Whitewater Helmet Review

Shred Ready Super Scrappy
Livin’ Large
Contact (334) 257-1212, www.shredready.com

Shred Ready is a scrappy little company located in Tallassee, Alabama. While most of their offerings are composite, we had an opportunity to test their ABS injection-molded (plastic) Super Scrappy. While readers should heed the before-mentioned limitations of plastic helmets, the plastic Super Scrappy does feature the most advanced retention system of the bunch—Shred Ready’s H.O.G., or Hand of God. Once you have the helmet in place on your head, simply twist the two opposing micro-adjusting ratchets and the helmet is drawn tight to your head. Its feel and function reminds us of an alpine ski-racing boot, but unlike a racing boot, it was snug and comfortable out of the box. The Super Scrappy also comes with removable earflaps for paddling on colder days. Our test model also carried Shred Ready’s CanCan Ear Flaps, which house waterproof headphones. These can be plugged into a waterproof MP3 player, or an MP3 player or compact disc player that is stuffed into a waterproof housing, or used with a radio for instructional purposes—very James Bond! At first the idea seemed ridiculous. The sights, smells, and sounds of the rivers are as much a part of the experience as the boating. No matter—in the interest of journalistic integrity we borrowed a waterproof MP3 player from a swimmer and hit the local play spot. Just as music can motivate or crush a weight workout, we found that a little Godsmack intensified our playboating. The local play spot didn’t seem quite so mundane, and the November weather was not quite as noticeable. While we wouldn’t recommend wearing headphones on anything where all of our senses have to be full-on, tunes at select play spots were welcome. Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon accompanied us while drifting down to the take-out and taking in the gray sky and brown hills, which perfectly rounded out our musical river experience. In addition to the Super Scrappy, Shred Ready makes one other plastic helmet and five composite helmets. All the composite models carry Shred Ready’s H.O.G. or H.O.T. (Hold on Tight) retention system.