There鈥檚 a common misperception that kids younger than five are too little to learn to ride a bike. The other day at our local playground, a couple of parents stopped to ask how old my daughter is. She was tearing around the outer loop, standing up to pump her pedals, and then slamming on the brakes with such conviction she proudly left skid marks on the sidewalk. They were convinced she was six. She鈥檚 four. They looked at me with a mix of awe and mistrust, like I have a prodigy on my hands or else I鈥檓 just being pushy and reckless. My daughter is athletic, but she鈥檚 not unusual. Almost any child can learn to ride a two wheeler by the time they鈥檙e three.
And some can even learn to bomb a downhill course, complete with ramps and bridges and rocky ledges, by the time they鈥檙e four鈥攍ike the rad preschooler named Malcolm in this video that went viral last week. If you haven鈥檛 already seen it, be prepared to be seriously impressed. The kid is clearing stuff at Highland Mountain Bike Park in New Hampshire that would terrify a lot of adults, and he鈥檚 four. More proof that, as parents, we tend to underestimate what our kids are capable of, and when.
Not every kid will be a natural-born mountain biker like Malcolm, but it's easy to raise competent three-year-old rippers鈥攐n one condition: No training wheels. Just. Don't. Go. There.
Training wheels don鈥檛 do kids any favors. They just prolong the awkward, wobbly period and put the fear of God into kids about falling. Back in the day, training wheels were part of the natural progression of bike riding: Toddlers started out on tricycles, graduated to training wheels by the time they were four or five, then finally鈥攚hile screaming “Don鈥檛 let go!” to the parent who has already let go鈥攍earned to ride a two wheeler. (My mother would stand at the bottom of our alley in Washington, D.C., and yell “All clear!” and my sister and I would screech down the nearly imperceptible slope on our Big Wheels.) Each step took time and you couldn鈥檛 skip a step or you鈥檇 scar your kid for life.
But balance bikes have changed everything. Designed with handlebars but no pedals, they teach kids to steer and balance on their seats while gliding along with their feet in the air. To stop, they simply put their feet down. Balance bikes also take the fear out of falling because kids can almost always get their feet under them to cushion the impact. Then it just becomes a matter of dusting themselves off, learning to untangle themselves from the bike鈥攁lways a good skill to have鈥攁nd saddling up again. Once they get the hang of riding, steering, falling, and balancing, it鈥檚 an easy, natural transition to a pedal bike. Our older daughter had just turned three when we decided to make the move. We weren鈥檛 sure she was ready鈥攁gain, the widespread assumption is that kids this young are too young鈥攂ut we had a hunch that she was, so we took her to a grassy park and after an hour or so of wiping out (see below), she was pedaling on her own and mostly staying upright (braking was another story). The next week, she was riding on dirt and bombing down our gravel driveway, with the booboos to prove it. A few months later, she hit the local pump track. Now she鈥檚 four and starting to ride her first singletrack: mellow, flat, mostly smooth sections of trail along the Santa Fe River.
Ryan McFarland invented the in 2007, when he was looking for a safe bike for his two-year-old son.聽 The company鈥檚 motto is, If your kid can walk, he can rider a Strider. And it鈥檚 true. Our two-year-old happily tears around the playground on her borrowed Strider like she鈥檚 been riding it for years. It鈥檚 only been a few weeks. At this rate, I don鈥檛 doubt that she鈥檒l be riding a pedal bike before she鈥檚 three鈥攁nd not because she鈥檚 gifted, but because of technology, pure and simple. (And yes, always, always with a helmet.)
Start them on two wheels when they're young and you'll be setting them up for a lifetime of riding. And who knows, maybe one day you'll have a hard-charging downhiller on your hands.
鈥擪atie Arnold