Trials Is Unknown

[adamtrials]

I havent read mbuk for ages, but from what i hear it features very little trials.

Im sure many of the older people on here will remeber when trials was quite

a big part of mbuk, well advertised and lots of articles. nowadays many of the

"mbuk dirt jump kids" who ride around in gangs and worship mbuk etc have never

heard of onza, koxx or anything. im sure the old school mbuk got a lot of people interested

in trials, i got into trials through it and lots of other people i know did. i think the uk's biggest

bike mag could easily get a lot more people into trials if it highlighted how relatively easy

and cheap trials is to get into nowadays. I stopped reading it when the trials got replaced by the topless

tandem riding etc... Fun but not what im paying £3:50 a month to see...

Im gonna send an email to mbuk later

Edited May 24, 2006 by adamtrials

[ben_travis]

Ahem ... All comp riders and doing well ... mostly wearing the Monty team kit ... !!!

and the rest of ur post here.....

that doesnt contribute to porters topic now does it. give your opinions then........

I think it needs money bumped into it by MTB companies first, which will then hopefully allow for these team kits/etc which in turn will bring the sponsors james is talking about. Maybe it could be introduced into the comp scenes that there is a team trophy for example so you would have

koxx

monty

tarty

select

ashton

and any others. This could pump a little money into it if the correct sponsors come around. It will take time, but i think its getting better. Although some street comps would do it the world of good. For example DH has the street dh in lisbon which is pretty cool and has thousands of spectators.

just an idea

good topic jaf

[PaRtZ]

trails isnt big because no one has put money into it basically...

Well when im ruler of the world i might throw this sport a couple of quid

[JT!]

but the lycra?

Waynio, I'd pay good money to see you in lycra.

[Backgren]

I, and few others, have been thinking about doing some urban trials event for a few months now, when i get more free time it might actually happen. mind you all, this is in Sweden, where the sport is even smaller, but still in a similar position where noone knows about the sport. I really really think that comps of all sorts in cities would be a good idea. Look at the UCI champs/cups, some of them seem to get a massive amount of spectators.

[PaRtZ]

Waynio, I'd pay good money to see you in lycra.

NO NO please don't!!! Ill pay double to see you not in lycra

[Mark W]

Fun but not what im paying £3:50 a month to see...

£3.95 now For lower quality articles, and fewer pages? Ching Sounds like a bargain.

In fairness, some of the public are still impressed by natural riding. My sister, who knows nothing about bikes or anything about trials, came to one of the YMSA comps to see what I was up to, and was amazed by the Elite riders. Tim Stedman did some mental gap in one of the sections that she was mad impressed by, and Gilles Coustellier upping that f**king mahoosive rock out of section at Knabb is still a talking point from her So yeah, people are still impressed by big riding. It's not as easily understandable as a 4ft wall, but then again with DH, it's not like they're all riding "understandable" stuff or anything? Like a big drop over an access road in some forest somewhere mid course will still get people going "Wow" no matter what.

Someone said the problem was that it's made to look too easy, but I get people coming up to me going "I could never do that" and stuff like that, so maybe it's also partially due to it looking really hard to balance on your back wheel and stuff like that? Like Martyn said in a column of his a while back, people seem to think trials is incredibly hard to learn, which is probably going to be more off-putting than it looking easy?

[Waynio]

JT & Partz you had best start paying to either see or not to see

out bid each other.

its a good topic BUT the thing is no matter hoe much we talk and debate. are we really going to see a change???i think we need a "direction" something/somewhere to take it. i rekon the street side of it is better and much more widely seen. BUT what you cant do is sack the british championships off as THAT is trials at its best. SOME riders will NOT ride street, will not take part in a competition that involves bashing their bikes against street obstacles? or for that matter they dont practise street as they prefer the challenge of finding hard lines and tricky sections on natural.

