Words: Ryan Walsch | Photos: Jordan Riddle

Neck braces are not a new thing to the mountain bike world, given riders and athletes are pushing limits more than ever before. Trails are becoming feature filled and often able to be ridden at higher speeds on bikes more capable than in the past. When we crash, sometimes we have a chance to get our arms out to protect or slow our fall and sometimes we are unable to react quick enough and land on our heads. There are many brilliant helmets which have all forms of inserts and aids to help decelerate the rotation of the head like Leatt’s own 360 turbine or MIPS which have saved me before. But unfortunately the cervical section of your spine, more commonly referred to as your neck, is vulnerable in these over the bar or high speed impacts.

TESTED: Leatt MTB Enduro 3.0 helmet

Recently I underwent spinal surgery on my cervical spine due to a moderate speed impact to my head in which my head tucked under and my chin bottomed out on my chest breaking C6 and C7 and rupturing the disc between. These 7 cervical vertebrae(C1 – C7) are exactly the area of the spine that a neck brace is designed to protect and they can reduce damage in the thoracic spine which is the next 12 thoracic vertebrae.

While I was extremely fortunate to walk away from this crash and I received the best care possible I do wonder how different my experience would have been wearing a neck brace in conjunction with a full face helmet - unfortunately something I could have easily done.

How does it work?

The Leatt 3.5 neck brace is an optimised rim striking platform that sits just far enough away from a full face helmets underside to provide freedom of movement while riding but close enough that it will limit the hyperextension of the cervical spine by redistributing and transferring forces away from the fragile bones in the neck.

It sits on the shoulders with AirFlow ribbed support pads on the chest and two adjustable CoreFlex Thoracic struts that run further down the back to about T8 and are designed to support the neck and helmet in the event of impact or hyperextension but break away if the force exceeds limits to the Thoracic spine. An independent study showed a reduction of up to 89% to the cervical spine and even a reduction to the chances of breaking your collar bone, riders are 45% more likely to injure their collar bone without one!

So how does it feel to wear on the trail?

Honestly it is pretty comfortable, it is super easy to put on as it is split and locks at the front and the whole 3.5 MTB brace is 497g. The brace has two unobtrusive clear straps that clip easily under the arms and in my slightly stiffer than I am normally state didn’t inhibit my movement on the bike drastically. The brace conforms to the shoulder nicely and I hope to never know how it feels when rag dolling along the ground.

The 3.5 is Leatt’s starting point for cervical protection, offered for juniors, Small/Medium Large/XLarge and XXLarge but that one only has a thoracic strut adjustment (the two rear pads). Leatt does have a huge range of more adjustable braces which the Australian distributor Bikecorp will be offering very soon on our Australia shores.

Our take

If you’re into jumps, steeps, getting rowdy with your pals, pushing boundaries or just know how easily mistakes can be made when you’re tired or riding beyond your limits then we can highly recommend investing in a Leatt Neck Brace!

I will note that not all full-face helmet's rims line up with the strike platform, full-face helmets with a removable chin bar or drop frame helmets sit higher at the rear of the helmet and thus will not offer the same limited movement as a traditional full-face helmet. I tried the 3.5 with Leatt’s 3.0 Enduro helmet initially but then with 3 other full-face helmets and found this is the correct pairing, something like the Leatt Gravity 4.0 would be a perfect match.

RRP: $379
From: bikecorp.com.au

Hits:
Increased protection, including for collarbones
Size range for different riders
Easy to use

Misses:
May not match up with your current helmet