Fakie Front Flip Flair

I can’t believe this is 3 years old. Pretty sick.

Critical Mass Halloween Atlanta…a few pics

Wow, I drastically underestimated the turnout for this thing. Thats what happens when you live so far away from the city I guess. This little clip of the mass crossing Moreland doesn’t even show the whole group. I hope homeboy found his wife lol (42secs)…

Since I lost my camera in a “party mishap” earlier this year, all i had to grab snaps with was the iPhone, so the quality isn’t very good on these pics, but you can get an idea of how everyone was in the halloween spirit for the ride.

I couldn’t tell if this guy was running the full Rock Racing kit as a costume or if this is his normal riding gear.


AYHSMB southeast remix

Probably the best “in theme of the event” costume I saw…


There was a whole gang of smart phone icons…Angry Birds! Wish I could have gotten a pic of the whole group together…


Probably my fave costume was E.T and Elliot. Great job on the E.T. sculpture/model…the only way it could have been better were if she would been riding the actual Kuwahara E.T. BMX bike.

The ride was a blast, although I ran out of beer waaaay too early. Next year I’ll rig up some sort of way to bring more suds. One thing I thought was pretty rad was when the mass got out onto Moreland in East Atlanta and cruised up to Little Five Points. Since I don’t get to come to many of these events I have never been to one where such a long stretch of such a major road was infiltrated. I had some other things to do that night, so when we got to L5P I dropped off so I could ride back to Kirkwood since I had parked there, but the ride kept trucking along headed up towards Ponce and who knows where else. While I was riding away in the opposite direction I could hear all the ruckus from the crowd and the car horns from quite a distance away. I hope it went long and everyone had a great time.

If you only do one CM a year, Halloween is the one to do for sure.

Joe Kid on a Sting Ray

Finally got the Joe Kid on a Sting-Ray DVD. Yes I know it has been out for a few years, but the pirated version someone gave me wouldn’t play correctly, plus ultimately I hope a little of the cash I laid out for it finds it’s way back to the folks who put forth the effort to make it.

So how did I like it? I loved it! So rad to see all the old school footage from the early southern California scene…so real and so pure. It was pretty interesting to see some of my boyhood heroes outside the confines of BMX Action Magazine  and actually get a feel for what their personalities were like in real life. It was also great to finally learn the correct pronunciation of “Scot Briethaupt“.

I’m pretty stoked that they didn’t ignore the East Coast scene, with notable inclusions of Rockville BMX and The Plywood Hoods (York PA).

If you didn’t live, breath and shit BMX through most of your childhood, the film will probably not have the same impact as it does on an “old school head / low budget soul rider” like myself, but it is still worth the watch just to see some of the rare footage.

I am giving them bonus credit for having a grand total of only like 3 flips in the whole thing, because this is a video about BICYCLE MOTOCROSS not circus acts. That being said, there is plenty of - late 80′s pastel color coordinated full uniform corporate sell out- early freestyle footage.

Suprisingly, the riding I seemed to like the most was Dizz Hicks. He just had something totally different going on. Pat Romano kind of tried to cop a bunch of credit for things he may or may not deserve credit for, which is kind 0f to be expected since his approach was from the artistic cycling scene and not so much BMX, so he may not have been aware of any parallel or preceding history from the BMX scene. I am suprised that they didn’t mention how he also used to perform his act on ice, which was played up heavily in BMXA when he became a full fledged trick team member if memory serves me correct.

Perry Kramer made me kind of sad yet at the same time hopeful. You could tell a dramatic difference in his personality between the two major portions of interview footage of him they spliced throughout the film.  At least they gave proper respect to the PK RIPPER, which I and a zillion other people think was the most perfect BMX bike ever made…at least during the true “golden era” of the sport.

Overall, I am glad I bought the vid, and recommend you try to catch a viewing if you get a chance. After you watch it, you’ll probably want to go out, find a suitable location, and bust a big flat tabletop. Nuff said.

