Rotorua’s mountain biking trails are world-famous, but they also have their “horror stories”.
Local mountain biker Cameron Moore said he knew “a lot of” riders who had been paralysed, and others whose necks were “really badly” damaged after going over the handlebars.
The 16-year-old saw someone in his competition category “mess up” a jump and leave in a neck brace just a few weeks ago.
So Cameron took off his bike helmet and put on his thinking cap.
The Rotorua Lakes High School student created an inflatable neck brace that senses a crash and rapidly inflates to support a rider’s neck, with the aim of reducing the risk of serious spinal injury.
His prototype invention, called the Air Brace, earned him first place in the Year 11–13 category of the nationwide Samsung Solve for Tomorrow competition.
Neck braces already existed in mountain biking, but Cameron said many riders did not wear them because they were “uncomfortable”. His design aimed to fix that.
The Air Brace used small sensors that detect sudden, high-impact movement. When triggered, a mechanism inflates the neck support in the moment of a crash.
The idea was the rider could have full movement while biking, but in a fall, the device stabilised their neck.
Finding a pressure vessel strong enough to inflate the brace was one of Cameron’s biggest challenges.
He said he found the solution in the kitchen – a SodaStream bottle, designed to hold high pressure, was “perfect”.
Cameron designed additional parts to seal the bottle properly, using his 3D printer to make them. He taught himself most of the skills to make the device through watching YouTube tutorials and using online forums.
Cameron said the next step was refining the prototype to make it lighter and more compact. It had been tested at home, but he hoped to trial it properly in the local forests.
Cameron said if the opportunity to further develop the product alongside businesses, such as a metal fabrication company, arose, he would be “extremely happy”.
Once he had a more polished version, he dreamed of commercialising it.
Cameron downplayed his invention, telling the Rotorua Daily Post it was “a bit messy” and he was “not proud of any of it” yet.
He was thinking about putting some of the $9000 prize from his Samsung Solve for Tomorrow award towards developing it further.
He reluctantly mentioned he had also won the Samsung Solve for Tomorrow competition in Year 9, with an AI-powered wallaby trap.
Cameron said being “observant about the issues around us” inspired his ideas.
He was looking at a future career path in mechatronics or product design.
In a Facebook post congratulating him, Rotorua Lakes High School said Cameron was “showing that world-changing ideas can start right here in Rotorua”.
University of Auckland chemical sciences senior lecturer and competition judge Dr Joel Rindelaub said Cameron’s invention “tackles a big safety issue in a simple way”.
Rindelaub said he believed that if Cameron focused on speeding up the reaction time and refining how quickly the device inflates, the invention had “real potential to reduce severe neck injuries in mountain biking and other high-risk sports”.
The New Zealand Spinal Cord Injury Registry 2024 annual report said mountain biking was the leading cause of sports-related spinal injuries last year.
The registry aimed to record every new spinal cord injury in New Zealand each year.
Sports injuries doubled in 2024 compared with 2023, with biking-related injuries making up 26% of all cases.
The increase reflected similar spikes in mountain biking injuries recorded overseas and may warrant further investigation, the report said.
Between January and November 1, 2024, in the Bay of Plenty, the Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) paid out $3.7 million on 574 local mountain biking claims.
ACC injury prevention leader James Whitaker told the Rotorua Daily Post in January that riders should use properly fitted safety gear, including a helmet that meets New Zealand standards, and stick to trails that match their skill level.
Annabel Reid is a multimedia journalist for the Bay of Plenty Times and Rotorua Daily Post, based in Rotorua. Originally from Hawke’s Bay, she has a Bachelor of Communications from the University of Canterbury.