In The Know Cycling

The Kask Elemento has built-in trade-offs that you can’t choose between – aero vs. cooling, fit vs. adjustability, comfort vs. weight, WG11 vs. MIPS, front vs. rear storage, and glossy vs. matt finish.

Ultimately, you should choose whether to buy the Elemento based on its price vs. value.

AERO AND/OR COOLING

Many enthusiasts choose a helmet designed to minimize aero drag or maximize cooling ventilation. The Kask Elemento tries to do both.

True, many of the best aero road helmets we’ve tested also ventilate pretty well, and some of the best ventilating helmets are pretty aero.

But those of us riding between 32kph/20mph and 40kph/25mph or more will benefit the most from picking one of the most aero helmets. And those who ride and sweat a lot in hot, humid conditions should wear one of the best ventilating ones.

How well does the Kask Elemento do against the best of each type?

Aero: On the aero side, Cycling News (subscription required) did a May 2024 wind tunnel test of 23 current helmet models from 18 brands including most of those marketed as aero road helmets and a few promoted as max venting ones.

In their test, the Kask Elemento’s CdA (coefficient of aero drag) was approximately 1.4% greater than the Specialized S-Works Evade 3, the best-performing aero road helmet. Based on that difference, they calculated that the Kask Elemento would ride a 40K time trial 0.18 kph or 0.11mph slower and finish 19 seconds later than the Evade 3 when riding at a constant 250 watts over that distance.

Alternatively, holding a steady 40kph/25mph would require 4.2 more watts to make up for the added drag of the Elemento.

The test’s margin of error was 1.2%. Thus, the performance differences between the two helmets are just outside the margin of error.

The Kask Elemento ranked in the middle of the 20 aero road helmets tested. It was surpassed by one max-venting helmet (Trek Velocis) and ranked ahead of another (Specialized S-Works Prevail 3).

Remember the position of the Kask Elemento between the Specialized Evade 3 and Prevail 3. I’ll come back to that later on.

I don’t put too much weight on a single test with one rider in one position. However, the performance differences in this test were very small, ones most enthusiasts won’t notice. Earlier tests with other aero road and pure aero TT helmets (wings, visors, no vents, etc.) using different testing methods and conditions show similarly small deltas between the best helmets.

For example, Aerocoach did tests for Cycling Weekly using live riders on a velodrome back in 2020 with four top aero road helmets of that generation. That test showed that riders maintaining 30kph/18mph speeds required just 2.5 to 3 watts more power to overcome the differences between the lowest and highest CdA helmets in that test.

So, the Kask Elemento is “in the mix” with the best aero road helmets today, though, according to this latest test, there are marginally better ones.

CdA, power, speed, and time differences between the best, top-of-the-line, and often most expensive helmets and the middle-tier, less expensive ones are more significant. Those differences matter for cycling enthusiasts but not for more recreational cyclists or those on tighter budgets.

Cooling: Does it cool notably better than other aero road helmets, enough to make up for its marginally greater drag? After all, you should expect to perform better, both in your decision-making out on a course and with your power output, if you’re keeping a cool head and your head cool.

While there’s no good quantitative test that I’m aware of that charts actual cooling vs. airflow volume, there’s always anecdotal testing. For that, my fellow tester Adam, a 6′ 4″ 250lb triathlete with close-cropped hair, and I, a half-foot shorter, 100lb lighter, B-group enthusiast with thick long hair, wore the Kask Elemento in a range of temperature, humidity, sun, and wind conditions.

In short, I found the Elemento cools slightly better and Adam slightly worse than the best aero road helmets we’ve tested. Neither of us thought it cooled anywhere near as well as the best ventilating helmets.

So, what else separates the Kask Elemento from the other aero road helmets, and what are all those other trade-offs that I mentioned at the top of this review?

My fellow In The Know Cycling testers and I consider six factors when evaluating helmets – fit, comfort, safety, function, form (or looks), and price. The inseparable trade-offs in many of those factors helped me decide whether or not to recommend the Kask Elemento.

