Heelychat, the forum for heelys, the shoes with wheels - View topic

Joined: 12 Jan 2007 Posts: 1

My son is 8 yrs old. all of his friends have heelys and wear them to school. I am apprehensive to even allow my son to get them. If I were to let him get them, I would be apt to make him wear a helmet and other protective gear. Can anyone please let me know if I am overreacting? Anyone who would like me to give some insight on Heelys, I would greatly appreciate hearing it. Thank you.

well when he starts off and is learning how to use them a helmet would be a good idea but when he starts wearing them for daily use after he's experted them then hemet wont really be neccesary

Team Heelys - Midwest Joined: 23 Oct 2006 Posts: 8388607

FOR SURE GET HIM THEM!!!!!!! It's always a good idea to start with protective gear, that way you can be aware of his skill level. Eventually if you see he's not doing any risky stunts just free rolling and chances of him falling are vveerrrryy slim then let him go with out the helmet but when he's working with ramps or grindrails or anything like that then make him wear a helmet. Also you might want to get him a model with mega wheels because they are wider and easier to balance on. about the school thing I was allowed to where mine but then I got them confiskated so now I'm not allowed to wear them so i dunno, check with school policies

General rule of overprotectiveness: If all his friends (and thus their parents) are fine with X and in little danger of getting hurt, and you're worried about your son getting hurt from X, then you're being overprotective. (X can refer to anything. In this case it's Heelys.)

Of course he's going to fall down sooner or later, probably on his butt. Almost everyone on this board has met concrete at some point. I've got scars. That's just the way it goes with any sport.

And of course if he ever gets really good and starts heading over to the skate park to pull serious tricks (grinds, one-footers, stalls, high jumps, and definitely anything involving vert), getting him to wear a helmet and some good wrist guards would be a very good idea.

On the other hand, once he's mastered the act of basic Heeling, it becomes no more dangerous than running (seriously) and he'd just look silly. There's other parents on this board who have given Heelys to their unhelmeted kids, years younger than your son.

My advice? Hold his hand while he does it for the first few hours, and let him go once he realizes what he's doing. He'll be fine.

Actually, kids that age love to hold onto their parents while learning and even like to get pulled around by their parents now and again...it's a wonderful bonding experience!
Contrary to what others have said above, I doubt at this age that he'll be doing more than basic forward motion which is pretty easy once he learns.
But even then, he'll fall down once in awhile, but at that age he's pretty close to the ground and will get little more than a scrapped knee and bruised pride.
If later on he does start doing tricks, I'd also recommend knee pads (not mentioned above).

Team Heelys - Northeast Joined: 15 Dec 2006 Posts: 1803

It really depends on the kid.

Some kids are level headed and naturally athletic. Others may be reckless and without ample dexterity. So its hard to make a blanket statement.

Mitigating risk is going to be a personal decision. My feeling is that with your own kids, you can't be too protective in the beginning. So pad him up till he looks like a sumo - and post a video. Razz

But by the time he knows how to do a 360 cleanly, he shouldn't need full armor anymore because he's already shown the aptitude for the sport. By then, simple things like going forwards or backwards should be second nature and then its no more dangerous than running.

That being said, you have to assess his personality. You can be reckless with anything. Learning one's limits is a part of growing up. My feeling is that if you don't get hurt once in a while, then you never realize those boundaries. Just don't get hurt permanently. That's the trick.

For me, even as a pro - I still wear wrist guards (gel sliders) while skating street. Joints take longer to heal than most other areas. So I take that into consideration.

For a kid, if he skates with proficiency on smooth surfaces, on flatground, then the risk is very nominal.

The last thing I'll add is that if he Heelys too fast, then you have to slow him down. Heeling at very high speeds tend to cause more injuries.

For more information please read this:
http://www.epinions.com/content_155631783556

Hope that helps.
MDHZ

Team Heelys - SoCal Joined: 26 Dec 2006 Posts: -123845