|
|
Dirt Rag Articles
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Although bike trials action may be hard to find these days, Ryan Leech has carved a niche out for himself in an otherwise faded sport. In so doing he has inspired not just riders of any discipline, but through his innovative Trials of Life program, school kids across his home country of Canada.
His smooth, flowing, powerful style—dubbed the Manifesto Style in his first video—draws gasps and enthusiastic applause from audiences. I saw one of Ryan's trials demonstrations at the Sea Otter Classic this past April and got a chance to find out more.
DR: Through your email newsletters, I found out about the Trials of Life program. It sounds like a great idea, the kind of thing that trials is good for.
RL: Yeah.
DR: What was your inspiration in getting that set up?
RL: Well, a number of years ago I was invited to come to a school to talk about my career as a pro rider. I didn't really think too much about it...I came into the classroom not really prepared, and just kind of spat my way through this speech about what I was doing. And you know, during the speech all these students were totally paying attention to me and listening to everything I was saying...I was like, wow, these kids are really into this, this is pretty wild, I should perhaps think about what I've got to say a little bit more and perhaps I can inspire them more.
So I decided to bring my whole trials show into the school, and instead of just a classroom get the whole school to watch, do a bit of riding, then talk, ride and talk, mix it up like that. It's been great so far—it's been really well received and I've been having a blast doing it and meeting so many cool young students from all over the place.
DR: I watched one of the videos on your website and it was cool to see the kids get really excited. What's the message that you try to convey in your talks?
RL: Well, through examples and experiences I've had, I pretty much just reinforce the fact that you have to listen to your heart, and that's really the basis of the whole presentation. Of course, I talk about success, what success really is, about criticism, stuff like that...it all sorta comes back to trying to inspire the students to really find out what it is that they want to do with their lives for themselves, not what everyone else is telling them to do, because there's so many pressures on students these days. I really believe we all have some special unique thing that we're meant to do and it's often hard to discover that if we're pressured to do all these other things.
DR: That's a really good message. What kind of schools do you work with, is it pretty much anyone that'll have you?
RL: Pretty much.
DR: Are they in Canada only or have you gone other places?
RL: Actually I've got a week coming up in Rockland, Maine that I'm excited about. One of the bike shop guys was bugging me to come over for the last couple of years, and basically he took it on and got a whole week scheduled together and I'm gonna visit a bunch of schools and do a few shows.
DR: I was reading on your blog about your friend that got to work with students a little more through the Boys and Girls club, taking them on rides. Do you see yourself going into that role a little more, working with students one-on-one? I imagine you don't have a lot of time...
RL: That's the thing, I was thinking about that recently, and it seems like my role has been to spread my message to a whole bunch of people without that personal longer-term relationship, so I was trying to decide, OK, what's best here? At this point I think I'm capable of, I guess you could say, preaching to a larger bunch of people, so I think that's what I'll do for now, and then perhaps down the road, things change, maybe I'm not riding as much, maybe I can get a little more personal and one-on-one with people.
DR: It seems like a good approach since your talents lend themselves to a display.
RL: For now I think, yeah.
DR: I read that you changed your style in order to make it more audience-friendly. Tell me more about how you got away from focusing on competitions, since I imagine if someone's into trials, competition's sort of the easy route...
RL: It's one route for sure, and it perhaps wasn't so much that I changed my style for an audience, I guess it was more I grew tired of the structure of trials competition and rather enjoyed the freedom and creativity of riding for a film or in front of an audience. I enjoyed that outlet, that sort of creative release style of riding, more so than competition. In order for me to really feel excited about riding a line it had to be smooth and flowy to a certain point, which is why I was motivated to create my first film which sort of took away a lot of those slow hopping style things that you often see in trials. That's kind of how that started and it just lent itself really well to doing shows.
DR: It seems to blend well with the mountain bike style...I've known a few riders who incorporate smooth moves like that, and it would seem to be useful, watching what you do and then seeing things differently out on the trail.
RL: Yeah, I think it's more useful also quite fortunately for doing shows because I'm on more of a regular-looking mountain bike, so the people that I do a show for are more likely to be able to relate to the bike, and perhaps they might be more likely to go home and find their bike buried in the garage somewhere and go for a ride.
DR: They don't need a strange looking bike...
RL: Yeah. Because a lot of the shows I do aren't for bike audiences, they're for a variety of crowds that might not be bike enthusiasts...if I can get bikes in their heads a little bit, I'm pumped about that.
DR: Is that the basis of your Manifesto Style? Tell me more about that.
RL: Sure, I mean it more or less was taking all the slow hopping and recovery hops out of trials riding and trying to blend each move into the next, and it's a constant challenge. It's something that I by no means have mastered—I'm still hopping all over the place trying to recover and trying to set up for moves in tight situations. But its actually been a really enjoyable challenge that I've presented to myself, and also I've been able to share that challenge with lots of other trials riders and hopefully it's pushed a few riders to keep on progressing. Certainly when you look around the trials world it's amazing what trials riders are doing these days—it's pretty fun to watch.
DR: That style does seem to be the next level, the next step in progression.
RL: Yeah, in one way, competition is a different route and the style and direction I've gone is another.
