Rapha new ad shows a rider moving without a helmet!

[martinn]

Just for interest, I noticed on the new Rapha collection, there is a cyclist on a bike riding, without a helmet!!! Is this a new market that Rapha has identified
Martin.
http://pages.rapha.cc/feature/new-season-collections

[Mike Sales]

Jolly good. But they will have to drop their prices to get my custom.

[meic]

By at least 80%.

Nice advert though and goes to show the money that others spend on the clothes gives us some benefit.

[PH]

I thought lots of Rapha adverts have been without helmets. Though that might change now they have their own.
Tests have shown that theirs is more effective than any other. We all understand the theory of risk compensation, well the risk of damaging a Rapha priced helmet means wearers won't ride fast enough to come off.

[Samuel D]

I have a single Rapha item, a pair of unpadded touring shorts. I have to confess they are better made than my other cycling clothes, all of which are budget items (still surprisingly expensive) from the likes of Wiggle and Decathlon, and all of which have steadily deteriorated from the second wash.

Going to have to try another brand next time, because so far I’ve not found anything I’d consider good value, whether cheap or expensive.

Nice film as usual from Rapha. Still a bit slick and ad agency for me, though. I think they could get away with the occasional overweight rider, for example.

[meic]

This thread may have to be thrown out of the ghetto, for drifting away from h**m**s.

[Samuel D]

Sorry!

Here: only an idiot with a death-wish would ride without a helmet.

[meic]

Only an idiot with a death wish would ride without a Rapha helmet.

[Samuel D]

Indeedy.

I could get behind your pricing suggestion for Rapha earlier in the thread. I wonder how much this latest ad cost, all told? They’ll have to sell quite a few socks, even at Rapha prices, to pay those bills.

[martinn]

You are probably right about them featuring helmetless riders before.
Have they been criticised by the mainstream "you must wear a helmet or you will die" brigade for this?
If not that is interesting, as to the why not. The other question raised is why are they featuring helmetless riders? Is it to do somehow with a retro heritage look?
Anyway I was trying to insert some levity into the helmet getto,
That would be a first a thread escaping the getto.
I must admit to owning some Rapha items and they are all very good. (Not paid full price) live with my riding distance of their outlet shop in Shepton Mallet. My wife thinks their messinger bags make excellent handbags

Martin

[PH]

You are probably right about them featuring helmetless riders before.
Have they been criticised by the mainstream "you must wear a helmet or you will die" brigade for this?
If not that is interesting, as to the why not. The other question raised is why are they featuring helmetless riders? Is it to do somehow with a retro heritage look?

From their website

Helmets
Q. Why do the riders in your imagery sometimes not wear helmets?
A. Some imagery on the Rapha website shows riders on bicycles who are not wearing helmets. Rapha does not enforce any helmet policy on the riders in its photoshoots other than they adhere to the law of the land. Writer, Rapha model and former professional rider, Tom Southam, tells it like it is after a sequence shot on the Monte Zoncolan:
OK, for the record. Helmet choice is not Rapha’s, it is mine, in line with the laws of the land where the images were shot. I have to say, that while I am pro helmets, and I understand their obvious and indisputable safety benefits, I am also pro choice. The freedom to wake up each day and make intelligent, informed choices in my life is something that I believe in very strongly. I do not think that getting angry and chastising Rapha over images used in their ad campaigns is really doing anything for anyone. I am not trying to make any statement that not wearing a helmet is cool, but I was riding at (much less than) 10 miles an hour, up a hill, with no traffic, with a film crew hanging out of a Fiat doblo, or whatever it was 6 inches from my face. My choice not to wear a helmet was quite obvious in that scenario. I do understand that there is a risk that kids will see this and potentially think that it is cool to ride without a helmet, but Rapha is as much a cycle safety awareness campaign as Bono is the savior of humanity. I am a 31 year old man, with 18 years riding experience. I have fallen off countless times, broken bones, skinned my backside, lost all of the skin from both of my hands, and in one quite extraordinary accident lost a nipple. Riding a bicycle is dangerous, period. Life is- like it or not- also a risky business. It is cruel, and hard and mean and even now, in the safest times that humanity has ever existed you, and everyone else around you will have to make choices, every single day of your lives to stay safe. Those choices should never be based on what looks cool. So, yes wear a damn helmet, but know why you wear a helmet, and make your own choice to wear a helmet, and have the intelligence in yourself, and promote the kind of intelligence in others, that allows people to be able to see an image in an advert without being compelled to go and risk your or their own life for the sake of looking cool, in exactly the same way that you can read that story and not be compelled to go and get drunk. This is my opinion, I am OK that many people will see it as wrong and I appreciate that. But, I personally salute Rapha for allowing me the freedom of choice, and helping to stop the world becoming the sterile kind of environment where no one understands that the obligation for their own safety lies with themselves and the people directly around them, and nowhere else.

[bovlomov]

Tom Southam, tells it like it is after a sequence shot on the Monte Zoncolan....<snip>

Crikey! Do Rapha make nipple guards?

[meic]

Could you afford them?

I am looking forward to the formation of a nipple guard ghetto.

[bovlomov]

Could you afford them?

I am looking forward to the formation of a nipple guard ghetto.

I can't afford not to have them! Only an idiot would ride bare nippled.

[Samuel D]

Because your nipples are worth it.