‘Uni’que athlete wows locals

Ken Johnston
Editor

If you had to look twice over the past week or so when you saw a funny looking cyclist go by you were not alone.
Joel Burgess, 16, of Sarnia, Ont., was in town visiting his grandpa Don Fraser of Rainy River, and was dazzling locals with his unicycling abilities.
Burgess started unicycling about 2.5 years ago when his friends started trying to ride an old one his dad had bought. He tried riding it and soon became quite good on the single wheeled vehicle.
Since then he has upgraded to a cycle that cost about $1,000 and he has travelled to several competitions in Southern Ontario and in the Eastern United States.
Burgess is not just a rider, but an “Extreme Unicyclist.” He is constantly looking for a challenge ride or obstacle to conquer. Lately he has been riding off of high places and landing wheel down. “I have ridden from a rock to a bench to a car recently.” While in Rainy River he tackled the fire escape stairs at the Rainy River Community Centre and the bleachers at the ball diamond. In between them he rode along a fence line no wider than 1.75 inches. The highest successful jump he has made to date was about 8 feet from a rock to a beach. “It seemed really high at first but I worked myself up to it.”
Burgess says the key to riding is not just balancing but to build momentum. “The trick is to get momentum up. Once you do that it is easy!”
He noted that there is a tremendous amount of pressure exerted on the cranks and spindle. As he improved, he started breaking cranks and that prompted him to look at upgrading. His first one was low cost and the wheel was 16 inches in diameter. His current unicycle has strong cranks and a 20 inch diameter.
His competitive ventures have seen him win several honours. “I came in first in Ottawa in the Sport Trials category, first in Expert at the Mt. Ste. Anne competition and third at Motorama in Pensylvania. He noted that it is by skills that you compete not age. The top level of competition is expert.
There are usually 50 different lines to complete at competitions and riders have to try and complete as many as they can without falling off.
While he said the sport is low impact, he has had several scrapes as he learned and upped the anti on the extreme side of it. Most riders have trouble with their ankles when it comes to injuries due mostly to the high level of pressure exerted to get momentum up. Burgess has been lucky with his ankles.
He said when he started he just thought of riding it around. “I never dreamed it would get to be this big.” He saw a trailer on the internet for extreme unicycling and fell in love with the sport. Now he and a friend operate their own club called The Unipsychos. They encourage people interested in learning the sport to come and try it. “You can get into it for as little as $60.”
In addition to competing and teaching people to ride, Burgess has also appeared in two extreme unicycle videos promoting the sport. One is called Training Wheels Not Required.
While in Rainy River Burgess turned lots of heads both on this side of the border and in Baudette. He frequented both skate-parks and found many people stopping to watch him do tricks.
While extreme unicycling is his main love right now, he has been dabbling with extreme free riding mountain biking. But he says his heart belongs to the thrill of the unicycling and doubts another will replace it in the near future.
Joel’s mom is Donna Fraser, formerly of Rainy River. She left here in 1978. She is the daughter of Don Fraser and the late Edith Fraser of Rainy River.