I just looked up a list on wikipedia of deaths in professional cycling to see if there was a strong correlation between helmets being mandated in year 2003 and deaths per annum. Here's what I came up with:
1896 to 2003- 130 deaths or 0.83 a year in racing
1900 to 2003- 38 deaths or 0.36 a year in training
2003 to present- 37 deaths or 2.17 a year in racing
2003 to present- 21 deaths or 1.23 a year in training
Obviously this is not a scientific survey, for example not all deaths were from crashes, but most were and I think this is good enough to draw some rough conclusions. So what do we make of this data /n/?
First of all I see no reason to think there was a significant change in the total number of pro cyclists over the period in question, as cycling has always been kind of a niche European thing. Nor do I think there was a significant change in record accuracy either, we had good record keeping in the 1890s so its not like there could be a ton of deaths that went unreported. So I put it to you lads, why have there been a huge increase in deaths in pro cycling in recent decades and why has helmet seemingly increased the rate of deaths? Cheers!
pic unrelated but funny Australia man