YOUNG RIDERS COMPETE FOR STRIDER CUP TITLES
Children as young as 19 months compete in Strider Cup World Championships
MORRISON» The biggest ramp at Weaver Hollow Skate Park stands 48 inches high, but it didn’t take long for tiny tykes Charlie and Daisy Noyola to conquer it on their Strider bikes when they visited the park for the first time last week.
Charlie, 5, stands two inches shorter than the top of the ramp, which looks precipitous enough to intimidate an adult. Charlie couldn’t resist.
“Daddy, I made it up here all by myself!” Charlie squealed to the delight of his father, Mark.
Daisy, 3, is nine inches shorter than the ramp, if you don’t include the pink Minnie Mouse helmet she wears whenever she rides her pedalless pink bike with 12-inch wheels.
“Daisy got on a Strider when she was 18 months old and we couldn’t — we still can’t — get her off,” said their mother, Alicia Pucci. “It really brings her a lot of joy, a lot of confidence and a lot of independence. They’re on the Striders every single day they can be.”
Saturday will be a big day for the Noyolas because Daisy and Charlie will be competing in their second Strider Cup World Championships, billed by organizers as the “Toddler Tour de France.” Last year the event was held in Salt Lake City, but this time the Littleton residents get to sleep in their own beds because the world championships will be held at downtown Boulder’s Central Park. Hundreds of kids, including some from foreign countries, will be racing on an obstacle course that includes a thicket of hanging pool noodles, a ramp with a fog machine, a minefield of tiny tires to roll over, a tunnel and a bubble wrap path that
succumbs to tiny tires with a pop, pop, pop.
Some of the racers will still be in diapers. The youngest, in fact, will be 19-month-old Crew Blake of Littleton.
Like the Noyolas, 3-year-old Huxley Fair will be competing at the world championships for the second time after finishing fourth last year. Huxley and his posse of buddies — Summit Hoskins, 3, and Johnny Cardos, 4 -— live in the Weaver Hollow neighborhood and ride their Striders at the skate park all the time.
Huxley was fond of his Strider bike even before he could walk, spinning its wheels when he was still in the crawling stage. Now he’s known for his daring tricks, one of which he calls the Superman: balancing on the seat with his pelvis, hands on the handlebars, legs extended in the air behind him.
“Once he was able to walk and was tall enough, up and down the street he would just go,” said his mother, Tovah Fair. “Then it became anytime we went anywhere he was like, ‘Can I take my bike?’ It’s developed into, ‘Watch this trick.’ There’s a lot of, ‘Bear down and pray that nothing bad happens to him.’ But he is good at it, and he has a good time with it.”
The idea behind “balance bikes” (Strider is a brand name) is that learning balance and coordination can be accelerated by starting toddlers on pedal-less bikes, propelling themselves with their feet trotting on the ground without the complication of pedals. Parents who are proponents of balance bikes say they make the eventual transition to pedal bikes a lot easier. Often they can skip the intermediate step of training wheels.
“The geometry was really geared toward the low center of gravity,” said Daisy’s dad, who is an engineer. “The low center of gravity (with Striders) builds confidence. The kids get their feet on the ground and develop balancing skills without feeling like they’re going to tip over. When we first put Daisy on it at 18 months, in less than two hours she was already balancing and pulling her feet up and riding without her feet on the ground. It’s pretty amazing. That whole concept really accelerated the balancing skills, and bike-riding skills as well.”
Daisy doesn’t think you need an engineering degree to understand.
“I like it because I get to bike race with it,” Daisy said while holding an action figure of Elastigirl from “The Incredibles” animated film franchise. “I like it and I have a pink water bottle like my bike.”
Her mom, who is a schoolteacher, sees other developmental benefits.
“It’s the gross motor skills, but it’s also the fine motor skills manipulating the turn,” Pucci said. “It does stimulate the brain. You’ll see that (benefit) in language as well. It’s like evolution on their bikes. Once they’re walking, they’re talking because it gets everything moving and all the brain cells clicking. It’s the coordination of the body and the mind.”
Charlie got a mountain bike for his fifth birthday, although he still rides his Strider, too.
“Charlie’s transition to a normal bicycle was seamless, not the typical ‘Put them on training wheels, take them off the training wheels, watch them fall several times and build confidence through pain,” said his dad. “For his fifth birthday it was, ‘Take the camera out, I’m going to capture him on his first ride.’ It lasted like two and a half seconds, because as soon as he got on the bike, he rode down the street and it was all over.”
Huxley has ridden a pedal bike 7 miles in Waterton Canyon. He’s also ridden his Strider hundreds of feet up Mount Falcon. For braking on descents, he drags his feet or chucks his Strider into a “power slide,” sort of like a “hockey stop” on skis.
“It wasn’t a 10-minute thing, it was like four hours,” his dad, Logan, said of their Mount Falcon expedition. “Coming down was definitely worth going up for him.”
There are mishaps, of course, especially in skate parks. Sometimes other parents ask Huxley’s mom about the risks he takes.
“I get a lot of that,” she said. “He’s going to get hurt, but he’s going to get hurt doing this in an activity that’s safer with us monitoring. I would rather have him get hurt and learn, ‘Yeah, sometimes you fall and, man, it hurts. You still get up and do it again.’ You can’t pad your kid. He’s had bloody knees, bloody elbows, he’s cut his lip. Then he does this, ‘OK, I want to try that again.’ If it’s really bad he’ll say, ‘Can I try it again next time?’ It’s never, ‘I don’t want to do this anymore.’ He assesses how hurt he is, and then he moves on.”
So, Huxley was asked, what is it like to crash?
“Not good,” he said.
Still, he wants to go fast and he wants to win.
“Yes,” he said, “the biggest trophy.”
About three months ago, Huxley’s buddy Johnny was doing tricks at Weaver Hollow and did a full face plant.
“He got up and was bleeding,” said Johnny’s mom, Tricia. “My husband was trying to clean it off him. He kept crying and saying, ‘I just want to still ride. I’m going to still ride.’ ”
Now he wears full-face headgear that looks like a motorcycle helmet.
“That’s why he loves to wear it,” Tricia said. “He likes to pretend he’s riding a motorcycle, so he really feels like he’s a ‘Motorcycle Man.’ That’s what he calls himself.”
On Saturday, Huxley will be hoping to improve on last year’s fourth place at the world championships. His mom said he seems to have a natural competitive streak but doesn’t have to win for racing to be fun. He just loves being on his Strider.
“He doesn’t think a good day is to sit at home and do nothing,” she said. “He doesn’t have that ‘I want to watch TV and play on my iPad.’ He’s like ‘Mommy, tomorrow can we go on a bike ride?’ He picks where we’re going to ride bikes and he picks some crazy places. He has a blast with it.”