Some really sick riding…

I would love to post the video of the Nike 6.o BCN BMX finals here, but WordPress isn’t playing nice with trying to embed from Vimeo…however you can click here to view the vid directly

I don’t often post links to vids, because I

know clicking through is too much work

for you…but trust me this one is worth it.

Tour De France 2010 video replays

Sadly, I do not have Versus channel here at home, so watching the Tour on TV is not an option. Of course I can dig around and watch a zillion 2 to 5 minute edited recaps on the various biking and sports sites, but to me it just isn’t -real- unless I get to sit through the whole length of the stage coverage. This is true even when it is a flat boring stage. I love the long panning aerial views of the spectacular countryside and the sometimes cheesy but mostly informative banter of the commentators. I like the scale of being committed to watching the full coverage. There are tons of little moments that happen that will never make the highlight reels that you won’t catch unless you go the distance.

So, it appears as though there are two options if you want to watch the full stages but don’t have the cable channel. Option 1 is to sign up for the Versus Tour Tracker for $29.95, which features full stage replays in HD plus a bunch of additional fancy GPS live tracking etc. Option 2 is to get the iPhone version of the Tour Tracker app for $14.95, which also features replays of each complete stage.

Unfortunately, I don’t think I’ll be plunking down the cash for either of these options.

So far, the iPhone app has gotten less than stellar reviews. From what I understand you cannot view the full vids unless you are on a wireless network, which is understandable and in my opinion a non issue. But most the customer reviews so far indicate that the app is a little dodgy…vids cutting out after 20 mins, vids not loading, tracking portion not jiving correctly…overall just sort of buggy. Of course, to be fair, there are a few reviews from folks who have had no problems at all. I am sure that the reliability of your internet connection effects an app this media rich, which may be why some folks are not getting the performance they expected. There is a free version of the app also with a dramatically reduced feature set.

My real issue though, is with the website version of the Tour Tracker. I think that a better model would have been to allow users to pay and view individual stages, and maybe have people that go ahead and purchase access to all the stages get a discount or something. I mean, to me, 29.95 is just a bit steep, but I would probably have no problem paying like $3.00 per stage if I could choose what stages I wanted. I like watching the entire stages, but that does’t mean I have TIME to watch every stage. If I paid for the whole lot, I would feel like I -had- to watch them all in order to get my moneys worth. Of course, I would -eventually- watch them all, but part of the fun of keeping up with the race is watching the footage as close to when the stage actually happened as you can. It is already kind of tough having to watch replays knowing the outcome, but if you get two or three stages behind in your viewing, the urgency just isn’t there to watch anymore because the older stages lose relevance in relation current news that is trickling in about the race. Of course this applies more to the -boring stages- than to the big climbing stages or stages where something happens that effects the overall outcome of the race in a big way, but I think you understand what I am getting at.

Hopefully next year Versus will add the ability to purchase individual stage coverage to the Tour Tracker. It looks like a great way to watch the race is you aren’t a subscriber to their cable channel. For now though, I guess it will all be 5 minute recaps for me.

fixed gear skatepark action

reposted from Prollys blogotron:

Of course these guys have nothing on the tricks the BMX crew throw, but I can really appreciate how hard this stuff is, having ridden both a fixed gear, and recently re-discovering skatepark riding. I can’t believe that they are popping out to the deck! It is not easy to do, even when you can set up your pedals and just coast.

Will I be lugging my fixed gear down to the park? I dunno…maybe just for fun…see if I can carve around the walls without killing myself. I’ve been wanting to pop a No-Brakes sticker up near the coping, but felt like I would just be a posuer if I I did it having never actually logged any park time on the fixie.

devils backbone time trials

Looks like there is going to be a Thursday night time trial series on Devils Backbone at Chicopee trails. This particular trail is sort of a menace. There is this one section that is just ridiculously hard to clear because of the combination of roots and switchbacks right at the beginning of a hard climb. I’ve only cleared it once…on Ye Ol’ Talera no less. Fortunately I have it on video for bragging rights.

