Did not read this, because there's too much text to just talk about wearing a bloody helmet.. lol Anywho - it's a simple conclusion, thankfully in England you do not need to wear a helmet by Law - so you can decide whether you're actually going to need one for your journey. I was skim reading, and noticed something about seat belts - that's a completely different ball game. In a car you're going significantly faster, and ergo, have much less control, and ergo, have a much higher chance of doing otherwise damage in the event of the worst happening. On a bicycle, you're going relatively slow (most of the time) - and if you're not, you should be wearing a helmet. I used to do Dual Slalom and Downhill, and I only ever wore Full Facer - I've seen way too many broken jaws, broken noses, cracked cheekbones to want to do anything other than ride Full Face on a gnarled track. I was going to babble, and I now see where these long replies are coming from... Be a !@#$%^&* man! Use your superman reflexes will falling off to do a triple back flip instead of waking your head - at least thinking like that you won't worry so much.. -Lynx