Dave, I am not sure they even had crash helmets when I did my motorcycling. I sure never saw or heard of one. They did have 10 inch wide, on the back, leather belts to reduce the back aches however.
When I was riding my Harley 74 my helmet was like that worn by the people flying open cockpit airplanes. They were like a nice, smooth, soft leather skull cap. They kept your hair out of your eyes and tried to make you look macho. Other than that they were useless.
Anyway when I flew through the air from the shoulder on one side of highway US 101 and lit a bit beyond the shoulder on the other side of US 101, I decided maybe I should stick to cars. My exhibitionism drew quite a crowd. It was winter and I was wearing all of my heavy winter clothes. All I had was a few bruises and scratches.
It felt like it took me several minutes to fly across the highway. I looked down and thought, "there goes the clutch, there goes the windshield, etc." And then I had time to position my body for the least damaging landing. It was almost like the old expression, "Time stood still."
Enjoy,
JimB