that impact will do to your brain, and then you start to consider just how many trails we're pushing 35 mph on these days, and yeah.

I've contemplated this a few times, some of it right here at the bottom of the bike internet.

Progressive trail construction, also, has likely contributed to the speeds we're going, but in a general sense most of us are in new territory when it comes to riding downhill on trails on a regular basis.   So a company like Trek that makes both bikes and helmets, and it financially and socially invested in not killing its customers, was due to step up the helmet game to hopefully offset the speeds they've enabled (and we have greedily gobbled up.)  Long way around to my point, but better protection was long overdue, and if it works this is a really good idea.

2) It's green, so I assume we can smoke it.

Can't wait to don one of these things and test out the limits of that "unconditional" warranty.

Keep 'em coming, Trek.

Up, up, up.