 |
|
| ASU grad Bouboulis
breaks into pizza |
Grayson Mendenhall
Staff Writer
|
Special to the AppalachianSenior industrial technologies
major J. Brad Walton helped form the Hick Huskster Freeride
Assault Sqaudron, dedicated to the sport of free riding. Walton
hones his skills on trails in the U.S. and Canada.
|
J. Brad
Walton, a senior industrial technology major from Statesville,
loves mountain biking.
For the past nine years, Walton has been honing his skills on
trails ranging from Wilson’s Creek in North Carolina’s
Pisgah National Forest to the wilderness of North Vancouver, British
Columbia.
Regardless of the trail locations, Brad Walton is happy as long
as he is on his bike.
Born in Hickory, Walton developed his love of mountain biking
at an early age.
|
"When
I was 12 years old, my parents bought me my first mountain bike,”
Walton said.
He rode his first bike all the time.
So much wear and tear from riding began to
complicate things for an adolescent not of working age and in
desperate need of money for bicycle parts.
“When I was 14 years old, I started working
for parts for my bike at First Flight Bicycles in Statesville,”
Walton said.
After a year of working for parts instead of
money, Walton was finally able to start doing what he really wanted:
learning to repair bikes.
“When I turned 15, I finally got a work
permit and started working at First Flight fixing bikes,”
Walton said.
After three years of repairing bikes, it was
time for Walton to attend college. He was unsure where he would
go.
“The only schools I applied to were Western
Carolina University and Appalachian State University … all
I knew was that I wanted to be in the North Carolina mountains
because I had seen a lot of the area from going on bike trips,”
Walton said.
Walton decided to come to Appalachian.
During his first years in Boone, he said it
was difficult to find people with whom to ride.
“At first I didn’t know anybody,
and I rode by myself a lot,” Walton said.
On one of his trips to ride at Jaycee Park
in Hickory, Walton met a few people with similar interests, to
ride bikes simply for the fun of it.
Through riding bikes and building trails, Walton,
along with his good friend Matt Norris, formed the Hick Huckster
Freeride Assault Squadron or “Hick Hucksters” for short.
The group is dedicated to perpetuating the
sport of free ride mountain biking or free riding.
They adhere to the simple motto, “ride
free or die,” according to their Web site www.hickhucksters.com.
Free riding is a sub-genre of mountain biking
involving dirt jumps, fast downhill runs and man-made stunts.
Walton has grown quite fond of the sport.
“The sense of freedom you get from free
riding is the best part,” Walton said.
Using his bike for fun rather than competition
is very important to Walton.
“With free riding, you don’t feel
obligated to do anything but ride your bike,” Walton said.
Walton’s feats as a free rider are often
so extreme and dangerous that he has earned the nickname “Wyld
Willy” from his fellow Hick Hucksters.
His friend Matt Norris offers a simple explanation
to the pseudonym.
“He’s a smart guy trapped in an insane
person’s body … his riding style is just balls to the
wall,” Norris said.
While he always had fun riding in and around
North Carolina, Walton wanted to take his chances on some of the
most demanding trails in free ride mountain biking in North Vancouver,
British Columbia, also known as “The North Shore.”
On June 17, 2002, Walton and Norris departed
on a 3,500-mile, two-and-a-half week odyssey to British Columbia,
Canada.
While there, Walton and Norris were able to
ride some of the most extreme and innovative trails in the world.
The sense of community they saw among the local
riders when they were in Vancouver inspired them in their own
efforts to build a strong local free riding scene.
“We went to British Columbia and saw how
tightly knit the local community was. We wanted to bring that
feeling back to Boone,” Walton said.
Upon returning to Boone, Walton and the Hick
Hucksters have made it their mission to build and ride trails
with the same passion they witnessed in British Columbia.
Now, while he is not riding his bike or studying
metals and manufacturing at Appalachian, Walton can be found working
on bikes at Magic Cycles in Boone.
“During my third year at Appalachian,
I got a job at Magic Cycles and have met a lot of riders through
that,” Walton said.
His love for bicycle repair runs deep. The
tattoos on his right arm are a testament to his love of bikes.
“I have a sleeve tattoo of bike tools
… that’s all I’ve ever really known how to do and
it’s all I would ever like to do,” Walton said.
Walton doesn’t plan on ever giving up
riding bikes.
“I see myself riding bikes for the rest
of my life,” Walton said.
Regardless of whether he is able to ride mountain
bikes for the rest of his life, he certainly has the motivation
to keep him going for a long time.
Norris, while extolling Walton’s affinity
for insane bike riding, said he also recognizes Walton’s
simple love of bikes and his ability to take free riding to an
even higher level.
“He just looks at a line and he can just
see himself doing it … he’s confident and that is how
you’ve got to be in order to do the stuff he does,”
Norris said. |
|
|
 |
 |
