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Monday, September 22, 2008


A Painful Milestone in Biketrial!

I have been trying very hard to learn the elusive "pedal kick" for a while now. My balancing on the rear wheel hop is not exactly very consistent, which makes learning the "pedal kick" doubly hard.

My arm and back muscles are constantly being pushed to their limits, with hardly enough time for them to recuperate.

Today, those muscles felt well enough for me to start practicing and I went at it with a vengeance.


Again, Joel was pretty excited to help me record my milestone.

Have you ever been practicing so hard and then when you finally managed to do it, you just get so excited and have to just keep going no matter what? Well, today was like that for me. Even after a nasty fall, I still went at it until I practically ran out of strength.

I have to learn when to stop... now that the adrenalin high is gone, my arms and back are killing me... LOL. I can't wait to start practicing again... but gotta recuperate first!



Monday, September 15, 2008


BikeTrial in Malaysia has future?

The past weeks while I was teaching my kids how to ride the bicycle, I was also riding my 20" trial bike with them. A boy about 10 or 11 years old was cycling past and saw me riding the Monty. He could not help it but noticed that the trial bike was without a seat.

So he stopped and asked me what bike the Monty was and how one would ride a seat-less bike. I tried explaining in my best Malay that it was called a trial bike and that we could ride it in many ways.

I did not know whether if he understood me or not, so I decided to show him the track-stand, hopping, pivoting and the rear wheel hop. As pathetic as my skills were, I managed to impress him before I embarrassed myself... LOL.

If I may be so bold, I believe I have opened up the boy's mind to the many possibilities of going beyond conventional cycling and bike control. I could almost see the flame lit up in his eyes!

After a few nights, the boy came back with a friend. While I was teaching Joel how to pedal on his bike, the boy asked me to show the rear wheel hop or "willie" as he calls it. I obliged and both of them were suitably impressed... LOL.

Then last Saturday, while I was teaching Jordan how to ride, the boys came back and this time, there were 6 of them! LOL... And they made the same request, to see the "willie". I was under a lot of pressure not to fail... LOL... stressed!

I let each and everyone of them try the Monty and taught them how to track-stand and so on. All their bikes were old and not well maintained. I took one of their bikes and show them how to track-stand and hop, just to show them that even with their own bikes, they can still practice the things I showed them.

And then tonight, just 2 days later, while I was teaching Jodene how to glide on her bike, the boys were back. This time around, they wanted to show me what they have been practicing... so I brought out my bike and sure enough, some of them could track-stand pretty well. I was suitably impressed!


The future of biketrials in Malaysia rested on these boys... :-)


Not bad.


This boy was by far the best!


Still wobbly.

I believed that given the right size bike and some coaching, they will learn trials in just a couple of months!!! Like all beginners, they found track-stand boring (LOL... I would have to agree) and they were already attempting pivoting.

Btw, I should also mentioned that almost all of them could willie cycle on their own bikes. If you can see them, I will bet that you will be suitably impressed as well... LOL



Friday, September 12, 2008


2008 Singapore BikeTrial Competition - Round 3

Last Sunday on 7th September, I went down to Singapore with a friend to watch the 2008 Singapore BikeTrial Competition - Round 3. I met my friend in Melaka around 1:00am and we left for Singapore at around 2:00 am in morning and arrived at about 6:00 am.



We parked in a parking lot in Bishun Park, around Ang Mo Kio Ave 1. Both of us took a nap in the car until 8:30am.

When we arrived at the competition area, all the competitors were prep and walking through the 8 sections to find their riding lines. They had already done the compulsory bike checks, safety checks and competition briefing.

This time around, there was an Open Category specially tailored for any cyclist other than trials. The organisers explained to me that the Open Category was to give other non-trial cyclists an opportunity to try out biketrials using just any ordinary bikes and hopefully, allowing them to build up their interest in biketrials from there.

This time around, I noticed that the Elite class' sections were longer than round 2's in Pasir Ris City Park and a lot of the Elite riders ran out of time. The sections for J. Senior and Elite looked very challenging and hazardous, well to me at least... LOL.









The competition ended at about 2:00pm and by 3:00pm everything were packed up. After the prize giving, I was on my way back to Malaysia at around 4:30 pm... :-)

I am really glad I made it to this competition. By attending a biketrial competition like this, I get to learn something new about the sports. In the not too distant future, I hope to be able to organise a BikeTrial exhibition competition for the fun of it... LOL. Help! Who wants to sponsor???

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