Safety in Sport, The Hard yards way - Part 1
Traditionally, protective wear in hard-ball sports such as cricket, field hockey and lacrosse has largely been an afterthought for sportswear brands who were keen to capitalise on the high-margin items such as cricket bats and helmets. Usually you’ll find a thick spongy piece of foam affixed to the arm with a pair of bulky velcro straps that (attempt to) keep it in place; not a very slick solution!
With advancements in materials science and clever 3D-fabric manufacturing techniques, things have begun to slim down. Subsequently, we find now that there are a couple of good simple solutions available to athletes on the market at present. However all (with the exception of our own design!) do not have an interchangeable construction and miss the mark with the smaller details that make a big difference to overall enjoyment when wearing.
The second issue arises from the regulation and standardisation of testing and indeed the precise way that the protective materials are tested is an issue in and of itself.
Regulation & Standards - This has been historically not-so-well regulated however in recent times, new legislation has come in to play and now sports PPE is beginning to see a base standardisation for quality and testing which is certainly progress.
Testing - As part of basic regulation, testing is often employed however, to standardise the testing of something means more often than not to test the object under very tightly controlled conditions using nicely rounded numbers in an environment that is very much removed from where the PPE is to be used.
In the case of protective wear this almost exclusively means that it is a ‘drop-test’ of some sort, ie, where a metal ball or plate of a pre-specified size and mass is dropped from a specified height onto the material being tested which rests upon an anvil of a specified shape and size. Now, you might feel that this is the best or only (or indeed a good!) way to test sports PPE, and to be fair it does make it easier to compare one type of protective material with another, but only under these particular circumstances.
Unfortunately, the circumstances of standardised testing are so far removed from the realities of the conditions that you, the athlete will face (such as a +90mph cricket ball) that any conclusions drawn are essentially meaningless in the real-world context of what you (the athlete!) will actually experience on the field. Furthermore, it would be inappropriate to draw any particularly meaningful clinical conclusions from a medical perspective from such data.
To illustrate, the British Standard for testing a protective arm guard is BS EN 6183-3:2000-3.2.2 and to the right is an extract diagram of the testing set-up; how inspiring!
In this test, the protective material is applied to the metal plate above and dropped onto the metal anvil below to achieve an impact force of 10J (joules).
Now the output from such a test would be a number that tells you how much of the original impact force (10J) is measured on the other side of the test material. To meet the level 3 standard (which is the highest for cricket PPE excluding gloves and helmets) it would need to demonstrate a force measurement of 4kN or less and we are pleased to see that our material does favourably and better than common alternatives (below).
Force measured against 10J impact test
This is all very pleasant, and looks very positive on the surface but let me ask you:
Do you know what a 10J impact feels like?
Could you tell me the difference between 35kN and 3kN? What about 8kN and 3kN; is this the difference between breaking your arm and not, or simply the difference between no pain and a mildly painful bruise to the wrist?
No, I’ve no idea either.
As a medical doctor I deal with scientific data on a daily basis however often I am asked to interpret clinical data presented and understand if the conclusions drawn are actually relevant to my patients or just look significant from the raw numbers.
This is where the Hard Yards philosophy of doing more for our athletes comes in.
We know that our protective guards hold up in standardised tests (although I hope I have changed your view of when it is appropriate to use these!).
We know anecdotally from our pro and amateur-testers that when a high-speed bouncer wallops you in the forearm, you barely feel it. But this is not good enough quality of evidence from our point of view.
We want to be completely confident that our kit will do the job it is designed to do. Not only transmit less than 4kN on a drop-test, but make a clinically relevant difference by preventing fractures, reducing game-altering pain and keeping you focussed on the job at hand.
That is why we are currently partnering with Newcastle University over the next 3 months to test our protection in as real-world conditions as we can recreate both in the lab and in the nets at high speeds. Speeds beyond what you would expect to face at the crease, on the hockey astroturf, or on the lacrosse field.
We also know that because of the molecular properties of our non-Newtonian-based material, the impact absorbing capabilities increase as the force of the impact increases. However we don’t know what the force-curve looks like, or what the true upper limits are. So, we’re going to push our protection to its breaking point so that when you wear our kit you know it does what we say it can and you can concentrate on doing what you do best!
