Real Vikings wear helmets is the slogan for a Danish bicycle safety campaign

A NEW humorous video has been issued in Denmark which says ‘Real Vikings wear helmets’ and tells the story of a chief setting out to invade England without his.

Rådet for Sikker Trafik pushes the point that in medieval times you wouldn’t hear a Viking say ‘it ruins my hair’ when he needed to wear a helmet on his horse. No excuses. He would just wear it for the sake of safety.

Whether you are a Viking on a journey or a cyclist who is going into traffic, it is good to wear a helmet says Rådet for Sikker Trafik in its new campaign ‘The helmet has always been a good idea’.

“There is a great deal of humor and irony in our new campaign,” Lisbeth Sahl, the senior project manager at Rådet for Sikker Trafik told the Copenhagen Post.

“But behind it is also a message that the excuses we sometimes have for not wearing a bicycle helmet can be a bit silly when we look at how high the price can be if you fall and hit your head.”

The helmet gained popularity from 2015 until 2019, but this increase has stopped in recent years. A new bicycle helmet count shows that now 47 percent of the cyclists in Danish cities wear one.

From 2015-2019, the police have registered 633 cyclists who have either been seriously injured or who have lost their lives as a result of a head injury. In the capital, the most were registered: 249.

According to the campaign, one of the most common reasons for not wearing a helmet is that one has simply not gotten used to cycling with the helmet and therefore forgets it.

Others are vain or find helmets annoying or cumbersome to wear and some feel that they are so good at cycling that they do not need a helmet to protect them or completely drop it on short rides.

Rådet for Sikker Trafik gives four tips to encourage helmet wearing which are;

Buy a nice helmet that fits well

Hang it close to your outerwear or bike so you remember it

Hang it on the bike when you shop

Have a comb in your pocket to straighten your locks when you arrive