Kyle Evans | The Olympic Bike

February 2017

Evans: For now I am all about getting fit and healthy. Plan ‘A’ is to be back and ready to go for the first two World Cup races. As long as that all goes well then the plan is to race as much as possible throughout the year.

The past few seasons I have been fast enough to go and be very competitive at the Elite level but I feel my lack of racing and experience has be my largest limiting factor, so now it’s time to change things around and try some new things within my training and racing environment with the plan of being successful in Tokyo 2020.

So you will see me on the WC circuit, USA BMX SX rounds alongside a few standard USA BMX rounds (maybe), European series and even some UK nationals. I always like racing in France so if I can fit any in then even a race here or there in the French Cup.

15: How is the post surgery recovery going? What’s the ETA of you back on a bike at full steam?

Evans: Recovery is going really well. The medical team at British Cycling and I are happy with where I am at right now. It’s still along way off being back on the bike but I am hoping to be ready for the first UCI World Cups.

But again, we are all on the same page, this needs time to heal and we are not going to rush the healing process. If we rush it I could be back to square one and having pain in the wrists every time I climb on the bike. Sometimes you need to think long term and general health later on in life is quite important, therefore if I am not ready by then that’s fine and we will set our goals and eyes to be back on the scene later in the year.

15: Did you have much input into how the bike looked or did you have faith that what ENV Graphics and Pure put together would be as good as it turned out?

Evans: I had full control of the project. I am lucky enough to have a group of great sponsors behind me that are pretty chilled to let me do as I please really. I think we all had our own ideas with how we wanted the bike … some ideas where similar, others were not. In the end, I went over to ENV to sit down with the computer whiz Ant and to put ‘pen to paper’ while sitting on a facetime call with Rich at Pure Bicycles to make sure he was happy with what I wanted and to also add in any other ideas or finishing touches. After a few painful hours we had a proof and went with it.

15: Is there anything on your bike that’s not available to the rest of us?

Evans: Ermmmmm, there’s certainly a few pieces on the bikes which ain’t available to everybody but again without taking them apart or getting up and close to them you wouldn’t even be able to tell the difference unless I pointed them out. That’s why I love all my sponsors/support team around me. They have always gone out of their way just to try and help me with my performance on and off the bike.

Photos: Kyle Evans | ENV Graphics | Maxxis Tyres | Stephen Brooks Films | Paul Makepeace Photography