Dont get me wrong street is extremly fun and is probably one of the main things that i was recognised for in trials years back. BUT now, i enjoy riding natural so much more, its so much more soothing and nailing a "trials" line on natural it can sometimes make a better clip on a video than a houge rail gap on the street. watch the trial noir DVD. my section is mainly full of natural riding. alot of the other sections are street, but the thing to me is, my section may not look as good as the rest as most of the others are street, BUT im happy with what has been filmed then angles and stuff. someone complimented me the other day, he visited where i work and said its one of the best parts in your section, and NO ONE on here will actually say "thats a nice line" or "thats a true trials line" il let the people who get it guess which bit it is.

i hope for the younger generation of trials riders that older lads and the adults assosiated with the sport can really get it going so for the future TRIALS WILL be noticed and then we can all be proud of what we have done for the sport. no matter how much you put in, if you get a little bit back, at some point your bound to get alot more back i hope and wish.

Waynio...............................

IF i had £10K going spare, i would seriously try to hold the best and most prestigious trials event so that people in this country would get a feel for trials. i wouldnt care if i got jack all back from it, but if something did happen it would all roll on from there. (problem is, i have no £10k!!!!) lol!!!

The world round IMO was very succesful and was advertised locally in most of the local newspapers and such forth. alot of the young lads who turned upto that, who didnt have a trials bike or know really what it was about AFTER the world round joined Tyke Trial and are still members today. so IT DOES create more interest, its like Porter said it just needs some money. i think

[John Shrewsbury]

Someone call Matt tongue.......................................Red bull bike battle wishing.

Would be great to have it here again, each year or every two years.

But over in bosten and other places they manage to aford it.

Matt did put on a great event, and should be repeat again in the near future.

[MrSuave]

there is one team who have been promoting trials across the UK , europe and the world for over 7yrs now. All team members wear the same highly sponser decorated jerseys, ride the same basic bikes and even wore full lycra suits one season! although they dont do too many comps i garantee you they have done more trials shows in more towns and citys in the UK than anyone and for some reason are always overlooked ?

Perhaps they dont have the biggest name riders but they do a huge amount for the sport.

Mind you, riders to have been and gone and some still present -

Tim Pratt

Jon Shrewsbury

Jack meek

Rich johnson

chris towes

si harvey

si sagar

matt barlow

steve thompson........ Not a bad line up

Check em out - www.m-a-d.co.uk

[robster]

I personally think it is the competition 'set up' that limits the popularity and viewing. Yes, we all know its fun to ride on rocks, but thats us. In a 'unaware' spectators eyes it could be very boring.

Viewers like something to relate to, this is why street riding will always get spectators because they can see the 'wall' and how big it is and how they find it amazing that someone can ride on it.

I've been to a lot of downhill events and BMX events, majority of the audience wouldn't want to sit in a freezing cold field watching someone jump all over the place on a bike, its just not 'extreme' enough. Its a slow sport which many people lose interest in very quickly.

Unfortunatly to say, if we haven't got the media on us now, I don't think were ever going to. Which, could be for the better, do you want a bunch of blonde haired 20 year olds at competitions shouting 'yeahh!' at everything.

If its 20 year old blonde totty I,m there bring it on :$

[Ash-Kennard]

there is one team who have been promoting trials across the UK , europe and the world for over 7yrs now. All team members wear the same highly sponser decorated jerseys, ride the same basic bikes and even wore full lycra suits one season! although they dont do too many comps i garantee you they have done more trials shows in more towns and citys in the UK than anyone and for some reason are always overlooked ?

Perhaps they dont have the biggest name riders but they do a huge amount for the sport.

Mind you, riders to have been and gone and some still present -

Tim Pratt

Jon Shrewsbury

Jack meek

Rich johnson

chris towes

si harvey

si sagar

matt barlow

steve thompson........ Not a bad line up

Check em out - www.m-a-d.co.uk

don't forget andy p!!!

[MrSuave]

don't forget andy p!!!

Oh theres plenty more but didn't have time for them all!! A guy called tom newbold used to ride for em, but he was shit......

[Ash-Kennard]

agreed lol, nah joking.

[trialsguru]

Oh theres plenty more but didn't have time for them all!! A guy called tom newbold used to ride for em, but he was shit......

yer he was pretty crap wasnt he, did some right silly thing when he sidehoped haha

PeCkEr!

