Katja Wittens’ garden is full of crates, concrete blocks and other elevations and obstacles. All for her son Victor van der Velden (16), so he can ‘bike trial’: stunts on his bicycle. Victor makes such an impression with his stunts that the municipality of Tilburg is going to see if a professional track can be built in the city.
The first thing you notice when Victor picks up his bike: there is no saddle on it. “Trailing is all about jumping over difficult obstacles. Then it is very important that you can easily jump off your bike. A saddle is just in the way.”
The art is balance. Seemingly effortless, Victor jumps on all objects in his mother’s garden with his bicycle. A clever game of cycling, braking and keeping your balance. Because if you hit the ground with your feet, you’re done.
“I collected more and more pallets.”
Victor was born with a love for the bicycle. His father is a racing mechanic. Victor has had a mountain bike since he was six and has been doing bike trials since he was ten. But then corona came: “The mountain bike club closed and I was bored. That’s when the love for trial really started. I collected more and more pallets, went higher and higher.”
His parents looked on with regret, because their garden slowly but surely turned into a bike trial course. But that irritation is really just a game. Because they are very proud of their son, who recently became Dutch champion.
While he demonstrates his skills in front of our camera, Katja tells how her son, who is sixteen years old, now has the muscles of an eighteen-year-old: “But no one is allowed to see it”, she laughs.
“You need more varied obstacles, like a boulder.”
Old tractor tires, even a broken car: everything can be used for a trial course. But a professional course as they have in mind in Tilburg requires a little more, says father Hein. He points to the improvised gang in his garden: “This is fine for daily exercises. I compare it to tennis: you can also do that on the street. But if you want something more professional, you need more varied obstacles. A boulder in a special shape, for example. That variation makes it fun.”
At the moment there are about 200 biketrialers all over the country. 20 to 30 participate in competitions. Few, but that makes sense: “Because there are no facilities,” says Katja: “When Victor shows some basic exercises here in the neighborhood with stones or tree trunks, those little men immediately respond: ‘Great, cool! Where can you do that?!’”
With a warm recommendation from cycling union KNWU, the municipality will investigate whether the first Dutch bike trial course can be given a place somewhere in the city. A careful look has been taken at the Pijnenburg cycling club, but nothing is concrete yet, Katja emphasizes: “It can be done outside or inside, in an old industrial hall? In any case, the alderman of Sport is very enthusiastic.”
