“Oh La Vache” – it’s like saying “Holy Cow” in French and honestly it’s the best way to sum up my summer.
June was spent doing shows in France and tightening up the StuntBums site to hit the road in July. I produced “Violet Stars & Happy Stunting,” my latest riding video which was a fun opportunity for me to mix artistic creativity and stunting. Right after the video I headed to London to shoot for a TV show with fellow stunter, Chesca Miles, and TT Racer and race legend, Maria Costello.
I flew back to Southern France and departed a few hours later for 28 days on the road. It was an epic adventure of riding, different cultures, events and learning. We hit up the European Championship in Austria, spent two weeks in Poland with Stunter13 and Ewa, another lady rider and fellow Icon teammate. It was nice to meet up with Nick Apex and Shin Kinoshita at StuntGP – always good to see some familiar faces.
Then it was onto Germany, to ride with Mai-Lin at German Stunt Days and finally Paris and some laid-back training in Northern France. Now my adventure is nearly over and I am having a second to take it all in.
While the summer was an overall success, one thing sticks out that I feel compelled to write about is how young our sport is and how it’s our responsibility to help it grow. At StuntGP in Poland, the three women competitors had a problem with the organizer not wanting to pay money to the female riders. Needless to say we decided not to ride in what essentially was an unpaid show, but it got me thinking about how to promote female stunters as serious athletes and valuable assets.
People love to see us ride, but we still face the same problem as women in all professions world-wide and that is we don’t get paid as much and sometimes don’t get taken seriously.
I have a few ideas on how to solve this problem – but I would love to hear yours. Ladies, what can we do to be seen as not only professionals, but valuable assets to any event or competition? Hit me up on LeahStunts.com or Facebook, I look forward to hearing your perspective.
