Showtime for Trevor
The story of his life, is his story on stage.
It’s as if a writer at Cirque du Soleil had researched his inner heart and soul and created a role for him on stage where he could play his true self.
Indeed, 31-year-old Trevor Bodogh from St. Catharines is a free spirit. A guy who graduated from Sheridan College with a diploma in business administration finance, then ditched a career path in commerce to follow his dreams of riding trial bikes.
He is a performer with Cirque du Soleil’s new big top show, Volta. An acrobat on wheels. Essentially, he balances so perfectly on his bike pedals, it’s like he’s standing on two feet as he travels across rocks, railings and other obstacles. He is part of a group of athletic entertainers who tell the story about the freedom to choose and the thrill of blazing your own trail.
The show, currently in Montreal, then Gatineau, is coming to Toronto Sept. 7 to Nov. 12.
In the show, he plays a free spirit. On his specialized trial bike, wearing a wildly-patterned bright shorts-and-top costume, he balances on beams and jumps from obstacle to obstacle. After all, free spirits have no walls or barriers.
“The free spirits are just an explosion of life,” he says.
Indeed, it just makes sense to Bodogh, the nephew of world champion curler Marilyn Bodogh.
“I feel like my whole life has been this. I’ve been this kid with a bike and a strange passion that no one has understood,” he said.
“And always has been told to get a real job. When are you going to stop screwing around on your bike?
“It all makes sense that I’m in cirque. It’s the exact right place to be and the right story to showcase my skills with the world.”
Bodogh and his bike are one. “The connection is so tight,” he says. “I don’t think about it as a bike, really.
“In the simplest form, it’s just an extension of myself. “It’s a beautiful machine.” Indeed, it is. A bike like this is not found even in the most specialized shop in Niagara, instead special-ordered from Europe. He has two.
It has no seat; that would only get in the way. “You’re always exploding your body up and down,” he says.
The all-aluminium frame, shined with custom cirque polish, makes it both lightweight at 19 pounds and durable enough to withstand the punishment of his jumps.
“When people pick it up they’re expecting something a lot heavier because they see me landing and jumping,” he says.
“They expect it to be armoured.”
The hydraulic brakes give him pinpoint accuracy. And the German-made tires are tacky and pressurized to the exacting specification of “just the right feeling.”
“I don’t use a number,” he says. “I just go by feel.”
Humid on stage, or not? He adjusts for maximum grip.
“Too hard and it feels like concrete. Too soft and you don’t have any control,” he says. “It has to be just right.” So too does the show. It has to look easy. Perfect. It has to flow.
“My heart is going double the speed it is when it’s in training,” he says. “All my senses are engaged.”
Bodogh, a graduate of Lakeport Secondary School, spent hours with his bike at the collection of boulders known as the Rockpile, at the corner of St. Paul Street and Westchester Avenue in St. Catharines. Jumping. Balancing. Practising technique.
The basics involve four movements: push, pull, squat and jump. “That’s what’s happening on stage hundreds of times a night,” he says. In videos, he’s seen springing over top picnic tables on two feet, one after the other, doing squat jumps up a set of concrete stairs holding on to his bike, and balancing on a rear wheel on top of a sloped boulder then vaulting through the air to land on another rock.
The judgement calls, identifying obstacles, strategizing jumps, assessing risk, staying safe, it’s all a takes mental stamina.
“It makes you very strong, very aware of your own potential to really hold on to your own fears,” he says.
It all comes down to a moment. “There’s that small window when you’re bouncing. It means you’re getting really close to blast off.
“There’s a countdown in your mind. You’re getting closer to the edge. Judging he distance. Making sure everything’s really tight in your body.
“Everything feels good. You can commit fully to the moment.
“That’s what trial is all about. That moment when you squat down, and you compress, and you leap to the next obstacle.
“You need to be one thousand per cent on point or else the mission is going to fail.
“All that preparation for that one split second.”
With him always is his late father, Gerard Bodogh who encouraged him to play squash at a young age. Gerard died in 2008. His mother, Louise, lives in Niagara-on-the-Lake.
“I think of him every day,” says Bodogh. “In the spirit of just the way I live. To live honestly. To not hold back.
“All of us only get one life. Enjoy it. Enjoy the friends and live healthily and happily.”
Bodogh has taken a break from his other passion – public speaking – to focus on his time at cirque. And yet, the message wants to spread isn’t far from the surface.
“You need to connect with your passions in life,” he says.
Listen to people’s advice, then listen to your heart.
“You’ll have to use your own gut instincts to decide on where you want to go and what’s going to make you happy. No one knows what that is.
“No one will understand your journey.”
“You’ve got to follow that, or else you’ll be living someone else’s aspirations.”