The Nutcase Bike Helmet Is Suddenly Hard to Find, but Not Impossible

It took a few close calls and a lot of outraged nagging by my friends for me to wise up and begin wearing a bike helmet while cycling in the city. It wasn’t the optics that were holding me back. I didn’t particularly care what I looked like while biking, and I didn’t think helmets necessarily looked bad by default.

That said, my decision to clad my valuable noggin in protective foam and plastic was helped along by the stylish bike helmets made by Portland, Oregon-based Nutcase. There was one, in particular, that made me fall in love with the brand. It was painted up exactly like a ripe watermelon.

Even though Nutcase had been, until recently, widely available at retailers, even its official website shows no available stock. Lucky for you, there are still a few Nutcase helmets to be had, and I’ve tracked them down.

need a bike helmet? of course you do.

“You don’t have to be in a high-speed crash to cause significant damage,” Dr. Thomas Waters, of the Cleveland Clinic, wrote in a piece explaining head injuries common to cyclists. “If you land wrong on your head and you don’t have a helmet on, there’s a chance you could get a serious injury.”

While the days of finding Nutcase helmets at REI and Backcountry at least seem to be at a temporary end, Walmart carries a few varieties, including the teal Tiffany’s model that I’ve seen as a perennial favorite. Amazon also has a few, including models with MIPS, a newer technology that adds protection that helps mitigate some of the brain injuries caused by rotational forces on the head.

More than a thousand cyclists die every year from crashes involving cars, according to the CDC. That doesn’t count those who die in other mishaps. So what are you doing to protect your head?