Hockey - Leader face shield review

I recently acquired a new visor for my hockey helmet.  Made by Leader, this is an excellent, top quality and user friendly face guard.  Its design incorporates a hinge and single clip so that the visor is really easy to drop into place during play, but is also easy to lift up out of the way after your line has stopped playing.

When lifting the visor up, you need only release the clip and pull up on the shield, and the shield will stay up after it has risen above the horizontal.  That way you can cool off without having to take the whole helmet off.  Additionally, you can remove the entire visor without removing the mounting strap at the pivots, by turning the visor to a 45 degree angle.  The visor comes off relatively easily once you know the right angle, and yet won't come off on its own.  That makes it easier to use the helmet without a visor once in a while.

My previous ITech face guard was rather lower down in the model range, and is attached to the helmet via a hinge at the top front of the helmet, and two clip on straps that connect to the rear of your helmet as shown in the photos.  This visor is nowhere near as easy to use as the Leader visor.  Additionally, it is not as well made, the visor is not quite as clear, and you don't get quite as much airflow.  That's not to say that the ITech visor is of poor quality - after all, it is a reasonable budget model.

Most people will tend to remove their face guards and or helmets after every time they come off the playing surface, simply because it's often too hot not to.  The Leader faceguard makes it much simpler to get cool air to your face quickly and easily.

Quite a few players don't wear helmets, which is perhaps taking only a small risk.  Get it wrong or get knocked over by someone else, though, and a head injury could take you out of circulation with serious consequences.  No one wants to be a vegetable, and that's why I tend to do the chicken thing and wear the helmet!

	The visor before mounting		One clip release to lift the visor.
	Chin guard		Visor mounted on my CCM helmet
	Bauer helmet with face shield.  Note the straps to hold the face shield down.  That's what I don't like, although it doesn't really matter much without the chin guard.

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