Sledding athletes are taking their lives • Hacker News Board

Re: Sledding athletes are taking their lives

#51

Post by manojlds » Mon, Jul 27, 2020, 4:43 AM UTC

Swizec wrote: post #39

gnramires wrote: post #19

This seems totally unacceptable. We should stop having this sport in the Olympics (implicitly supporting this madness) -- of course athletes are free to do as they chose, but we cannot encourage such pointless self-destruction and misery. An alternative to save the sport is completely redesign it to limit maximum accelerations. Usually injuries follow power laws so I doubt even that much reduction would be necessary…

So funny thing about unacceptable and lateral g-force — this is a big part of why F1 cars aren’t V10 engines anymore. They were getting too fast and the decision was between g-suits and slower cars. FIA chose slower cars (also more fuel efficient, yay). Now it’s a few years later and cars have again advanced to the point that drivers pull more than 5 lateral G in some corners. It’s kinda bonkers. I wonder if somethin…

Do you have a source on the reason for moving away from V10s being about safety of drivers. It was, I thought, about cost reduction and image (move towards less gas guzzling monsters and then hybrid that we have today)

Re: Sledding athletes are taking their lives

#52

Post by nickthemagicman » Mon, Jul 27, 2020, 4:44 AM UTC

Markoff wrote: post #50

that's lot of assumptions why they are taking their lives, but I'm missing comparison with suicide rate in other sports 3 athletes in 7 years in one sport doesn't seem out of ordinary in extremely stressful environment where each millisecond counts

Thank you, the first person who isn't acting emotionally and asking further questions to get to the truth.

Re: Sledding athletes are taking their lives

#53

Post by redis_mlc » Mon, Jul 27, 2020, 4:50 AM UTC

SenHeng wrote: post #46

matz1 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>pointless self-destruction and misery. Maybe its pointless for you, fair enough but it can be meaningfull for other people, i myself think it's interesting.

matz should not be downvoted. Humans do lots of objectively pointless self-destruction like things as a hobby with increasing risks. Things like human powered flight, aerogliding and sky diving, parkour, climbing steep things with and without gear, driving at high speeds around bends, 'explore' the wild, many of which we celebrate, reward and encourage.

You're presenting a false dichotomy.

Most people agree that the following should not be allowed in high schools because of the risk of injury:

- spearing in American football

- heading in American soccer

Also:

- most of the wingsuit pioneers are already dead

- you can carry a transmitter when in the wild to avoid wasting millions of dollars in rescue searches

- American NFL players have an average career of only 3 years, so accepting brain damage is absurd.

Re: Sledding athletes are taking their lives

#54

Post by qserasera » Mon, Jul 27, 2020, 5:10 AM UTC

Swizec wrote: post #39

gnramires wrote: post #19

This seems totally unacceptable. We should stop having this sport in the Olympics (implicitly supporting this madness) -- of course athletes are free to do as they chose, but we cannot encourage such pointless self-destruction and misery. An alternative to save the sport is completely redesign it to limit maximum accelerations. Usually injuries follow power laws so I doubt even that much reduction would be necessary…

So funny thing about unacceptable and lateral g-force — this is a big part of why F1 cars aren’t V10 engines anymore. They were getting too fast and the decision was between g-suits and slower cars. FIA chose slower cars (also more fuel efficient, yay). Now it’s a few years later and cars have again advanced to the point that drivers pull more than 5 lateral G in some corners. It’s kinda bonkers. I wonder if somethin…

I was told that engines were more stable in multiples of 6's from some weird physics going on in the engine. I guess that guy could have been completely full of shit.

Re: Sledding athletes are taking their lives

#55

Post by tomcam » Mon, Jul 27, 2020, 5:14 AM UTC

WalterBright wrote: post #43

elliottkember wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, that's what it does. It's not zero, but it's definitely less. But you probably only hit an airbag a couple of times max over the course of your lifetime, whereas on the field you'll hit your head the whole game. And I don't know how you could put an airbag in a helmet, there's not enough space to slow your impact

Make the helmet bigger, and put a liner filled with gel in it.

