I’m sure this has been asked a hundred times but I can’t find anything useful on Google or on this forum.
My hair is just below shoulder length and very fine. If I’m not using a hair net (which I don’t want to do for little schooling shows) I tie it in a low bun or pony tail but it looks messy after an hour. Even with strong hairspray! Does anyone have any tried and true products or techniques to create a neat, quick hairstyle that lasts?
I think that’s what hairnets are for.
Yup. I ride at a H/J barn that would describe itself (lovingly) as very traditional, and hairnets are de rigeur even for lessons, let alone at shows. So, you will certainly catch all of us in full hairnets with the “hunter ears,” even in the jumper ring, which, as goofy as it sometimes seems, is practical for the reason you identify (otherwise your hair falls out of your helmet). Now…the navy jackets in the jumper ring on the Thursday of a rated show? that’s a more complicated issue 
Even if I’m schooling at home and wearing my hair in a ponytail, I still use a hairnet, I just don’t flip everything up under my helmet. I have layers and fine hair, and I hate the feeling of it escaping all over. So I just do the standard ponytail with hair over ears, hairnet over, ponytail elastic around the hairnet and put on helmet.
If you’re using the no-knot ones, I do my standard ponytail, but then instead of putting the elastic UNDER the base of my ponytail in preparation to flip it up, I put it on top of it and then put my helmet on.
I always wear my hair in a low pony tail, and I rarely put anything in it. I found out that as long as I don’t put layers in my hair it looks pretty neat, and if you use a strong elastic nothing should fly out, though a hairnet would help here too. I am under the impression that it is dangerous to put your hair up under your helmet, as it affects its ability to distribute the impact. Not saying this to upset anyone, as I think it looks much better up, I just know I have had enough concussions in my short life so far, and I don’t need to risk any more headaches! On this note, please remember if you ever fall and hit your head DO NOT take the helmet off until the EMT tells you to. I recently fell on my face (horse flipped over a jump) and I remembered this fact after 3 doctors yelled at me the last time I was visiting the hospital for head injuries :lol: Many of the people who saw the fall did not know this fact! The EMT was impressed, and I like to pretend it was because of this knowledge, and not the acrobatics my horse and I performed.
Why no hairnet at a schooling show? It isn’t like it takes up any more time. Color me confused.
Anyway, I pull my hair back when wet and smack some product in it. I wear a baseball hat until I ride anyway. Then I just use a hairnet (cough cough).
I use a neutral coloured buff. My hair is chin length and SUPER annoying under a helmet and looks dumb in a hairnet. A buff keeps it all together and out of the way neatly.
Yikes! I’m sorry about all the head trauma!
my understanding is that the safety issue depends on how your helmet fits — I.e., that if you got your helmet fitted with your hair tucked under it, you should be fine, as long as there are no disrupting objects under the helmet (hair pins, ponytail holders, etc all need to be outside the helmet’s Footprint). But, I could be wrong.
A friend used to Frenchbraid my below-shoulder-length, fine hair & sew it in < just like Hunter braids on a mane.
I could do the braiding myself, but not add the yarn & that made the difference.
Stayed all weekend , I could even shower with it & it stayed in place.
I’d cut it down on Day 3 when we were done showing,
I have thin, not-very-long hair too, and I find that if I do tiny twists at the front of my head and around into my ponytail I get very few escapees from the ponytail. I don’t usually hairspray, but I suspect twists+hairspray, would make a fairly sturdy ponytail/bun.
I’m not totally sure how to describe it, but it isn’t braids.
I just take a thin bit of hair near my part (at the front edge of my hair), twist it into a strand (call that #1), then take another bit of hair lower down, twist that into a strand (call that #2), and cross #2 over #1 (which “locks down” #1), then I add the next bit of hair to #1 and twist. Cross #1 over #2, then add hair to #2, twist, cross over #1 ect. and keep going like that till I get to the back of my head. Once I get lower down on my head (like behind my ears) I usually quit adding more hair or switch to non-french braid to avoid having the twists getting very thick. Then I use a barette to keep the first side’s hair twist in place while I do the other side. When I go to put my hair in a ponytail I undo the barrette and just use the hair tie to hold the twists in.
The important things for me are that the lower strand on your head has to be over the higher one to keep the smaller hairs from escaping, and you have to twist the bit of hair you are adding with the bit it’s being added to or the small hairs from higher on your head will still escape (i.e. I can’t just add the hair in like a french braid).
Sorry if this is confusing, I’ve never found a good tutorial for it!
It’s called a Dutch Braid when it’s braided to the outside like that.
Personally, I find doing any kind of braid like that alters helmet fit far, far more than tucking up a little bit of hairnet at the back does. I did it once on vacation and could feel my normally perfectly fitting helmet bobbling around the entire ride, but it felt too fussy to take a hairnet along to go ride a pony in Ireland. Lesson learned: hair up in hairnet, every ride.
If you find the old school hairnets too complicated, the RWR ones make it really easy to do. After using those for years, having to use one of the old ones in a pinch is annoying!
That was my understanding at first, but I recently came across an article stating the issue was the extra hair creating space between your skull and the helmet. From what I hear, they’re still doing studies on the subject, and hopefully more will focus on putting hair up. This would be hard to control given we all have different types/thickness/length, all hard to quantify well enough for a strong argument. But you’re right that this is the guideline now- well fitting helmets are safest, hair up or not.
They are referring to some more recent research indicating that having hair tucked up into your helmet is what causes issues and decreases the effectiveness of the helmet, whether or not your helmet was fitted to you with hair up vs. down. Of course I can’t find it now, but I swear I read it in an article in the Chronicle within the past year…or maybe a blog on the site…but fairly certain it was in print.
But, yes, to go back to the OP’s original question, hair nets would be my recommendation. This problem is why we wear them.
Signed, another one with wispy, medium-length hair.
Why wouldn’t you just use a hair net all the time? I often use one even for schooling at home.
Thick, somewhere-between-chin-and-shoulder-length hair here. I always wear a hairnet…even when I was moving cattle across a mountain in Montana in July. 
The RWR hairnets are the bomb-diggity and make it so easy. It takes me about a minute for the whole helmet process (from taking helmet out of bag, pony tail, etc)
I’m thinking seriously about just braiding and leaving out. I see more and more ponytails in the jumper ring. I wouldn’t do it as a fashion statement (I’d need feathers for that!), but to help ensure proper helmet fit. I feel better in my helmet with my ponytail out for schooling. I haven’t been brave enough to show that way, though. I know most people wouldn’t be caught dead in the ring like this, but, that’s okay.
Simone, WEG 2018 Individual Gold Medalist, Show Jumping, won with a pony tail. Pony tails are quite common in Europe. Always a pony tail for me as a junior; now my hair is shorter so it’s a hair net. 
We’re seeing more and more braids out in the jumper ring in my area (VA), and I think I may be one of them with my new helmet. Of course, with a hairnet to keep it neat
I have waist length very curly hair. I put it in a simple braid down my back, braided while wet. No french braiding as the ridge formed by a french braid is wicked uncomfortable. I sometimes use gel or hairspray to try to limit flyaways, but with curly hair its fairly inevitable.
Having the bulk of this much hair inside my helmet severely affects the stability of even a helmet fitted with my hair up. There’s no way to ensure it stays in place when you stack a helmet over nearly 2 feet of hair all furled up. I’ve already had too many head injuries, so I wont take any chances.
I’ll do the same in the hunter ring, hunter hair be damned. My brain is worth more. I tuck the braid inside my jacket to make it less obvious.
Yep, and if it’s good enough for her, it’s good enough for me. 
Maybe I’ll ride better.
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