Road safety and training
The balance bike - learning to ride
The balance bike is suitable for children aged two to five years and 85 cm to 110 cm tall. It is designed as a modern alternative to a bike with stabilisers. Not only is it a fun toy for your child to enjoy everyday, but it also teaches them many skills such as coordination, balance, steering and strength building.
Balance bikes all have the same concept - learning to ride a two wheeled bike without training wheels / stabilisers. The bike is without pedals, chains or sprockets so their little legs don’t get tangled up. It is propelled by your child walking, running, then in short a time gliding with their feet off the ground! The balance bike gets your child ready for the transition to a pedal bike with little effort.
A balance bike can manage a multitude of terrains and easily glides over grass, dirt, wooden bridges and even bark. While enjoying the balance bike, your child is getting ready to ride a real pedal bike.
Once a child learns to balance, glide and steer they can usually hop on a pedal bike, with no training wheel / stabilisers, and master the basics of riding a pedal cycle in one day. The success and learning approach of a balance bike is largely due to balance being a harder skill to learn than pedalling. The balance bike has basically switched the order skills of pedalling and balancing that used to be taught using a bike with stabilisers.
In many European countries, where a child on a balance bike is the norm, it is very easy for children to be riding pedal bikes without stabilisers by the age of three! Balance bikes are the future of teaching children how to ride bikes; stabilisers could soon be a thing of the past.
