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Center of Gravity and Effective Weight
Why does the weight of your head matter? Adding weight to the head, such as wearing an old-style headguard, potentially increases the chances of brain damage because the weight adds to the concussive equation when the neck is the pivot point. The positioning of the helmet's weight and center of gravity critically determine whether it reduces or promotes a concussion.
Effective mass is defined as the mass of the helmet added to the mass of the head. What is important is how and where the weight is added. Adding weight above the ear-eye line, increases or makes the helmet top heavy, increasing the tipping point which promotes concussive injury. In simpler terms, a top-heavy headguard, like an old-style headguard has most of its padding above the ear-eye line. This increased weight adds to the momentum which encourages the whiplash movement and potentially a concussion. The Warrior Tough helmet was purposefully designed with a low center of gravity below the ear-eye line so it is not top heavy, nor will it add to the concussion equation working against the athlete.
Cracking the Code: Understanding Helmet Weight in Concussion Prevention
Simply adding more padding doesn't solve the concussion problem because it increases the weight on the top of the head. Old-style headguards feature the majority of padding above the ear-eye line, creating a high center or gravity as illustrated by the line in Figure A, making the headguard top heavy.
A heavy, padded, top-heavy helmet provides a false sense of security to the user, it sounds like a good idea, but physics says it promotes concussion. When the headguard is hit and the neck bends backwards, the weight of the headguard adds to the weight of the head, adding to the force of the impact, generating brain inertia. Think of brain inertia as energy trapped in the brain that makes it want to move. The brain and the skull typically move as one unit, but they are two separate parts: the brain within the skull case.
Once the helmet and the skull case stop after an impact, the brain is still moving because of built up inertia in the helmet transferring to the skull and ultimately the brain. The motion of the brain abruptly stops by crashing into the skull that contains it. This results in an impulse concussion.
This explains why there is a constant pursuit for lighter headguards, why concussions cannot be solved by just adding padding, and why headguard and helmet testing for U.S.A. Boxing certification for competition imposes strict weight restrictions.
High Center of Gravity
Impulse Concussion
Whiplash
Pivot Point
Distance Head Moves is Increased
Figure A
Optimizing Safety: Warrior Tough Helmet's Innovative Design and Strategic Padding
Distance Head Moves is Decreased
Low Center of Gravity
Safety Stop
New Pivot Point
Figure B
The Warrior Tough helmet positions it's center of gravity below the ear-eye line, making it bottom-heavy as seen in Figure B. This design prevents the padding from contributing to the head's inertia, in contrast to the old-style, top-heavy headguards. Additionally, Warrior Tough has shifted the pivot point of the neck by adding a built-in safety stop at the back of the neck. This change alleviates stress on the neck and lowers the risk of whiplash by reducing the distance and slowing how fast the head moves backwards after an impact.
Our goal has been achieved: Warrior Tough reduced head acceleration, inertia, and the potential for whiplash by creating a design that decelerates and supports the head and neck. This, in turn, not only establishes a pathway for force transfer out of the head but it also provides a method to increase the mass of the head by connecting it to the torso mass making it harder to accelerate. “In all these examples, the mass of the head has effectively become too large to be easily and suddenly accelerated or decelerated by the potentially concussive force” (Shaw, 2002, p. 288). The Warrior Tough Energy Transfer design also minimizes the overall trauma reducing neck injury potential.
Measuring Time from Impact to When the Head Hits the Shoulders
Whiplash force and momentum are multiplied because of centrifugal force (rotation of the head about the neck).
When the back of the headguard hits the shoulders, the skull stops.
When the skull stops, the brain is still moving and the curvature of the back of the skull actually adds a final boost of energy before the brain crashes into the back of the skull.
Figure C
Instead of delving into complex math and physics to explain these concepts, let's keep it simple. The old-style headguard shown in Figure C lacks features to control energy, except for the brow pad in this example that is useful for only about the first 40 milliseconds. After the impact, the padding in the old-style headguard then contributes to concussion potential by increasing the weight of the head, because the headguard is top-heavy. This padding situation encourages whiplash since the neck serves as the pivot point for the movement of the head. The old-style headguard design promotes concussive issues, through increasing the likelihood of whiplash movement which promotes the jarring of the brain. The difference in whiplash movement between Figure B and Figure C is substantial. “It has been evident to boxers and most laymen and physicians that the essential feature of a concussive force is that it be sufficient to jar or shake the head and any connection thereto” (Parkinson, 1982 p.132).
The automatic safety stop engages to transfer energy
Warrior Tough Concussion Counterpunch: Advanced Head and Neck Support with Built-In Safety Stop for Enhanced Impact Protection
Warrior Tough Concussion Counterpunch helmet is crafted to provide active support for your head and neck in addition to a built-in safety stop feature. Acknowledging the reality that you can't anticipate every incoming punch; upon impact the head tends to tilt backward, until it's stopped by the shoulders when wearing an old-style headguard or no headguard at all. Although the Warrior Tough helmet also tilts backwards upon impact, the helmet is designed to control this harmful action by a feature called the safety-stop. The safety-stop operates automatically, functioning like a shock absorber for each impact, automatically linking the mass of the head to the mass of the torso, making it more difficult for kinetic energy to jar or quickly accelerate your head. Increasing mass is a method described by Parkinson to reduce concussion potential. In An Instructional Book on Boxing it is indicated that "... boxers well before the turn of the century were aware of the futility of pounding on top of the bowed head, as the striker would only damage his knuckles (Fig. 8.4). In this position, the head is an extension of the mass of the spinal column and its appendages. Thus, the mass is too large to be set rapidly in motion by a blow” (Parkinson, 1982 p. 132-133).
The safety-stop also makes the connection between the head and torso which changes how energy affects the brain. According to Shaw "if the head is not mobile or is in contact with another surface or object, the kinetic energy transferred via the blow will simply flow through it and be transmitted elsewhere, leaving the brain unharmed and its function intact" (Shaw, 2002, p.287-288). Which is exactly what the Warrior Tough Concussion Counterpunch helmet is engineered to do. In this way we can keep inertia from being trapped in the brain. The helmet's low center of gravity design uses force absorbent padding to create a contact between the head and the torso, allowing impact energy to transfer to the torso, reducing concussion potential. The automatic safety stop was also engineered to reduce whiplash potential with each side of the helmet supported by a robust two-inch-thick neck pad that braces against each shoulder to transfer energy while cushioning and supporting the head and neck against rotational attacks. In this way Warrior Tough maximized the purpose of the padding used to create a low center of gravity helmet that is able to reduce potential trauma. The Concussion Counterpunch helmet is designed to safeguard the athlete rather than promote concussions.