INTERNATIONAL HELMET SAFETY CERTIFICATIONS

All riding helmets on Bit of Britain have passed, at a minimum the SEI/ASTM Certification.  This certification is given after rigorous testing for protection against the kind of impacts that are sustained specifically when riding a horse, which tend to be high rather than low impact in nature. Our friends at Charles Owen have this great graphic that shows the level of protection that each body certifies for.  Depending on the discipline that your ride, some certifications may be more important to you than others.

While some standards look closely at preventing the most severe types of head injuries a rider may experience, others protect from the more commonplace.

No one standard can accurately predict the specific type of accident or fall a rider may experience as there are too many variables to take into account: if the fall is on concrete, grass or in an arena; whether the rider is kicked when he or she falls; whether the horse is wearing studs/caulks; or if a horse falls on the rider, causing a crush injury.

Therefore, a helmet that meets multiple standards has been proven to provide the most comprehensive protection and cover a wider range of the potential accident scenarios a rider might experience.
(Courtesy Charles Owen)

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The Certifications that you will see inside the helmets of all the major brands that we carry are the primary indicators of the safety level of that particular helmet.   Picking a small number of these helmets to rank against one another would be of secondary interest as apposed to putting helmets with more certifications ahead of those with less.

There are thousands of highly certified riding helmets on the market, just a few of which are ever chosen for independent ranking/rating from independent organizations.   The first of these here in the United States has been done by Virginia Tech University.  Here, they chose 40 helmets to test and then rate, with a higher weighting on low impact blows to the helmets.  There has already been discussion about the protection that MIPS technology not being a factor here.  Also, that the weighting was so much less for helmets that scored well in high impact scenarios.

The Champion Revolve X-Air is designed to fit ROUND heads better.  The EXACT SAME helmet in an OVAL is the Champion MIPS VENTAIR Helmet.   We were asked to show you these styles by the US Distributor for Champion. Fit being the most important thing.  So, here they are:

The Champion Revolve Radiance is the same helmet as the Ventair above but with Sparkles!  It too is designed for riders with an Oval rather than a Round head    We were asked to show you these styles by the US Distributor for Champion as they have experienced a huge demand for these helmets because of the Virginia Tech Report.   We are working with Toklat so that as you place your order for any of these helmets your order will be fulfilled in the order it is received as they hurry to bring more helmets into their US facility.

And this from OneK Helmets:

Please note that the VA Tech rating system is not a pass/fail system. OneK helmets have passed the safety standards for equestrian helmets set by ASTM F1163-15. Those results are then certified by the Safety Equipment Institute (SEI). They also carry the  European standard VG1 certified by CE.  It is important to note that the ASTM standard is based upon high impact falls that could result in catastrophic injury. Helmets built to the highest levels of this standard often do not score high on studies that include low impacts.