clinder

@waltworks: It’s not math, it’s based on published participation statistics. Less than 1% of youth athletes make a living in pro sports. I’ve worked in pro sport myself and am aware of the low odds of getting there.

@Andykmn: Difference is there's lots of money for an athlete in hockey if they get past the junior levels. Still a very small percentage, likely less than 1%, of kids who grow up playing make a living from the sport as an adult. The academies out there for any sport are ridiculous with their costs and the false promises they provide. I will avoid going on a rant of how bs it is so much of youth sport has been professionalized.

@Capable: Assuming full face are less protective than half shells because of the VT scoring is too big a leap in assumption to make. A common challenge with VT and other independent testing labs is the exclusion of products since they're trying to constantly keep up to the market. Plus there could be other issues we don;t know about if certain companies don't want their products tested. An educated guess on why fullface helmets don't test as well. They don't rotate like a half shell since the cheek pads and chin bar limit it's ability to rotate during the tests. VT looks to place a lot of emphasis on the rotational component of force absorption in their protocol. These helmets are placed securely on dry plastic or rubber heads with high levels of friction. Even mips may not be able to overcome the increase contact a full face has on a head compared to 1/2 and 3/4 helmets.

@succulentsausage: This is a challenge and frustration with public facing tests like this. It's impossible to test every product on the market since new versions come out every year. Other independent tests which are released to the public are similarly limited and have different ranking and scoring when compared to VT It's also hard to say how much less protective a helmet with a poor score is. since the ratings are arbitrary a helmet with a score 2X higher to another helmet(ie 20 vs 10). It is not necessarily going to increase your risk of head injury 2x during an impact. It's likely much smaller of a difference than that. VT testing is great to be confident your money is going towards a helmet that has better protection. Plus its pushing helmet manufactures to produce better protection than in the past.