[F-Stop Junkie]

Would be great to have it here again, each year or every two years.

But over in boston and other places they manage to aford it.

Matt did put on a great event, and should be repeat again in the near future.

It was a great event, but in order to continue doing it, someone needs to keep banging in a lot of cash. On top of that, having Red Bull gives it even more cache, so more people turn up because it's a Red Bull event as do more media.

In the States they obviously think it gives a good return on their marketing investment and keep putting it on. You can even buy videos through DH-Productions of each year's event, but it's not a trials event any more, it's street and jumping. Guys like JJ Gregorowicz and Chris Akrigg have been pushed out by them changing the terrain and obstacles so it's suitable for the Aaron Chase, Eric Porter and Kyle Strait.

[Christophe']

i have been thinking about this a lot lately and was watching the road racing in spain on euro sport yesturday and it made me think.

trails isnt big because no one has put money into it basically... take the british rounds for example... they are nothing special are they to be honest? considering the people the take part in them are mostly the best the country has... yet you get about 2 spectators (slight exageration) but it really is no where near the numbers of dh/xc.

i also think that the problem lies in there are no dominante teams wearing separating jerseys. if you look at dh/xc/road, they all have teams, these different teams all wear the team jerseys/kits... this invites companies to the sport cause they could have their name plastered all over the kit and get noticed... true there may not be enough good riders and companies to do something like this...

the main teams would be......

koxx

monty

they are the MAIN big companies in the comp scene... monty are the only company with a noticed jersey really... yes koxx have that jersey but not even hermance/benito wear it nowa days... they wear a t with "try all"/"koxx" on it... no bright colours, striking designs though. what we need are defined teams.

we have smaller uk teams...

the onza team, slinger/butler wore that axe jersey and that made them stand out and got them noticed as people knew who it was even if they didnt see the face...

we got the tartybikes team, stan mainly being the only one in the comp scene... but still, could have a jersey with a nice design.

selectbikes team... goddard, wheeler, burton... big names in the comp and street scene...

ashton bikes team... gav, ali, ashton and myself...

revelle team... doney sort of got a strip.

koxx uk team... waynio, savage *world team i know but massive in uk*, hyland * same as ben*, duncan shaw (minds gone blank, thats right int it?)........................... waynio wears the koxx jersey quite often, which is awesome if you ask me, summat you would want froma team rider.

these are the only teams i can think of anyways which have riders in the comp scene... if i have forgotten some please say... now, its not to many... 5!!!!!! but if you think, there are on average 3 riders in each team. if you were at a comp, thats deffo going to get noticed if all the riders are going around in the brightly designed team jerseys... surely this is going to bring more sponsors into the sport??? which means more money... inturn means more spectators... in theory means trials gets more noticed.

that is just one way of getting it noticed a bit more, but i think i would deffo do the sport some good... i just thought it was worth bringing up, maybe for tarty/select to look into.

i know there were talks at ashton about it... hawzie, ashton and myself have had a few convos about it... hawzie is dead on it and thinks team kits are what it needs... its in all other major cycling... and its helping them getting noticed for sure.

obviously there is more we could do to get it noticed aswell... better comps for starters, we need more red bull bike battles... comps with man made sections which involve jaw dropping moves (jaw dropping to the non trials rider) but maybe have the comp/sections somewhere where more people are going to notice it more than a wood 30miles down back roads? i know insurance would be a problem there... but maybe the entry fee would have to go up??? an entry fee for dh/road is ALOT more than £20... would be worth it anyways?

more things like the onza cycle show thing... a comp in the middle of bristol/london/liverpool, somewhere, anywhere... where the worlds best riders get to ride on invite only... obviously cost shit loads to do... but think of the publicity... surley you could get bbc on it?????????????????????????? i dunno about that though... dont know much about it... but if you got people like akrigg, beleay, hermance, benito, ashton riding some crazy sections in the middle of london, doing things people didnt think were possible on a bike. fair enough there is koxx days etc BUT its again in the middle of no where... london, think how many people are there... and people WILL watch, they allways do.

i just think there has got to be summat trials riders and companies can do, and start doing it now????? ashton/chopper/animal are doing a good job, doing them demos... but i dont see anyone else doing it????

interested to see other poeple views on this... i think the team kit thing is where it needs to start.

