- Long hair creates a unique challenge for advanced cycling helmet design.
- Snagging the adjuster dial on your ponytail can be deeply annoying.
- Lazer has addressed this issue with its new Sphere helmet.
Bicycle helmets and long hair are often an unhappy issue to manage for riders with ponytails.
Unlike a stylish leisure hat or trucker cap, there are a lot of safety regulations that govern the production and guide the design outcome of a cycling helmet.
Creating a design that is both safe, aerodynamic and comfortable to ride, even with long hair, is challenging.
Respected Belgian helmet brand, Lazer, has launched a new helmet that attempts to play nice with riders who have long hair.
The Sphere is an aerodynamic helmet targeted at road and gravel riders, instead of hardcore mountain bikers. It features a minimalist design that optimizes airflow with generously sized ventilation ports.
Data drives great design and Lazer exhaustively analysed rider posture during the Sphere’s feasibility study. What industrial designers and ergonomists at Lazer discovered was that most road cyclists tilt their head forward, at approximately 15°, when riding along.
With that knowledge, Lazer’s engineering staff shaped the curvature of their new Sphere helmet to function with the best possible aerodynamic and airflow principles.
It won’t snag your style
The Sphere’s aerodynamic shape and cooling airflow properties are only half its appeal. What is more impressive, is this helmet’s internal construction and features.
Experienced cyclists know that fit is a very personal experience, with any helmet. This is made even more complicated by hair. Riders with shaved heads have it easiest, when adjusting their helmets for that perfect fit.
If you have voluminous hair or like riding with it tied in a tidy ponytail, some helmets can be uncomfortable.
The tension liner inside a cycling helmet controls its fit and usually has an adjustment dial at the base of the helmet’s rear, which is exactly where a bunched ponytail would be. This can trigger an annoying tension between the helmet’s adjuster dial and your hair.
Lazer has cleverly avoided this by integrating its fit adjustment dial atop the Sphere’s rear section, which leaves the lower portion completely free of a fit mechanism that could snag or irritate long hair or ponytails.
If you love cycling and don’t wish to sacrifice your hairstyle when riding, the new Lazer Sphere is a great solution.
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