It doesn’t look that hard on the vid, but it is. It just keeps going up and up and up. The tough part is keeping your momentum after the second turn…there is a giant root and no clean line you can take. It’s all about brute force on this one. The roots continue the whole way up.

Good luck to those of you who are going to man up and time trial this trail, it’s still a bit out of my range.

tandem fixed gear

Track racing is already pretty sick, but track racing on a fixed tandem? CRAZY. I want one. Someone is selling a Peugeot tandem on Atlanta craigslist today that is just screaming to get the fixed treatment.

Here is some vintage footage from the 1982 World Track Championships tandem sprint. Watch for the trackstand tandem style early on as the first team waits for the second team to pass. The pace picks up around 1:30sec…and just after 2 minutes there is almost a complete disaster. Also note the hi-tech brain buckets these guys are using as helmets. We have come a long way from 1982.
Lots more tandem track footage floating around on the internets.

JumpJam 08 iReport with bonus XC stuff

Met up with Graham at Central Park(GA) to do a few laps of the XC course and check out the Jump Jam. Man, it was so windy. Almost too windy. We started off with a solid loop, skipping the Jump Jam action so we could get the days mileage kicked off. Central Park is not a very technical trail. Parts of it remind me of a monorail because you are going way fast on a strip of trail about 6″ wide thats cut into a hillside…you sort of surf the hillside contour. Once you get back in the woods, there are a few cool drop-off jumps, but other than that its pretty tame. You pop out of the woods, do some switchbacks on a gravel road, then cruise past the freeride area to the one tough climb of the whole loop. Once you pass the tough climb, you are sort of on top of this big hill, with singletrack meandering in a big sort of spiral. It was here that we encountered these things:

Now, you may like the futuristic alien-esque look of this thing, but please note that the entire thing is composed of razor sharp stickers…even the head! These things were out in force on both sides of the trail, blowing in the wind, right into your arms and shins as you went past. Hurt like hell. But we pushed on and finished the loop.

Next time through we stopped to take in the JumpJam action.

SICK air! Reality Bikes was hosting the event, and I am kicking myself or not entering the raffle. Even though the event was fairly well attended, the raffle was a great deal because hey gave away SO many prizes. I think everyone there except me and Graham got something. Not cheapo prizes either, they were giving away helmets, tires, shirts and someone even walked with a brand new Jamis bike!

There was much style going on throughout the freeride area, but without a doubt the this kid stole the show:

He was clearing the same gaps as the big guys on his 16″ Hummer pit bike! Seriously, this little guy was so rad. He would pedal til he was totally geared out and then just rinse solid air. Lip to lip that is about an 8 foot gap he is clearing here. SICKNESS.

Graham and I continued on the XC trail after each break watching the JumpJam. Things got pretty wicked when the wind would let the guys get a decent run.

Since we were riding ourselves, I didn’t do the full iReport style dealie and get the riders names and such. Here is an unknown rider going big with a tire grabber air:

…and of course, it wouldn’t be a JumpJam without someone doing a flip:

Yes, he landed it! The whole crowd gasps if anyone does a flip, and this scene was no different.

We eventually kept plugging on and finished 4 laps of the XC trail. After our 3rd lap, it was really windy, and the JumpJam folks seemed to be packing up to leave. All in all it was a great day of riding, and of course I came away from it wanting a dirt jumping bike so I can go out and break my neck.

stats
Time Moving: 1hr 47min 4sec
Distance: 14.14 miles
Average Speed: 7.9mph
Max Speed: 22.7 mph

Cycle ball on Trans World Sport

A great primer on the sport of Cycle Ball. Vid is 5 mins long and includes description of both how to play and of the unusual bikes