James Im with You on your plite to get trials recognized.

Road cycling has big sponsorship in Europe due to the sheer amount of people that ride road.

The amount of people that ride Trials compared to Road is tiny.

Its also an age thing, kinda like golf.

There are 50/60 something roadies out there still spending their wads of cash on very expensive bikes. Thats how come the road companies can afford to support events like the Giro.

Just my thoughts.

Dave.

Roadie for last 8 years.

[Mark W]

Not to mention the prestige and heritage of those events? Stuff like Le Tour is just so incredibly well known and has such a great history that companies love to be associated with it, rather than it being a burden one company's taken on?

[Jez]

Trials isn't big because it's not promoted. It's not promoted locally where the competitions or riders are based, it's barely promoted in the wider cycling press, and within MBUK there's very little coverage these days outside of Martyn's features and HipHop. It's become a very insular sport with everyone looking in. The general trials population is very knowledgable, outside of that is very unknowledgable except for a very few riders. Most of never heard of Ot Pi, but all have heard of Martyn Ashton or Hans Rey. This isn't though for a lack of interest in trials. I know quite a few people who have been into mountain biking for a long time through XC who love watching trials, because they find it fascinating, but we don't make our competitions widely known. Then, when we get people coming to events, they may not be educated as to the rules or who is taking part, and without that any sport is not enjoyable to watch.

That'll be the nail being hit squarely on the head.

It's the same as music - promote it enough and people will love it, regardless of whether it's great or not. Think about how many 'bands' or 'artists' (read: products) you see in the Top 10 these days. How many of them are actually good musicians and/or songwriters? Answer: very few. So why the hell are they so popular? Answer: Because they've been promoted to hell and back. Because someone has gone out there and made sure that they get heard at a national/international level - and more to the point TOLD everyone that they're 'really great' and 'the next big thing'.

It's the same with Trials - if someone managed to get an hour of Trials on BBC1 at 8pm one night, the sport would grow immensely overnight. Make that a weekly thing and it'll go through the roof...unfortunately doing such a thing is a bit beyond the average Joe and his bike; this is where you need the big companies to use their clout and get a real promoter involved who can get Trials the coverage it wants.

And then the problem that you face is competing with the other 'bigger' sports for coverage. Why should someone try and promote an unknown sport when there are loads of well known sports that are easy to promote? The trick is to really make it worth someone's while to do it.

Blah I'm just blathering, hope some of that made sense...

On the subject of team strips, I do remember the days Way Back When when Ashton used to go around in head-to-foot blue, white & yellow MBUK/Cannondale strips, and Hawyes was pretty much coated in yellow for Giant. Same went for Hans really as well, always had a GT strip on, regardless of what he was doing - seeing any of those three in 'civvies' was a right old rarity. Nowadays it's the opposite I think. I'm sure it's the whole lycra-phobia (which is irrelevant when you think that those Cannondale/Giant/GT strips were a lot more like MX clothing style than the Monty/Megamo lycrafest). Whether all of that has much bearing on the size of trials as a sport is a different matter, but I'm willing to bet a LARGE amount of money that promotion/coverage is WAY more important than team strips being identifiable.

Thing is, I'm yet to meet someone who doesn't actually enjoy watching trials...as long as it's kinda streety stuff. Yes, natty looks boring to most people (here we go, this is me and my tin opener, I fancy some worms...) - street is what they ('they' being the average bloke on the street who doesn't know what the word 'Magura' refers to) really want to see. Big moves with 'wow' factor, prefereably cleverly edited to cut out all the set-up hops and stuff like that (which do bore people, but you can't really cut out of comp footage very easily). Everyone enjoys watching impressive stuff - it's summat to talk about down the pub or wherever. You know "hey, did you see those blokes on bikes on Beeb 1 last night? This one guy jumped off this 6' wall..." or whatever. People do it about other 'extreme' sports, and to me trials is a lot more impressive than e.g. skateboarding.

