Taylor + Aiden Podcast

Aiden Parris, a BMX rider, is interviewed on Talking With Taylor. He discusses his BMX career and the tracks he rides on. Most tracks are made of dirt and some have berms made of concrete or bitumen. Aiden has had several injuries but nothing too severe. He has competed in nationals and even the World Titles. BMX is an expensive sport, with bikes and parts costing thousands of dollars. Aiden's best performance was at the Worlds on a cruiser bike. Transitioning between bikes is not difficult for him. He doesn't have a specific rival and the level of competition changes as he gets older. Aiden trains regularly and travels for races. He has reached his goals in BMX and is not as interested in pursuing it further. His nickname is "Bald Eagle" and he might consider coaching in the future. He is a member of the Mackay District BMX club. Hey Tater Tots, welcome back to Talking With Taylor. Today we have a very special guest, everybody welcome Aiden Parris to today's episode. Hey Tater Tots, thanks for having me on today's episode of Talking With Taylor. Aiden is a BMX rider around the cycling glen that goes around the world with his rubber. Today we will be talking about Aiden's BMX career and how he is travelling in the competition. How many years have you been riding Aiden? So this year would be my 9th year riding BMX, but I think next year would be my 10th. What's your favourite track to ride on? My favourite track to ride on was probably the 2021 World Titles in Nantes, France. It was a purpose built track, so it wasn't like one you could still ride today, but it was only made for that specific event. It was probably the best track I've ever ridden, but in Australia, Gladstone, Walshton, a bunch of them, they're all really really good. What are the tracks made of? So most of the tracks are built on a foundation of dirt, and then sometimes the berms or the corners are built out of different materials like concrete or bitumen. But most of the tracks are covered by a layer of dirt, covered by a layer of glue and sand called thick surface. That makes the track look newer and you can't slide around it much. The majority of tracks are made from that. Is there any tracks that have been harder for you to ride on than the others? Yeah, there's been a lot of those. Each track's just different to each other. So, I mean, some tracks you're worse at, some tracks you're better at. But there have been some, like Emerald, I wasn't the greatest at that track, or there's some in Victoria that I've ridden and I'm just not as skilled on them. Have you ever injured yourself riding? Yes, many times. What I've lost in Brno is pretty minor compared to some of the other people I know. I've broken my wrist once or fractured it. And I've scraped all my knees, my back, my belly, shoulders, did my chin run. I think I did my nose as well. But, I mean, I know people who've broken arms and had bones sticking out of their ankles, so the majority of my injuries aren't really that severe. How far have you gone in BMX? Well, I'm fairly lucky because I can afford it, but I've gone further than most people would have in a sport. Because the majority of people, they go to local events, and if they feel like they're good enough, they go to state events. And if you go to a state event, you qualify to go to a nationals, and you have to pay for nationals yourself. So once you get there, you race, and if you get a national place, a top 8 place, race on, top 8 in Australia in your age, you can qualify for worlds. And once you go to worlds, that's probably the highest you can go on BMX. How expensive is BMX? BMX is much more expensive than most sports. I think the frame of my bike alone, no added parts, just the frame itself, costs about three grand. Plus wheels, which I've got carbon fibre ones, which cost another maybe two grand. Tyres are not cheap, they're a few hundred each. Everything on my bike costs a lot more money, and I'm willing to admit. Have you ever damaged any BMX tyres? Any BMX tyres? Yes, I've damaged my bike a few times. I crashed into a kid in Townsville, and he scraped all the side of my bike up, and the front of it, right on the front of the frame, and the corpse. That wasn't very good. I hate that kid, but yeah. What does that kid do to make you hate him? Oh, he was just like, I mean he's really rich and he just kind of pisses me off. Like overtalking and stuff? Yeah, he's really stuck up, and he's not even that good, but he's got his own Mercedes-Benz for BMX. Damn. Do you ever get nervous before your races? Yeah, I get nervous before mostly my first race of the day, and if I make it to finals or anything further than that, like semis or quarters or stuff like that, anything qualifying I usually get pretty nervous for in the race. How do you overcome those nerves? Usually before I hop in the gate to my race, I just take a few deep breaths, and that calms me down a bit, but I mean everyone is a bit different to each other, and everyone copes differently with it, because I know a few people have rituals where they tuck in their pants and stretch or whatever, but whatever works for you I guess. Have you ever had to pull out of a race? I don't think me personally, I haven't, but I've actually never pulled out of a race, but I've stopped a race to later because they call it a mechanical, where if there's something wrong with your bike, like your chain falls off or something happens to your bike that makes it unrideable for you in the race, then you get to call a mechanical and you get to postpone the race, or if you can't get it fixed in the next 10 or 15 minutes or something like that, you have to pull for the race. Have you ever forfeited? I haven't forfeited a race, but I've definitely slowed something down for the last minute or so of my mechanical time. What is your best performance? My best performance, I guess I could say it was when I went to Worlds in 2021, but I placed 50th or 48th or something like that in the