Pedalheads: Bike Camp Review

07/31/2017

This spring, I contemplated whether or not to put my 4.5 year old daughter in a Pedalheads bike camp. I had seen the Pedalheads camps around the city, usually around community centre/church parking lots with lots of orange cones and kids riding around on their bikes and trikes. But admittedly, I was hesitant. Riding ones bike is a rite of passage and I felt torn whether or not I wanted someone else to teach my child how to ride her bike.

So I did what most other Moms do when facing a question regarding their child. I asked other Mom friends. And when I started polling my friends with children, I was overwhelmed at the responses that typically went something like this:

“Best money I’ve ever spend!”, “What a relief to take that stress off me!,” “Highly, highly recommend Pedalheads!”

Honestly, not one single parent I talked to had a single negative thing to say about sending their child to a Pedalheads bike camp. Turns out there’s a lot of stress, angst and lots of anxiety for both parent AND child when it comes to that magical moment our children start pedalling their bikes on their own. From parents knowing what to say and do, to children wanting to do it quickly, to falls off bikes, turns out it’s not so magical after all.

So I enrolled my daughter in a week of their Level 1 program for new bikers with training wheels. Most of the kids at this age and stage come with training wheels on and by the end of the week the hope/goal is to see if they can ride without them.

I admit looking back, I had high expectations. I had tried to teach my daughter how to ride her bike with me, through various methods but she was very hesitant. She fell off her bike once, not a massive tumble, but enough for her to realize how much it could hurt if she did fall off badly. Since then, we had been struggling with training wheels on, training wheels off. So when the week of bike camp came up, I was thrilled.

Set in a large parking lot of a church, we were met the first day with plenty of friendly, smiling counsellors in bright blue shirts. My daughters instructor was a lovely girl named Christina, who was very involved with all of the kids. It was great because it was a small group of 4 kids, so lots of personalized attention.

The first day of camp, I picked her up and she had no training wheels. My daughter immediately told me she didn’t want to go back to bike camp. Turns out, they took off her training wheels mid morning. I was very surprised and concerned. I thought she would have had more time and more instruction before going right into no training wheels. But turns out, she was learning how to sit on her bike and walk along with her feet so that she could start to get her balance. Huh. Good idea, great start!

So I convinced her to go back to camp and do her best. That night we put her training wheels on again to go for a bike ride. And every day that week she went to camp, came home, we put the training wheels back on to go for a bike ride, only to take them off again for camp every morning.

And it turns out we’re not alone.

Many other parents I talked to said the same thing, Some said their kids got it right away and started to ride, while others, like us, put their training wheels off and on everyday of camp.

Everyday we got great feedback from our instructor Christina on how she was doing, where she was having challenges and what we could focus on at home.

Balance, holding her elbows close it, getting a good start and looking ahead (not at her feet) were key to her development.

So I showed up for camp on the last day around 30 minutes early. It was the last day so they made it ‘Disney Day’. Kids were wearing princess dresses, Disney shirts and hats (along with instructors too)! I was excited to see if my girl had been able to get up and ride on her own!

We ended the week with much success! While she wasn’t riding all around the parking lot all on her own, she was pushing herself to start (which takes much practice) and she could go for short bursts by herself.

Every child learns at their own pace and it may take us the rest of the summer of practice to get her going, but she’s well on her way. So even though Pedalheads gave her the foundation to ride her bike, I’ll still get my magical moment when I run alongside her as she rides for longer and longer. Win-win! And yes, absolutely worth the investment.

Thanks Pedalheads!

• If you do check out their programs, be sure to look up their Heroheads camp which is a superhero camp (looks super fun)!