Ah well I think I've talked bollocks for long enough.

[Andy P]

there is one team who have been promoting trials across the UK , europe and the world for over 7yrs now. All team members wear the same highly sponser decorated jerseys, ride the same basic bikes and even wore full lycra suits one season! although they dont do too many comps i garantee you they have done more trials shows in more towns and citys in the UK than anyone and for some reason are always overlooked ?

Perhaps they dont have the biggest name riders but they do a huge amount for the sport.

Mind you, riders to have been and gone and some still present -

Tim Pratt

Jon Shrewsbury

Jack meek

Rich johnson

chris towes

si harvey

si sagar

matt barlow

steve thompson........ Not a bad line up

Check em out - www.m-a-d.co.uk

I was wondering how many posts it would take before someone even mentioned MAD....

And don't worry, I would have left my name off the list too!!

Andy P

[Davetrials]

ive been to two of the mad demos recently and there were so bad, there was no promotion anywere they didnt have jeserys they only had 2stickers on there bikes, and the demo rig didnt have anything to do with mad either, BIT let down.

to be honest the crowd hurt it was that bad.

[Danno]

In Spain (in the region I live in anyway) trials and moto trials is pretty big, there is coverage of major trials competitions on television, but I can have conversations with people and they know what trials is.....

So how did it get like this? the main reasons I think is obviously the competition side of trials is massive here and that you have got riders like Ot Pi, Cesar, Benito etc. who are the best riders in the sport.

But other things I notice is that trials frames are marketed in pretty much every 'high street' bike shops, so people are able to see trials bikes as a common bike in a shop. Also a town named Calpe not far from me used to have a big sign of Ot Pi and Cesar as they climbed the famous 'rock/mountain' of Calpe, I managed to find the article on it and use google to translate it to english so people on here can read it Link Also their are a number of trials schools in Spain now (the biggest being in Barcelona run by Ot Pi and Cesar) and it is being advertised in shops. But i remember reading a topic on here not so long ago about Danny Butler doing lessons, now this would be a start in the right direction as Danny being one of the Uk's best competition riders, But half the people on here replying to the topic were slating him for it

I do think in the UK trials is 'unknown' to the general public, I don't think that in the UK trials competitions will ever be huge.... However what I have noticed here in Spain and in Vancouver, Canada (went out their for a month and should be going back for a year) Is that their are alot of ZOO! and Echo bikes around as oposed to around 2 years ago when I moved to Spain (it was just Koxx and Monty everywhere).

But what has this got to do with the UK trials becoming known to the public? well talking to riders from here in Spain and Vancouver they all have ZOO! and Echo bikes now because of obviously the company expanding and growing, but also because of Craig and Neil (some people havn't even heard of Martyn Ashton or Hawzie in Spain but know of Neil and Craig)... When I talk to riders from here in Spain and Vancouver they all say that they would love to come and ride the UK because it has the best street trials scene/owns the street trials scene......

Now this is coming from just other trials riders but I think if the UK wants trials to become a recognised sport to the public it has to do more comps like the red bull bike battle for example, showcasing the huge amount of talent the riders have, riders such as Craig, Neil, Ashton, Akrigg, yourself James and many others, as i really can't imagine the UK comps getting huge but it is getting bigger and bigger as world championship venues are starting to be hosted here.

Also get Dvd's like Glassyeye get1 for example in shop shelves at halfords and other local bike shops (I know it would be a huge expense but I'm only using Glasseye dvd as an example) That's how trials got big in Canada after the releases of the Reed Merschat films (Revolution, Evolve, Contact) and look at what Tricks and Stunts did in the UK..... Loads of riders got into trials because of it and this all helps to get trials known to the public.

The team clothing is also a good idea James and demo's like m-a-d have been doing, by other trials company's.

But anyway that's my opinion on the subject

Dan.

Edited June 2, 2006 by Danno

[TrashZen]

We are a magical breed of people, with an ability that is very uncommon as far as things are going.

