A Kingston teen has taken the BMX scene by storm. At only 17 years old, Andrew Colling has represented Ontario and now he’s off to the world championships wearing the maple leaf.
He’s hoping his inspiration for joining the sport can lead to a full circle moment after tearing up the Kingston BMX Park for the past 11 years.
“So I was actually watching the 2012 Olympics in London, and we were going through watching through the rounds and I was like that actually looks like a lot of fun,” Colling said, “I saw them go through all the jumps, and then my dad was like there’s a BMX track pretty close if you want to check it out.”
Being inspired by the World’s best certainly has paid off. Colling is coming off a second-place performance at last month’s National Championships in Drummondville, Que. He’s set to race against the best of the best at the World Championships later this month in Scotland.
“It’s my first world championships, so I’d like to at least make it through some of the rounds,” Colling said. “End goal would obviously be a world plate. I think that would be really cool to get top 8 in the world, but we’ll see how it goes.”
But getting to this point doesn’t happen overnight. Colling’s mother says his will and determination are what’s taken him this far.
“When we first brought him out here to check out the track he just thought it was a really cool thing he saw on tv,” Kerry Colling said of her son. “Then he came out here and absolutely loved it. The fact that he hasn’t wavered from that whatsoever in the last 11 years, it’s actually given him more drive.”
While making the world championships is quite the accomplishment, Colling hopes that won’t be the top of his mountain, and wants to have a full circle moment by making it to the Olympics.
“Hopefully, yeah. I’ve already started riding with Team Canada and that’s been a lifelong dream. so hopefully I can keep that going.”
The world championships take place from August 6th to 13th.