Meester: Shown Up By BMX Mom

Meesterbox: As odd as it sounds, my mom was a BMX racer and not in her youth. She started when she was 40 years of age and I thought it was pretty cool, so much I was her first sponsor and help pay for her gear. Just after one short season she was picked up for sponsorship by a local shop and was riding for Haro. I came out to visit her and she wanted me to check out her new bike so I took it out on the course. Now, I am not a BMX racer, but I had done a bit of mountain biking before so I didn’t think it would be that hard…come on, my mom can do it, so it should be that hard, right? I strapped on the helmet, set up on the gate, and zoomed down the first hill to hit the first jump at maximum velocity. Next thing I knew I was flying with no bike below me heading face first into the ground. Rest of comment below. (AP photo for illustrative purposes, of men’s BMX finals at Olympics today)

Question: Can your mother do something athletically that you can’t?

After flying a few feet and pile driving the earth with my face, I jumped up and acted like everything was cool, but I could only play that charade for a few seconds because the full face helmet I was wearing was destroyed - bust off the face guard and and the visor was shattered. Luckily the helmet took the brunt of the damage and I was able to walk away with only some wounds on my chin-ny-chin-chin. My mom’s new bike also was ok, but that was the last time I tried out any of her new gear or even attempted to ride a BMX track.