A GOOD FIT WITH MINIMAL ADJUSTMENT

Kask helmets have always fit me and my fellow testers, Miles and Adam, quite well. The Elemento is no different. It’s suited to those of us with moderately oval-shaped heads, somewhere between more rounded oval and long oval ones.

At the same time, Kask seems to pull off this good fit despite providing limited adjustment options.

There’s a US quarter-sized circumference dial in the back that’s easy to turn and allows for small adjustments to the strap that surrounds your head. That strap is made of sturdy plastic that hugs the inside shell of the Elemento and hides under the front pad.

However, the cradle does not have the rear width adjustment we used to see in more helmets, including those from Kask, which enabled Kask helmets to fit a wider spectrum of head shapes.

Kask was one of the first helmet brands to replace the adjustable clips that thread the front and rear down straps, which come together below the ears, with a fixed, sewn junction. Yet, I’ve never felt the need to adjust the junction location on the Elemento. Adam, who has a bigger head to fit his undeniably more powerful brain, finds it disappointing that he can’t lengthen the down straps before they join together.

Unlike most of Kask’s other top-model helmets, the Elemento doesn’t have a faux leather strap running under your chin between those sewn junctions. Instead, it has a wide, comfortable polyester strap with an adjustable buckle that holds in place well after you set the length you want.

Like other Kasks, it clips in on the left side of your jaw. There’s also a goldilocks amount of extra strap strength; not too long for my neck or too short for Adam’s

Finally, the mechanism that sets the height of the rear cradle and how far the helmet comes down on your forehead is easily and almost continuously adjustable. Rather than picking one of four or five positions and locking it in before putting the helmet on, the Kask Elemento, as with other Kask helmets, allows you to slide it up and down almost at will after you put the helmet on.

This is somewhat controversial. I like sliding the helmet’s front lid up or down, depending on how tall the sunglasses I’ve picked for a ride. Once I put the height where I want it, the height doesn’t change again unless I move it or take the helmet off.

Adam struggles with this design as it moves position on him during a ride.

WHAT MAKES YOU COMFORTABLE?

Helmet comfort is in the eyes on the head of the beholder. Some like a helmet with only the necessary padding, where the air flows across your head so freely that you almost don’t feel you’re wearing anything.

Others like a more padded and molded sensation that gives you the confidence that it’s protecting you against the elements.

The Kask Elemento is a hybrid of those two experiences. The air flows through it easily, cooling me so that my head doesn’t sweat on 85F/30C days of VO2 max intervals. On cooler days, it doesn’t get too cold or prompt me to put on a hat.

Yet it feels, and indeed is, more padded than any helmet we’ve tested in recent years. It uses tall yet not dense, durable, 3D-printed honeycomb pads, one at the crown of your head and four running along the major ribs inside its carbon (rather than EPS foam) shell.

There’s a 35mm, 1¼” tall, soft Merino wool pad along the full width of your forehead that easily absorbs any forehead sweat on the hottest days and is comfortably warm on cooler ones. It’s both taller and wider than most.

All of this adds up to an almost swaddled feeling the Elemento gives you. It’s very comforting and protective, yet it also feels a bit weighty.

Practically, it is quite weighty. The Kask Elemento size Large that Adam and I tested is 40-60 grams or about 15% heavier than the best aero road helmets we tested including the Trek Ballista, Specialized S-Works Evade 3, Giro Eclipse Spherical, and Kask’s Utopia Y. It also weighs 25-40 grams more than the Trek Velocis, Specialized S-Works Prevail 3, and Giro Aries, the best max vented helmets we’ve reviewed.

I can’t tell you whether the swaddling-like comfort or the actual weight makes it feel heavier or whether it’s a good or bad thing. I’d prefer the comfort without the weight or sensation of it, but I don’t know if you could get one without the other from the way Kask has designed the Elemento.

SAFETY BY ANOTHER NAME

Like a number of helmet brands, Kask doesn’t use the MIPS technology and designation for its helmets nor pay the licensing fees to do so. MIPS has always seemed to me to be a quasi-safety, a quasi-commercial designation that epitomizes the conflict between safety testing and cycling marketing.

MIPS came from a good idea – reducing the effects of your head twisting in contact with your helmet during a fall. However, the organization that created MIPS built a business and marketing approach around it that made those non-adopters look like unsafe suppliers of road bike helmets.

