Eye glasses!

[MacRae]

I took a pretty bad spill just the other day, smacking my face into the road after falling while footbraking on a road that turned out to be much steeper than I wanted to ride without a helmet. The impact absolutely flattened my glasses (though it didn't crack either lens) and the metal frame carved my face up a bit. This incident got me to thinking about the safety of wearing regular glasses while longboarding; it never really occurred to me up until now, but now that this happened I don't feel very secure about wearing glasses when I'm skating. If the lens had shattered, I probably would've had glass rammed into my eye.

I've had contacts before, but for whatever reason they give me constant migraines and make my eyes tear up if exposed to even a little bit of wind, so they're out of the question for the moment. I can't see well enough to skate sans glasses, and even after putting on my helmet and checking out my face coverage I'm pretty sure that I'd still have hit my face in almost the exact same way if I'd been wearing it.

So here's my question for the four-eyes of the 'fish: short of wearing a full-face helmet, what do you do about your glasses while longboarding? Does anyone wear prescription polycarbonate safety glasses/goggles? If so, what kind? I just found out I'll be getting a sizable tax refund and protective eyewear suddenly seems like a pretty good investment.

[speshlspeclsteak]

rec specs/ polycarb lenses i dont have glasses but it works for my friend who skates

[glideronfreerides]

research PRK refractive surgery. best investment you could make with that tax refund.

[boarderaholic]

I'd shy as far away from corrective eye surgery as possible. Once changes are made, they are permanent. As for contacts, it sounds like they may not have been fitted properly. My best advice to you is to learn to fall properly, or get sports goggles. They are absolutely cheesy looking, but work well. Our store sells them to many people who play raquet ball type sports like squash and such.

As for polycarb lenses, they are actually not a good product. They may be "shatter resistent" but scratch up faster than one can say "boo". Many stores use them because they are cheap, both in price and quality.

[Moogleluvr]

I'd shy as far away from corrective eye surgery as possible. Once changes are made, they are permanent. As for contacts, it sounds like they may not have been fitted properly. My best advice to you is to learn to fall properly, or get sports goggles. They are absolutely cheesy looking, but work well. Our store sells them to many people who play raquet ball type sports like squash and such.

As for polycarb lenses, they are actually not a good product. They may be "shatter resistent" but scratch up faster than one can say "boo". Many stores use them because they are cheap, both in price and quality.

From the way your other options sound, this is probably your best choice. I have a friend who played basketball with prescription sports glasses/goggles (whatever they're called), and they made him look hilarious, but they worked.

[MacRae]

Thanks for the advice, guys. I'm leaning heavily towards the rec. specs, since I've considered eye surgery in the past and decided against it; I really don't mind wearing glasses, I just want to be safe at the same time.

As for falling properly, I fared pretty well in terms of actual damage, it's just really gruesome-looking since where I did get hit was right near my eye and it's turned all blackish red and puffy like it always does in that area. But even if I were a card-carrying Master of Falling with a license to practice falling in four states, I'd want proper eye protection after this one: the frames of my glasses left cuts on both my upper and lower eyelids from the jagged edge of the frame, so a little up or down and I could very well be blind in one eye right now. Meanwhile, if I hadn't been wearing the glasses to absorb some of the impact, I might have hit my eyeball itself against the ground. That would've sucked.

[JY Jelly]

I've never had a problem with my glasses skating, I usually dont fall on my face though.

[floridais4lovers]

There are contacts that you can wear at night and they correct your eyes while you sleep such that you don't have to wear anything in the day. Of course the effects are temporary and you have to wear the lenses every night.Talk to your optometrist.

[MacRae]

I've never had a problem with my glasses skating, I usually dont fall on my face though.

I've been longboarding for about three years and I skated a good deal as a kid, wearing regular glasses the entire time. I never had any problem, either; in fact, I don't think I'd even had my glasses come off my face as a result of a crash up until now. One time is all it takes, though; the vast majority of the damage was done by my glasses, and if I'd been wearing some kind of safety glasses I might have nothing more than a scrape.

99% of the time I'm sure it'll be fine, but coming within half an inch of maybe getting your eye carved out is enough to make me worry. I've given it some thought since it initially occurred to me and have decided it's not a make-or-break thing, but given the chance I'm definitely going to get some kind of eyewear that's less likely to cut me or leave glass in my eye - even if it's unlikely I'll manage to fall in such a weird way again.