Do you want it commercialised to make yourselfs more money..or to actually introduce more people into the sport?

That's the problem with a lot of the promotion. It often comes hand in hand with brand advertising rather than actual sport promotion . So for example, you'd have red bull or koxx or monty organizing an event... and any stickers or banners will lead to the brand... and buy! buy! buy! not really conveying the real message about the sport... (which is.. take any bike and start doing silly things and experimenting and playing around). And again most commercial sites will just link their sponsors or self-promote other pages in their site etc... a very closed loop system that is more harrassing than helping .

I understand that you can only spend big money on promotion if you can expect some big returns in sales, but I think that approach completely ruined the skiing/snowboarding attitude for example...

I really like the idea of promoting the sport itself, and personally, I am tempted to design some stickers (that'd be TrashZen of course), for the promotion of trials in general (obviously via the site's content which is rather explicite), and maybe some Ts if there is some interest... You could blame me for self-promotion, but I reckon TrashZen is a good entry point when you are a passers-by and have no idea about the sport.

I think too that if Trials-Forum was to issue some stickers, these would certainly be popular (or was it already done ever?)

I already have a Black & White design sketch, but I am looking for a good place to print, cheap, black and white on transparent, as the idea is to either give them away, or charge for the actual cost of making... If any one is willing to help or share some info on the topic...welcome ...

This is less formal than team jerseys, but it probably makes it an easy entry to trials in general.

[F-Stop Junkie]

That's the problem with a lot of the promotion. It often comes hand in hand with brand advertising rather than actual sport promotion

The few times I've seen an F1 car on general display, it was put there by a sponsor. At Dubai airport, Marlboro put a Ferrari F1 car on display to try and sell more fags. The signage put up where races are taking place are put there by promoters. Team PR people try to create interest to get more people to see their sponsors, not for the good of the sport.

Promotion does cost money, of course. Some football clubs run soccer schools for kids. Partly paid for by the parents, partly by the club. It does their image good as they're giving something back to the community, and they get a chance to spot young players and sign them. It's still the club partly paying for it at the end of the day.

Currently, the one way the trials community is connecting with a target audience is through Martyn Ashton's demos. They're done at good venues towards the right demographical (largely 15-25) who are already into extreme sports. I know Martyn will talk about trials (at great length ) if asked, and he'd point people in the right direction. As would the Butlers or Ben and Fred Savage when they do demos.

However, what trials should do is become accepted by the larger cycling world as a legitimate part of cycling, not as a sideshow or throw away trick riding. We have an increasing number of riders gaining international titles, but a lot of general cyclists don't know this. There are even journalists throughout the cycle trade with an interest in trials, but they never really get tapped into.

Other cyclists already have the tools to give trials a go. They have bikes, helmets and some skill. In a way, there is almost a need to present a watered-down version of trials for general consumption. To move away from heavily specialised frames with high BBs and no seat, move away from 40" sidehops and 50" taps and say "with any bike with good brakes and a low saddle, you can ride simple trials routes". We then also need to say why this is good for general riders, the improvements in balance, confidence and brake technique.

Speaking with normal mountain bikers, they want to improve their skills and ride challenging terrain. They don't want to be able to do what Martyn Ashton or Martin Hawyes do. We need to show a middle ground.

[TrashZen]

Other cyclists already have the tools to give trials a go. They have bikes, helmets and some skill. In a way, there is almost a need to present a watered-down version of trials for general consumption. To move away from heavily specialised frames with high BBs and no seat, move away from 40" sidehops and 50" taps and say "with any bike with good brakes and a low saddle, you can ride simple trials routes". We then also need to say why this is good for general riders, the improvements in balance, confidence and brake technique. .

That's very true... :$ , this was one of my arguments for having a "normal" bike for so long... since I have a modern geometry, I realise that prototype-alien-looking bikes only raise the question "how much does it cost?", instead of, "how do you do that?"

Middle grounds are reached through talking to passers by who look decently interested... and giving them some place or community where to find more info, rather than running a freak show on bikes .