I’ll be writing Part B of this article when we have the report available from the Newcastle University project team later this year. And, if it doesn’t stand up to the testing, we’ll be back to the drawing board the next day.
That’s the Hard Yards way!
Our most impactful drop yet…
We recently launched our High Impact Protective Sweatband in the HY shop and we have never been more proud of the team behind its development.
Through one of the most challenging years of manufacturing we’ve seen we have designed and created a product that achieves the 4 key components we laid out that it had to meet.
Safety / Agility / Comfort / Focus.
Safety - Premium lab-grade aerated non-Newtonian protective guard.
Agility - A streamlined, no-fuss design with a unique in-built pocket making it fully interchangeable so you can alter the protective level or band colour in seconds depending on your needs.
Comfort - Beautifully soft, yet reassuringly robust cotton.
Focus - All the above (and more!) giving you complete piece of mind on the field so you can concentrate on the job at hand!
Let’s take a deeper dive in to how we developed our our unique sweatband and our protective guards.
The Sweatband
This is the result of some very nice fabric engineering. When we spoke with our technical engineers at the factory they did initially laugh at the idea of single-piece sweatband with a pocket inside! However, after a couple of months of trial, error, trial and error we found a digital roadmap for the 3D-knitting machine that would allow us to create our unique sweatband design.
Made as a single-piece tubular design, we have managed to completely eliminate all seams at areas that take the most wear and tear! The only seam you’ll find is our patented (pending) 3/4 seam on the inside of the band the neatly lays against your arm keeping the velcro flap that leads to the internal pocket nicely closed flat.
You’ll also find little details across the band that elevate ours further:
textured & elasticated cuffs ensure a snug and secure fit every time.
hidden stitches at both ends of the internal pocket ensure the protective guard stays where it is supposed to be and doesn’t creep into the cuffs or round to the other side of your arm!
the Hard Yards branding is subtle, yet definitely there.
and finally, over the central part of the band, the cotton we use is knitted into the classic thread-loop structure called ‘Terry’ towelling which helps to wick away moisture from your arm or brow. We have doubled the density of the fibres here to give a super soft, yet reassuringly solid feel.
Most importantly, what sets our sweatband apart from the rest is our patented (pending) internal pocket that allows you to quickly change the level or size of the protection and means you can wear different colour bands or buy a new band without having to buy a whole new complete set!
The Protection
Now you’ll notice that Safety is at the very top of that list I mentioned earlier. This is not by coincidence, but by design because in our eyes it’s the most important aspect for us to get right for you.
You might be familiar with the thick sponge-like materials in many of the current arm guards on the market and to give them their fair credit, they do a half-decent job. However, if you’ve ever worn one of these guards you know just how bulky and sweaty they can get in the heat of the game and this can lead to a loss of focus on the field.
This is where we’ve taken a player-first approach. We started by asking what our athletes would want from such an item of sports protective wear. The answers were simple:
Lightweight; good. Forget that it’s on my arm; even better!
Streamlined form factor. We don’t want it getting in the way of our movements.
Wrap-around comfort. It needs to be form fitting.
With these in mind we looked towards the labs at Newcastle University who helped us to identify a material that would meet our players’ needs and after working with our materials science factory we have developed our 1st version of our High Impact Guard.
The key feature to highlight is that this is a non-Newtonian material and in it’s raw state it looks rather like a thick liquid slowly flowing and oozing but on a sharp impact the molecules come together tightly, creating a solid barrier that dissipates and absorbs the force across the entire material.
Now you might think that a liquid wouldn’t be the best option for a protective guard and you’d be right! So what we do next is process the raw liquid into a form that is a solid at normal temperatures, yet still retains its desirable ‘shear-thickening’ properties. Not only this, but we micro-aerate the molten form such that when it sets solid in the mold it has 1000s of tiny air pockets (much like an Aero chocolate bar) that not only reduces the overall guard weight, but also provides additional recoil or spring within the material, thus helping to return some of the impact force back into the projectile itself creating a deflecting-like quality to the guard.
All-in-all, this protective armguard is packed with serious tech and dashed with lots of little niceties that elevate it to the top of the market.