Not to be overprotective or anything, but after reading this I am just going to put my kids in giant rolling blocks of gel to keep them safe. Look for my YC Winter ‘21 startup GelBlok.io. If we need another compiler writer I will DM you

Re: Sledding athletes are taking their lives

#56

Post by Markoff » Mon, Jul 27, 2020, 5:21 AM UTC

burlesona wrote: post #8

Article isn’t readable on mobile. Any link to just the text?

It should be perfectly readable in any Chromium browser on Android, care to post screenshot?

Re: Sledding athletes are taking their lives

#57

Post by racl101 » Mon, Jul 27, 2020, 5:23 AM UTC

matz1 wrote: post #22

gnramires wrote: post #19

This seems totally unacceptable. We should stop having this sport in the Olympics (implicitly supporting this madness) -- of course athletes are free to do as they chose, but we cannot encourage such pointless self-destruction and misery. An alternative to save the sport is completely redesign it to limit maximum accelerations. Usually injuries follow power laws so I doubt even that much reduction would be necessary…

>pointless self-destruction and misery. Maybe its pointless for you, fair enough but it can be meaningfull for other people, i myself think it's interesting.

Well said.

Depending on people's level of courage, or lackthereof, all sports might seem like pointless self-destruction and misery. Heck, even basketball or ice curling.

Heck, I would never in my right-mind try grinding a rail on a skateboard after seeing some kid break his leg on a bad landing.

But just cause it looks insane to me doesn't mean it has no value or merit.

Not to mention that it makes a fun video game on the PS2.

Re: Sledding athletes are taking their lives

#58

Post by frutiger » Mon, Jul 27, 2020, 5:39 AM UTC

ashtonkem wrote: post #30

nimih wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why not? To me (a layperson in the physics of helmets and brains), they would seem to be quite directly related, especially when the cause of the gees is not related to an impact.

Helmets are padded, deform, or have suspension systems to decelerate any impulse that the helmet takes. This should cause a very different g-force spike between what the shell of the helmet experiences, and what the wearer experiences. If the helmet didn't decelerate any impulse to the head, the range of impacts that it could theoretically protect the wearer from would actually be quite narrow.

> If the helmet didn't decelerate any impulse to the head, the range of impacts that it could theoretically protect the wearer from would actually be quite narrow.

This is wonderful understatement: “If the g-forces between the helmet and the brain weren’t different, the helmet wasn’t a helmet at all!”

Re: Sledding athletes are taking their lives

#59

Post by libraryatnight » Mon, Jul 27, 2020, 5:41 AM UTC

racl101 wrote: post #57

matz1 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>pointless self-destruction and misery. Maybe its pointless for you, fair enough but it can be meaningfull for other people, i myself think it's interesting.

Well said. Depending on people's level of courage, or lackthereof, all sports might seem like pointless self-destruction and misery . Heck, even basketball or ice curling. Heck, I would never in my right-mind try grinding a rail on a skateboard after seeing some kid break his leg on a bad landing. But just cause it looks insane to me doesn't mean it has no value or merit. Not to mention that it makes a fun video game…

I recommend the YouTube rabbit hole of Alex Honnold interviews, whenever he talks about risk it's interesting.

Re: Sledding athletes are taking their lives

#60

Post by djmips » Mon, Jul 27, 2020, 5:48 AM UTC

frutiger wrote: post #58

ashtonkem wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Helmets are padded, deform, or have suspension systems to decelerate any impulse that the helmet takes. This should cause a very different g-force spike between what the shell of the helmet experiences, and what the wearer experiences. If the helmet didn't decelerate any impulse to the head, the range of impacts that it could theoretically protect the wearer from would actually be quite narrow.

> If the helmet didn't decelerate any impulse to the head, the range of impacts that it could theoretically protect the wearer from would actually be quite narrow. This is wonderful understatement: “If the g-forces between the helmet and the brain weren’t different, the helmet wasn’t a helmet at all!”

A helmet can just protect the skull So a helmet doesn't have to be padded or help with g-forces to be a helmet. I think helmets were initially just to prevent skull fracture.