Backflips in his bones

START in first gear coming up to the ramp, as you click up into second, you hold it up so you don’t fall off the bike in mid-rotation.
“You come up to the ramp at a pretty cruisy speed. As you get to the bottom of the ramp, you floor it as hard as you can.
“Full throttle when you hit the ramp, once your wheel is half a metre off the top of it, you pull off as hard as you can.
“You have to keep looking backwards, cause whereever your head is looking that’s where your body wants to go.
“Crouch up a little bit on the bike; you can feel it as you get around one. Once you’ve done one, you can go for the next one, but you can’t tell if you’ll land it, so you’ve just got to trust yourself.
“Once you leave the ramp you can usually tell if you can land it or not.”
Jayo Archer is an everyday, down to earth teenager… except when he’s flying his motorbike through the air performing backflips and double-backflips as he describes in the quotes above.
The Botanic Ridge (just near Cranbourne South) motorbike rider Archer, 15, is performing at a standard usually reserved for only the most senior freestyle riders.
Archer can execute a double-backflip on his motorbike (into a foam pit at this stage), a feat which wasn’t even thought possible in the professional ranks until Travis Pastrana succeeded in completing the trick at X Games VII in Los Angeles in 2006.
Archer takes after his mentor, Cam Sinclair, who has been teaching Archer how to ride since he was nine. Sinclair’s pedigree is top notch, having won an X Games gold medal in the Moto-X Best Trick competition at last year’s event and backing it up this year with silver.
“I started riding when I was four years old, and racing the bikes when I was six,” Archer said.
“Freestyle jumping probably only started late last year in October.
“I’ve always been mates with Cam, and he’s always been into it. I got into it after watching him, and really started liking it.”
“That’s the way I’d like to go instead of racing.
“It’s a lot of fun; find it a bit more fun than racing. It’s good to have someone to ride with as well.
Sinclair took Archer as his protégé, and taught him how to perform the double-backflip and other tricks in the paddocks of near his Pearcedale property.
“Cam’s been a great mate of mine,” Archer said. “We’ve known each other for about six years now and it’s been fantastic to have him around to help me.
“I grew up living in Sydney.
“I really like living here; Cam is just down the road. Where we ride is only two kilometres away and lot of my mates live here.
“Step-brothers were professional motocross racers. They met Cam at a supercross race and became good mates with him.”
The road to success for a motorbike rider is paved with broken bones, sprains, jolts, concussions and a myriad of other ailments, but this is what Archer wants to do and is willing to break every bone in his body to achieve it.
“Messing around in the foam pit last week, I was trying some new stuff and fractured my hand,” he said.
“Should be right in a couple of weeks. It’s a bit annoying, I’ve been out watching the guys ride and want to be out there myself, but it’s better to let it heal than to hurt it again.
“As for freestyle no other major injuries. Broke my ankle, both my wrists, a few fingers through bikes. Had a lot of stitches and stuff, but that’s part of the experience.
“I knocked one and a half teeth out when I was younger.
“That wasn’t on motocross, that was BMX bikes. I knocked it out at the skate park; jumping a big box jump at the skate park and I came up a bit short and faceplanted the concrete. Broke my nose in that as well.
“It’s a bit weird to have a false tooth on a plate since 11.”
Fun is a common thread connecting Archer to the sport, with everything he does another step towards achieving another trick, which in turn generates a bit more excitement and joy for him.
Will try a few more double backflips into the foam pit and see how it goes,” he said.
“It’s just for fun at the moment, I’m not thinking of trying to do it to dirt at the moment.”
“It’s coming naturally to me. As I enjoy it so much and I want to learn so much, it’s all going well.
“It mainly comes down to Cam; everything I’ve learned in freestyle I learned from him. It’s good that he teaches me things, and I just try it and go from there.”
The big aim for the future are the X Games; the motorbike equivalent of the Olympics.
“X Games and big tournaments are my aim,” Archer said.
“Love to do the comps and stuff. But Cam and the other senior riders are definitely really talented, so it takes a long time to get to where he is.
“I’d love to do it in the future, if all goes good I’d love to do that.
The sport’s going crazy now with people doing front flips and everything.
“Front flips now; lot of crazy tricks with 360s and stuff like that.
“In like five or 10 years’ time, there could be even crazier stuff coming.
“Love to try out the new tricks, there’s no reason why I can’t.
“Got some ramps for trying crazy stuff like that.
“Tried some front flips into the foam pit. It’s definitely a lot harder than you think.