They even went so far as to fund the Virginia Tech helmet testing organization along with the brands that adopted MIPS to test bike helmets using protocols that some respected engineers say favor helmets using MIPS.

Worse, one of the MIPS founders and still active executives joined the European Commission for Standardization Working Group 11, aka the WG11, that believes the head form MIPS uses to develop its technology and conduct its testing doesn’t accurately measure the rotational impact forces on a human head during a cycling fall. (Keep your friends close and your enemies closer?)

Kask engineers have also been part of that working group, though Kask and the WG11 working group are at odds now that Kask gives the Elemento and its other helmets a WG11 approval sticker after passing the “Kask rotational impact WG11 test protocol” that Kask says it developed.

To further confuse the association with WG11, Rudy Project says their helmets pass the WG11 working group standard. Yet, the development of the WG11 working group standard for measuring rotational kinematics is still in progress. Without an approved standard, you can’t have an independent organization doing testing or issuing WG11 approvals.

To bring this back to something useful for this review, the Kask Elemento helmet does get a 5* rating from the Virginia Tech helmet testing group, but so do 140 other helmets, some of which use MIPS technology and others that don’t. The Elemento also gets WG11 approval, the one Kask developed and put its name behind.

Do I feel safe riding the Kask Elemento? Yes, I do. With Virginia Tech giving it high marks, Kask putting their reputation behind it, and getting US, EU, and other country and regional consumer protection agency approvals required before it can go on sale in those areas, its safety is one thing different testers agree on.

FUNCTION AND FORM

I’ve already written about this helmet’s aerodynamic and cooling performance. I’ve also noticed it’s a bit noisy on my head at speed.

That might say something about how aero the helmet is on my head whereas it might be less noisy and perhaps more aero on another. I’ve worn quieter and noisier helmets. I don’t take away anything scientific about these differences. It’s just worth mentioning if you want the absolutely quietest helmet.

The various sizes and brands of sunglasses we’ve tested fit without interfering with either the helmet’s brow or down straps. The height strap I mentioned earlier allows you to adjust how close the helmet’s front lid gets to the top of your sunglasses for aero and style benefits, something you can’t easily do with other helmets.

When it comes to docking your sunglasses, they are most securely placed upside down in the back of the helmet. Sliding them into the front vents is more stable with some sunnies than others we tested, but they don’t feel especially secure and can bang against the helmet when riding.

The Kask Elemento is very well-built and uses high-performance materials. Its carbon shell, smoothly finished and sewn down straps, and inside pads all say quality. Kask’s attention to detail and style really shows up with the Elemento’s cover which wraps the edges of its inner shell, something you don’t often see on other top helmets.

My only style objection is to Elemento’s wonderfully glossy and sparkling cover alongside the polished matt finish of the carbon shell that isn’t covered. The contrast doesn’t work for me, though it’s more my personal taste than that of a true style critic.

PRICE VS. VALUE

At US$400, £335, €375, available at BTD (BikeTiresDirect), which provided us with a helmet for this review, the Kask Elemento is considerably more expensive than the top aero and vented helmets we’ve tested from leading brands, most which sell for US$300, £250, €300 or less.

With little, if any, added aero or cooling performance compared to others that offer a similarly good fit, comfort, and safety, it really comes down to whether you prefer the Elemento’s style enough to justify the added cost and added actual or sense of weight.

Alternatively, at US$300, £230, €300, the Trek Velocis is an example of a better-vented road helmet whose CdA measures nearly as small as the best aero road helmets.

Specialized also appears to be targeting demand for road helmets with good aero and cooling performance but at an even lower price point – US$200, £165, €200. The recent introduction of their Propero 4 claims to draw from the aero design of the Evade 3 and the ventilation of the Propel 3.

We’ve just begun testing it to see if Specialized claims bear out in our experience.

Personally, while I’ve owned and enjoyed several generations of Kask helmets more than any other I’ve tested, I can’t justify spending so much more for Elemento.

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You can compare this helmet to competitively performing models in my review of the Best Aero Helmet for Road Cyclists.