“ Yes, I am a bike nerd and my passion is designing and developing quality bicycles and components, I ride and trust by my own.“
Hi, I am Frank… Already as a little kid I got fascinated about biking and I was spending all day long doing power-slides, riding off-road, getting some air over wooden ramps or just doing some afternoon races together with friends at the local mx track. Back in those days, we used standard touring bikes with gear hubs. It worth to mention, during that time there was no internet access, so we did not get any influence from anywhere at all. We were all living in our own small world and each of us was focused on his personal mission, which was pretty much beating anyone else on the private races or holding the wheelie record of the hood.
It must have been around 1982, when I saw a story in a youth magazine, were kids in the USA were racing on little bikes with off road tires. I think it took me less than a second and for me it was obvious, I needed a bike like that. This was my first contact to bmx. I did all kind of jobs, from fruit picking to newspapers delivery, just to save up the money for a bmx bike. I can still remember that day, when I smashed 235 german marks on the counter, to get proud owner of a low quality BMX 2000. But this piece of crab was enough to fully change my life. We spend every single minute pulling wheelies, doing bunny hops or catching some air…Well, that´s the story of my childhood…
Today Frank enjoys ridin´ with his son. Here is the > Video
Today I am open minded to a wide range of different bicycle activities. Dirt jumping is still my major passion, but I although enjoy riding through the forest on a mountainbike, join a bike polo session or just cruise around.
I started leafcycles, because I always had that dream, „one day I wanted to fly on my own designed frame“. This dream got true in the year 2007, when the „d.one“ frame hit the market. Right after the launch leafcycles got international attraction in the dirt jumping segment and for years I was riding the wave of a boom market. But suddenly I had to learn on the hard way, no trend runs forever.
The years from 2016 to 2019 were the dry time for leafcycles. My major mistake was, that I concentrated on the dirt jumping segment only. Sales went down dramatically and suddenly, riding the wave of success was history. The situation was that bad, that I had to accept a side job, just to feed my family. This new situation was not easy and the hamster wheel was spitting sparks. Well, it took me almost 4 more years to understand, that developing bicycles is my passion and here we go…
leafcycles is back. Not as big as before, but this does not matter. My vision is still the same. Serve those of you, who trust into 4130 CroMo steel, with quality steel bicycles made for serious riding.
Leafcycles – equipment for the dirty hours of your life
Frank Heinrich – founder of leafcycles
Click on the link below, to read more about the leafcycles timeline, starting from 2006 till today.