For children who have faced more than most, finding a space to feel safe, strong and in control can change everything… and that’s exactly what’s happening here.
Johannesburg, South Africa (21 March 2026) – For the past year, I’ve been riding a motorbike thanks to Linex Sandton Yamaha… and while that’s been an adventure on its own, this story isn’t about me. It’s about what happens when those same bikes become something far more meaningful.
In an exclusive interview with Tiffini Hein from The Maletsatsi Foundation, I got to unpack how a “happy accident” grew into Team Zonke… a programme where motorbikes are helping children rebuild confidence, process trauma and find their footing again.
“Team Zonke has been the best thing we have done for our children and their mental and physical well-being.”
From the start, Tiffini makes it clear this wasn’t planned. It came from a gap that needed filling. Traditional therapy simply isn’t always accessible for children in care, especially when legal processes or systemic challenges get in the way.
“Truthfully, Team Zonke is a very happy accident,” she says.
“Traditional therapy is notoriously difficult for kids in care to access, and there are a number of reasons for that. Children who are involved in criminal cases are often not permitted to access talk therapy until those cases are closed, because it’s seen as potentially influencing their testimony, and that process can take years. So you have a child arriving in your care having been through something incredibly traumatic, needing support immediately, but unable to access the very systems that are meant to help them. And even outside of that, therapy is just not easily accessible for many of our families… there are language barriers, financial constraints and often just the overwhelming complexity of navigating it all.”
That reality led to a decision rooted in instinct rather than strategy. One child needed an outlet but the suggested path didn’t feel right.
“Just over two years ago, one of our children was finally able to access a combination of therapies, all of which he absolutely hated, and the recommendation was to get him into wrestling as a way to channel his energy. But my gut just didn’t sit right with that. These kids already carry so much, and there is already so much stigma attached to children in alternate care. I didn’t want to place him in an environment where he might be misunderstood or labelled again. I also didn’t want to see him in a space that simulated fighting… they’ve had enough of that in their lives already.”
So she looked closer to home. And what she found was a motorbike. Her husband has always ridden motorbikes, so there were always bikes around, and at the time, there was a small kids’ bike in the garage that hadn’t really been used.
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“We popped a helmet on him, put him on the bike and enrolled him in some basic coaching, just to see what would happen. And then we started watching him blossom. I mean the change in this child was unbelievable. It wasn’t just about the riding, it was about confidence, about presence, about something shifting inside him.”
That shift didn’t stay with just one child. It sparked curiosity. It drew others in. And before long, something bigger began to take shape.
By Tiffini’s own words, their home had become “a melting pot of trauma and medical stress.” The children had experienced loss, uncertainty and emotional weight that few should carry so young. The bikes arrived into that space… and slowly, something changed.
“The bikes came in and started becoming an outlet for so much of that. We started seeing children who were so overwhelmed by stress that they couldn’t even make eye contact begin to find confidence behind a helmet, and then slowly bring that confidence into their everyday lives. We saw kids become stronger, more aware, and more capable of making decisions.”
What happens on the track doesn’t stay on the track. Their riders have learnt to master both their bikes and their emotions. They learn to assess risk, to recognise danger, and to make informed decisions. That carries directly into daily life. But Tiffini believes the most important shift is that riding gives them back something that was taken from them. That something is deeply personal… and incredibly powerful.
“For many of our children, ownership of their bodies has been taken from them, whether through abuse, neglect or medical trauma. On a bike, that changes. They are the ones making the decisions. They choose the speed, they assess the risk, they decide when to push and when to pull back. It’s not something that is done to them, it’s something they actively create. And that is profoundly healing.”
This is where Linex Yamaha becomes part of the story. Not just as a sponsor but as an early believer.
“Yamaha was the first corporate to really see Team Zonke and believe in it as something real. They sponsored one of our first bikes, and that belief meant more than I think they even realise. Because behind the scenes, we are making this work through what I jokingly call ‘mom math’, but in reality, it’s a lot of personal sacrifice. We are investing everything we can into this because we’ve seen what it does for the kids, but we also know that we can’t sustain it alone forever.”
And when you hear the stories of the kids, that support starts to make even more sense.
“We have one little guy who was told he would never walk and that he wouldn’t amount to much, and he kept watching the other kids ride and saying, ‘Mommy, mine want to ride’. One day I just decided that we were going to make it happen. We went to Yamaha, got him onto a bike, and he just took off. The joy on his face was something I will never forget. Today, he rides like he owns the track.”
“I mean, imagine being told you would never walk and then quite literally giving the middle finger to the world by hopping onto a motorbike.”
Tiffini speaks with so much passion about that story. The video she shared with me made me see why. But there are more stories like that. Stories of kids finding their voice, their confidence and their place again.
“We have another young man who came into our home carrying a level of trauma that is difficult to describe, and over time, through riding and being part of this team, we’ve watched him find himself again. He’s now editing videos of his rides, he’s found confidence on the bike, he’s standing on podiums, and his dad said to me recently, ‘Mum T, this boy is more than my ancestors could dream.’”
Looking ahead, the focus is simple. Keep going. Grow the impact. Bring more kids into the fold.
“We’ve got our Ride for a Reason campaign this year, which is about creating awareness and raising funds so we can keep this going. Riding is eye-wateringly expensive, from the bikes to the gear to the nutrition, but the return is something you can’t measure on paper. We just need more people to understand why this matters.”
And maybe that’s the most important part of the story. Not the bikes or the races… the shift. Kids who once felt small now taking up space. Kids who didn’t have control now making decisions. Kids who were defined by what happened to them now defining what comes next.
“You can see it in the way they ride. You can feel it in the way they show up.”
And once you see it, you understand… this is working.
Click here for more information about The Maletsatsi Foundation or Linex Yamaha.
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