00:00Trinidad and Tobago born BMX freestyle rider Keegan Alves was in Europe for
00:04close to a year doing the thing he loves most. Even though it's not been a month
00:08that he's retained home, it's business as usual for the 32 year old.
00:13Yeah well I've been outside for a little over 10 months. Started in Bermuda
00:18actually. I spent a few months outside there. I was doing some shows and stuff
00:21like that and then I went back to the UK. I did some shows there as well and I was
00:27off to like France, Spain, competing. Recently came back. It was a good time.
00:33Alves is expected to remain in TNT for the rest of the year but then heads back
00:38to Europe. So what will he be doing here in the meantime? Yeah so all I'm doing is
00:43staying ready for next year events. I plan to travel a lot more and compete a
00:47lot more on the world circuit. So yeah just practicing a lot every day as much
00:52as I can. I mean we have some bad weather here from time to time but yeah
00:57that's it. Just staying ready. And when you go back to Europe where would you be based and
01:02what you would be doing there? Well I recently got Portuguese citizenship
01:07through my parents. So I'll be staying on that side for now but all over Europe I'll be
01:14traveling. Alves cannot see himself having a future in this country since
01:18this is his livelihood. He says the interest in this sport has dwindled over
01:22the years in TNT. Well growing up in Trinidad doing this I had a lot of
01:27friends who was doing it before me as well too and there's some new riders who
01:31are riding. Probably not flatland so much. Kind of sad to see where the sport has
01:36reached in Trinidad because at one point it was really taking off and you know we
01:41was having a lot of local competitions and international competitions in
01:44Trinidad. Having said that he does have some words of encouragement for
01:48youngsters in TNT who want to take up the sport. You may not feel like you're
01:52going anywhere at the start but keep practicing because I mean the
01:56opportunities right now is outside so if you keep practicing keep putting in the
02:01work and stuff like that for sure it will pay off you know. Alves who is
02:05self-taught started doing this in his teens and has worked his way up.
02:09Vinod Narwani, Thiefs Export
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