INSIDER
A Thinking Rider’s Game J A M E S H O LT E R
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ost years in the fall the AMA welcomes chartered club Trials Inc. to our campus, where members lay out eight to 10 trials sections on our nearly 23 acres. The event draws about 100 riders each year, including a few nationalcaliber pilots. In 2021, pros Josh Roper, Sam Fastle, Travis Daniels, Nigel Parker and Seth Vorseth participated. (Results are posted at www.trialsinc.org.) One of the very non-pro riders was me. I’ve ridden trials bikes, and a trials event once before. I’ve learned a little, mostly what I don’t know. I have learned one very important lesson, summed up by Michael Jolly, who I rode with at this year’s AMA trials. “Trials is the golf of motorsports,” Mike said. “It’s a thinking rider’s game.” Just as playing a round of golf is different than going to the driving range, competing in a trials event is different than riding a trials bike on gnarly terrain. I don’t golf, but people who do tell me that whacking a ball as far as possible isn’t always the best strategy. Sometimes, a shorter drive, or one that leaves a particular lie, is preferred to set up the next shot. Likewise, a trials section, like a golf hole, must be observed, digested and solved as a singular problem, not a series of individual ones. This is the difference between screwing around on a trials bike and competing in a trials event. Many a would-be trials rider can carve some tight figure-eights, ascend a rocky bank and hop a greasy log with ease, but throw in some “gates” and they stumble. Or dab. 10
All this was explained to me by trials expert Brad Baumert (who also was my “sponsor” for the day because he loaned me a bike, which you can read more about on our website). A Trials Inc. event has six skill classifications: Novice, Intermediate, Sportsman, Advanced, Expert and Champ. Each event includes multiple trips, or loops, around a designated course. Each course has multiple sections, and each section includes different routes, of varying difficulty, for each skill level to follow. These routes are identified using paper tags (gates). The tags are applied in adjacent pairs to trees, rocks, etc., and you have to ride between them. You can only ride through the gates for your class. So, if you’re in the Intermediate class, you can’t ride through a gate tagged for just Novices, even if doing so would set you up better for the next Intermediate gate. You also can’t go backward or re-cross your line. You have to navigate this without dabbing your feet or stalling your bike. Sections are three-dimensional puzzles. Additional loops aren’t always easier. The puzzle does change. Traction is different, logs and rocks move. A trials course is not just a conundrum, but an evolving one. I couldn’t have had a better advisor. Baumert is the former CEO of the North American Trials Council, has won a Friend of the AMA Award, sits on an AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame Selection Committee and is a member-elected representative on the AMA Board of Directors. A member of Trials Inc., Brad was the brains behind bringing a trials event to the AMA campus for the first time
AMERICAN MOTORCYCLIST • JUNE 2022
The author and his sponsor, Brad Baumert.
several years ago. He is a prolific promoter of the motorcycle lifestyle, an incredibly nice guy and one of the most important motorcyclists I know. Between Brad, his brother Phil Baumert’s pre-ride tips, and Mike Jolly, I was set up to do fine. I did do okay, for a beginner. I cleaned the first of four loops, not dropping any penalty points, which made my co-rider Mike a little nervous because he dropped one. Mike made a comeback, though, tallying just two more. I regressed and dropped nine — eight on the fourth section alone. So Mike beat me, but he did teach me a couple things about trials along the way. More important, he also triumphed in the Intermediate class, taking home first-place. Clearly, Mike needs to be bumped up to Sportsman next year. What do you say, Brad? James Holter is a Charter Life Member and the AMA’s chief operating officer.
