Jordan Clark has achieved in just a few months what many athletes take several years to build. A former scooter champion and now a BMX champion, the British rider made the switch from freestyle scootering to BMX and secured his first major title last month in Darmstadt. The European gold represents a significant reward for an ambitious career change, with Clark now setting his sights on becoming an Olympic champion at the 2028 Games.
From scooter to BMX, a transition already bearing fruit
Before making the move to BMX, Jordan Clark had already built a remarkable career in another freestyle discipline. For more than a decade, the British rider competed at the highest level in scootering, winning five world titles and three European titles. He also became one of the most successful athletes in the history of Extreme Barcelona, building a record that led many to regard him as the greatest rider his discipline has produced.
His international debut on a BMX confirmed just how quickly he could adapt between the two freestyle disciplines. At the 2024 UCI Urban Cycling World Championships, Clark qualified in first place before eventually finishing sixth in the final standings. His 2025 campaign was more inconsistent, as he qualified in 16th before producing a significant improvement to reach second place in the semi-finals.
The pressure increased in the final after Clark crashed during his first run, leaving him with little margin for error on his second attempt. He responded with a strong performance, scoring 89.76 points to finish eighth overall. It remained the best result by a British rider at the event and provided further evidence that his transition to BMX was progressing quickly.
A year later, in Darmstadt, Clark took another step forward. He began the European Championships weekend with the second-highest qualifying score before finishing third in the semi-finals. He therefore did not enter the final as the outright favourite, but his competition experience and distinctive riding style ultimately proved decisive. On his first run of the final, the British rider posted a score of 94.00 points. It immediately put him at the top of the leaderboard and, crucially, proved impossible for the rest of the field to beat. None of his rivals could better Clark’s mark on their own attempts, handing him his first European title in BMX Freestyle Park.
The victory also highlighted the distinctive nature of his approach to BMX. His background in scootering has allowed him to retain elements of the technical vocabulary he developed on a scooter while adapting them to a BMX. That influence can be seen throughout his runs, with tricks including the double downside tail whip, double backflip and the bri flip, a move closely associated with his experience in scootering.
For Clark, the result is therefore the culmination of a rapid progression rather than an isolated breakthrough. He entered BMX as an established champion in another discipline but had to build his reputation again on a different bike, against riders who had spent much longer competing at the top level of the sport. Winning European gold so soon after making that commitment underlines the scale of his progress.
British dominance continues
Jordan Clark’s success also extends a particularly strong run for the United Kingdom since the introduction of the BMX Freestyle Park European Championships. The 2026 edition was the seventh in the history of the event, with British riders having now collected eight men’s podium finishes between them, achieved by just four different athletes.
Declan Brooks began that run with a bronze medal at the inaugural edition in 2019 before returning to the podium in 2023. Kieran Reilly then added three podium finishes, including European titles in 2023 and 2024. Dylan Hessey finished third in 2024 before going one step further and becoming European champion in 2025. Clark has now continued a British presence that has become firmly established at the top of the discipline. His victory in Darmstadt makes him the fourth different British European champion and allows the United Kingdom to retain the title for a fourth consecutive edition. Reilly won in 2023 and 2024, followed by Hessey in 2025, before Clark took over the European crown this year.
Brooks has since retired, but the other three riders are expected to be among those chasing success at the 2028 Olympic Games. All three have already demonstrated the level required to challenge for Olympic gold, giving the United Kingdom a particularly strong group of contenders heading towards Los Angeles.
