One Problem + One Problem == One Solution

Problem #1: It wasn't a real big problem, but the story is that we signed Braedyn up for soccer this year. We went out and bought him his uniform, shin gaurds and cleats. He was all ready to go. Well we missed the first couple weeks and then when we did go we found out that, well, it wasn't his favorite sport in the world. Maybe he needs to do it for a few more years or something, but in the picture below that is him over picking grass and looking for bugs while the game is going on behind him. After a couple of games Braedyn would start coming over to us on the sidelines during breaks and ask if we could go BMX now... We usually went BMXing after the games so he still got his fix of biking. Well he only played about 3 or 4 games, and I was feeling bad about having dropped all this money for something that he only did a few times, especially those shoes, since he'll for sure outgrow them before next year.

Problem #2: So BMX racing is this kid's favorite thing to do this past year. We've spent a lot of time at our local tracks this summer and it is all he thinks about and talks about. We try to talk him into going to the beach or going for a hike, but riding is what he wants to do most. It's a pretty great sport, he gets to be outside, riding his bike, getting some exercise, hanging out with lots of other fun kids and we've gotten to go visit some fun places for races. One thing that you notice is that BMX is taken pretty seriously in Southern California, there are tons of kids that ride and race 5 or 6 days a week. Everyone has the latest and greatest gear and you know that bike manufacturers come up with about everything you could possible want for your bike. One of the things that struck me as interesting was the number of kids who were riding clipless pedals (clipless being the kind you clip your shoe into). It's especially interesting because kids of all ages are riding clipless pedals, 12 year olds, 7 year olds and even 4 and 5 year olds. Well as any good sport participant would be, Braedyn soon began asking to get clipless pedals like all of his friends at the track had. At some point in the summer I promised him that if he kept trying hard and still wanted them in a few months that I would get some for him. Well he's been doing great and having a blast and the time came that I needed to follow through. So I ordered some nice clipless pedals and then began the search for some shoes to go with them. Here enters problem #2. There apparently is not a huge market for children's size 10 bike shoes as there are probably not all that many 4 year olds that are begging their dads for clipless pedals, and probably even less dads that are crazy enough to actually go out and get them. So we were resolved to just have to put him in shoes 3 or 4 sizes too big in order to let him try out his pedals.

Solution: After getting a tip from Richard Huvard who runs the Santa Barbara and Camarillo BMX tracks I decided to give a try at solving both of my problems. The plan was to turn Braedyn's soccer shoes into clipless BMX biking shoes! I started out by grinding off the cleats. I finally had a use for the grinder that I got from my grandfather.

Once I had the cleats off I pulled apart an old pair of Mountain Bike shoes I had and removed the little piece of metal that the pedal cleats screw into. I drilled holes in Braedyn's soccer shoes and inserted the metal piece and then screwed in the pedal cleats. It worked out a lot better than I was envisioning and it looks like they'll work great. Now we just have to teach Braedyn how to get in and out of the pedals and how to make good use of them.