Worlds. That's pretty good considering it's the Worlds. Yeah, but it was on a cruiser, they call it a cruiser, it's got bigger wheels and not as many people have them, so it's a bit of an easier class I guess. But yeah, I placed 50th or 28th, I'm 48th or something like that, and I guess that's probably my best performance ever. Was it difficult transitioning from your original bike to the other one? No, because I ride both those bikes at the same time, so I go to any event and I bring both the bikes and I ride them two separations. And that's not massively difficult to transition between them, but there is a big noticeable difference. How many bikes do you actually own to be honest? Well I mean, I only ride one now, and I don't have the cruiser because it's too small for me now, but in total I think I've owned about 4 or 5 bikes, and then I only ride the one that I have now. And I think my family in total, we've owned about 15 bikes, so yeah we've still got most of them, they're sitting in the shed at home. Do you have a biggest competition? Do you have a peer in your races that is your biggest competition? Not really, not anymore. I definitely used to, when I was a lot younger I used to race Carlos Gaines, he was a very good rival to me when I was a lot younger. We had an interesting friendship, but I mean once I grew older I just never really had that much competition against me specifically I guess. But there's definitely been kids that I've raced against multiple times and won once against them at different events, but I've never really had a rivalry with them. Does it get harder the longer you ride? Yes and no. So once you get older, everyone else is training differently, developing differently, some people when they hit puberty they get a lot stronger and they get much faster, others they hit puberty a bit later, and it all depends. And I mean that's like a lot of people who start training and it's not as competitive as some people that are older, but that also means a lot of the people who were racing quit because they just can't keep up anymore. Do you train for BMX quite often? Well when I went to work in 2021 my training was, my training resume for the week I guess, was I'd practice on Mondays, I'd have Tuesday off and I'd usually go to the gym, and then Wednesday I'd have training with a coach, Thursday I'd have club racing with everyone at my club, Friday I'd go to a different track and race there. And Saturday and Sunday usually there was a carnival on that I'd go visit, so I'd travel out to Westmoreland Bar, Townsville, Burdekin, sometimes even Brisbane. Do you want to continue further into BMX? I mean I haven't really, I kind of reached all my goals in BMX, you know I visited France, I've gone around the world for the sport, I think I've kind of reached my peak I guess, and I'm kind of, yeah I'm not as interested in it. Like I'll definitely continue it, but I'm not going to be as competitive and my life won't revolve around the sport nearly as much. So do you have a nickname for yourself that appears for you? Yeah I do, because I'm friends with a commentator in the sport who goes to most, or he used to, he's kind of moving away from the sport now, and I'm friends with him, he runs a bike shop, he sources most of my stuff. And he gave me the nickname, well it started off with my brother who had the nickname Giraffe because of his height, because he's 6 foot 5 and there's no other really tall people in the sport. And for a while I was called The Car, because that's Baby Giraffe and all, just all in common. But once they shaved my head, they so called him Bald Eagle, so that just kind of became my nickname and all the events I go to, everyone squawks like a bird when I ride past, and yeah it's just been my nickname ever since. Would you ever consider being like a commentator, like him for BMX? I don't know if I'd consider being a commentator, because you have to travel a lot for the event, but I would consider being a coach for some of the kids in my club, or stuff like that and just helping out the club, but yeah I don't think I'd ever be a commentator. What club do you actually train with? I'm a member of the Mackay District BMX club, but originally when I first joined BMX, like 9 years ago now, I was part of the Warpsting club, but ever since in about 2020, the both clubs are struggling a lot and they merged clubs together, so it became the Mad Mackay District BMX club. But we've also got a third track out in Serenos, which is it's own separate thing, and yeah, unfortunately though, Warpsting, my home track, has just closed because a lady broke her arm there, and they had to close it for legal reasons, but yeah. When were you first put into BMX, like how old were you? I'm not exactly sure how old I was, I think I was somewhere like 6, something like that, 9 years from now, 15, 5, 6? Yeah, 6. Yeah I think I was about 6. Does your mum ever regret putting you and your brother into BMX, because of the price of it? I don't think she regrets it, because I'm not exactly wealthy or anything, but we were always better off I guess, and it wasn't a huge hit to the income I guess. What do you wear when you ride? Well we wear protective gear, so Oz Cycling, the ones who run BMX in Australia, they have a, you need to wear a long sleeve t-shirt, long pants, clothes and shoes, and you have to have a helmet and gloves. But me, I wear, I think, well I've got like, I've got a bunch of different jerseys, you get them from a lot of shops, you can get custom ones, my brother's got a few custom ones, I've also got some custom pants, because pants are a little harder to find. And yeah, but I specifically wear a neck brace, because my parents don't want me to break my neck if I do crash or hurt something badly, and I wear a nice helmet, you can go see my review for Mr Shaman on my helmet, in my YouTube video. Ok, well I think that's a wrap on today's podcast episode. Thank you Taylor for having me on the show today, and goodbye K-Defogs.