Cycling Veers Off on a Rough Road : Sport of Trialsin Takes Mountain Bikes Anywhere Obstacles Can Block the Path

Bouncing his mountain bike’s knobbed front tire on the hood of his wife’s Datsun, Michael Thomas demonstrated the first lesson in trialsin riding--don’t park a car near a trialsin course.

Moments before, Thomas had pranced his bike through a rugged, boulder-strewn trail between the swings and slides at Peppertree Park in Newbury Park. Had he wanted to, Thomas could have ridden over the swings and slides.

In this sport of kamikaze mountain biking, any obstacle will do.

“A construction site has great things to ride over,” Thomas said. “Any place where there are piles of this or that will do. Five-foot drainage pipes are really good.”

Thomas, 30, is a novice in a sport without many veterans. Mountain bicyclists looking for a challenge came up with trialsin riding. They have not been disappointed.

Its origin is in the European-born sport of trials, in which motorcycles are ridden over an obstacle course. A winner is determined by whomever can best maintain control of their motorcycle.

The object in trialsin racing is to ride a customized mountain bike over an obstacle course of rocks, streams, picnic tables, barrels and old cars while collecting the least number of dabs. A dab is a penalty point for using hands or feet in contact with the ground to maintain balance.

A skilled trialsin rider deftly combines the balance of a trapeze artist with the durability of a motocross racer. Thomas won’t call himself an expert.

“It’s such a new thing,” he said. “There are a few guys who are really good--not myself--and a few guys who make it look pretty funny, like me. If you’ve never seen a trialsin competition, you wouldn’t believe your eyes.”

“What I like about trialsin riding is that you can go anywhere, you can ride on any little thing.”

Or big thing. After two months, Thomas can bounce his bike atop oven-sized boulders or stick his back tire in the air and turn it back and forth.

He’s working on his technique in order to compete in races such as the Rockhopper South in Big Bear, the trialsin Super Bowl.

“I’m real anxious to do some trialsin racing,” Thomas said. “I mountain bike every day, but I want to trialsin race to see how I do. It’s very rough and takes a lot of balance.”

David Urquhart of Newbury Park is Thomas’ trialsin mentor and riding partner. Urquhart has pursued the sport more vigorously, having competed in races such as last weekend’s Mammoth Mountain Kamikaze.

Urquhart, 30, finished third overall in the event that included a trialsin race, 20-mile cross-country ride and a four-mile race down the mountain.

“David will do things I can’t even think about,” Thomas said.

Thomas also sells trialsin bikes to a burgeoning market. He owns Michael’s Bicycles in Newbury Park, the only store in Ventura County that sells trialsin bikes. Thomas predicts a long future for the sport.

“Mountain biking is here to stay and it’s going to be very big,” he said. “It’s in warp drive right now. As a spinoff of mountain biking, it should stay around a while.”

Thomas also runs group mountain bike rides every Sunday. The rides go through a different part of Ventura County and the Santa Monica Mountains each week. Riders meet at 7 a.m. at Michael’s Bicycles in Newbury Park.