DR: It seems as though you're pretty passionate about environmental issues and other things outside of bike riding. Does that tie in to the Manifesto Style?
RL: No, I've never really made that comparison, but I'm sure if I thought about it I could come up with some really good reasons why they both work together...keeping the flow going, keeping open to possibilities. There's a lot of crazy energy going on in this world right now and if you can smooth it out, people can get a little bit of a flow going, open up to a few more possibilities and change their lifestyles, then I think that would stoke lots of people out...like hopefully my Manifesto Style will stoke a lot of people out by watching.
DR: Do you incorporate an environmental message in your school talks as well?
RL: Yeah, I definitely bring it up, absolutely, it's another chance to just spread that awareness. It's really amazing to see how many schools are actively pursuing these changes. Cruising through the hallways of a school more often than not I see a wall that's got artwork on it about ways to save the human race and whatnot.
DR: It seems to be an issue that adults need to pay attention to, but it's easier to get kids excited about it and it's something they understand.
RL: Yeah! It's really cool because the kids do have a lot of power. They go home and tell their parents, we gotta do this, we gotta do that, and the parents are more likely to listen to their kids than they are to listen to some radio guy talking about how harmful what we are doing is to the planet.
DR: Have you been able to see results, seeing kids get inspired, with bike riding or other things?
RL: It's definitely pretty cool when some rider, it doesn't even seem to matter what age, comes up to me and says, "I got into riding because I saw one of your video segments."
DR: How did you start on this path? I understand you were fairly young when you got sponsored, but wasn't it for cross country racing?
RL: That was sort of a grassroots kind of deal, good deal on a bike from a bike shop kind of thing, but it was really trials that allowed me to get on a factory team.
DR: What was your first example of trials? How did you pick that discipline?
RL: I saw some people messing around doing a bit of trials around the cross country circuit, and then I ended up seeing a Hans Rey video, so that blew me away, and I'm like yeah, this is something I want to do. So I phased out the cross country and got totally hooked on trials and that was all I did all day long as much as I could.
DR: How old were you?
RL: I was 15, 16, 17 when I was really getting into it.
DR: And it wasn't too long after that that you got good enough to be on a team. You're obviously naturally talented. You've been with Norco your entire career?
RL: It's been 10-11 years with Norco. They've done so much to help get me to where I am today—it's been an awesome relationship.
DR: Where do you see yourself going in the future with your career?
RL: It's so hard to say...I like speaking, I like writing, I have a feeling that I might go more in that direction in the future, maybe more of that and less of the harder, high-intensity riding. I think it's going to be a gradual blending from one thing to another, I don't think it'll be, "OK that's it for riding and doing shows," it'll be a gradual change.
DR: Have you had any injuries, or been hampered by physical problems?
RL: Not too many, knock on wood. I blew my knee out, ACL, so I got that all fixed and it's been good, that's about the worst I've had—I've been pretty fortunate. But trials is generally a pretty safe sport if you're smart about it, I think a lot more so than other styles of riding.
DR: Yeah, I guess you don't just throw yourself at something.
RL: No, it's very calculated, it's a very mindful sport and I think that's what I like about it. I can get the same satisfaction on a personal level by doing something that's just a couple inches off the ground and have it look really exciting to an audience. Like say the train track [featured in Ryan's movie Crux]—I was riding a train track and going from one track to another, and that's just a few inches off the ground. I was stoked when I nailed that line and people were stoked to watch it, compared to, for instance, some freerider that's gotta huck themselves 60ft. across a gap, literally risking his life.
DR: The audience almost wants to see the crash as much as to see the rider make it.
RL: Yeah, it's pretty crazy. I'm really glad that I'm not a slopestyle rider, really glad I don't do that...it's exciting to watch the other guys do it, of course, but I'm glad I'm not doing it.
DR: Do you participate in any other sports in your off-season? Get into snow sports?
RL: Not so much, because I don't want to spend time and gas driving to a mountain. I do yoga for cross-training.
DR: Just to touch on the economics of it, do you get salaries from your sponsors to do these presentations?
RL: Yeah, it's a combination of revenues that makes this career possible. Thanks to Norco, Shimano, Marzocchi and Ryders Eyewear for being my key sponsors. Sponsorship is the most important part of it, also producing those DVDs.
DR: You produced those yourself, which is pretty impressive. You decided what to film, got the film crew, decided on the soundtrack, the whole nine yards...your own creative effort.
RL: It's a fun process, too...three videos now.
DR: Is that another potential thing you could get into in the future?
RL: For sure it is. I've got so many interests, producing is one of them.
DR: It's great that you've taken your own creative control, rather than doing as you're told, you look for more opportunities and make it a whole package.
RL: Yeah, it seems to be a natural flow, and it's been a lot of fun.
 |
| Comment from Beavis on 2008-07-20 |
| Victory. Bicycles and success. Hand in hand. I'm very impressed. He's a real Renaissance Man. |
|
| Comment from karl rosengarth on 2008-07-03 |
| Rayn is a smooth rider who puts on a great show. I saw him at a past edition of the Sea Otter and was very impressed. |
|
|
|
|
 |
