The one and only time Liao said “I can’t” was when he tore a foot ligament while executing a 360° flip at an ESPN event in 2002. “I was soaked in cold sweat and it was too painful to speak,” he recalled.
A few months later the injured biker was once again in the media spotlight when he hurtled over the mammoth 15m-wide Shihkang Dam (石岡壩) in Taichung County. The dam had been destroyed in the 921 Earthquake, and Liao deemed the performance, held to commemorate the disaster’s fourth anniversary, his most challenging — not because it was difficult, but because of the consequences officials in charge of staging the event would face if he cased the jump.
This tough guy does have a soft spot, though. Starting in 1996, Liao has taken in a total of around 20 young athletes, most from single-parent households, trained them, paid their school tuition and pretty much raised them, using money he earns as a designer and consultant for local bicycle companies.
Bears Teams (小熊家族, www.bears-bike.com), for which Liao is the sole sponsor, coach and mentor, includes professional in-line skaters, skateboarders and BMX and mountain bike racers and is one of the best extreme sports teams in Taiwan.
“I find a niche for each of my students. If you don’t have skills, you can play downhill. If you have neither skills nor physical strength, you can be a good host for bike shows,” Liao said. “People need confidence ... They are happy with themselves when they have a stage to do whatever they’re good at.”
Having found his stage at the early age of 8, Liao thinks it’s now time for him to make a career change and give the same opportunity to a younger generation of athletes. Having valued freedom over business and fun over money for most of his life, he is now an entrepreneur and has designed his own US- and EU-patented bikes, which will ready for mass production this year.
“If the business becomes stable then the kids can join in and work with me,” said the Liao, a bachelor who thinks marriage would only get in the way of a career that involves potentially deadly risk-taking and a big family made up of mostly teenage boys.
Liao hopes to place among the top three at this year’s National Sports Games (全國運動會) to be held in Taichung in October. And he has another aspiration: that one of his students will win a world championship one day.
“What my generation could not achieve, I hope that the younger generations of bikers can accomplish,” Liao said.
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