The Albion Issue 4

Š Êclat bmx | all rights reserved | designed and developed in cologne, germany | www.eclatbmx.com | mail@eclatbmx.com | photo by daniel benson

Material tubular heat-treated 4130 crmo arms & crmo axle | Length 170mm or 175mm | Axle 22mm crmo ultrva hollow Colors matt black, chrome | Specials invest cast pedal & spindle boss / new crmo bolt with spline for better grasp | RSD & LSD compatible | Weight complete 883g

CHECK OUT WWW.ECLATBMX.COM FOR ALL 2011 PRODUCTS UK: CYCLING SPORTS GROUP I TEL: 01202 732288 I WWW.CYCLINGSPORTSGROUP.CO.UK I USA: SEATTLE BIKE SUPPLY I TEL: 800 283 2453 I WWW.SEATTLEBIKESUPPLY.COM I GERMAN HEADQUARTERS: ECLAT BMX I TEL: 0221 50005720 I WWW.ECLATBMX.COM

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Geoff Slattery Photo: Ryan Fudger

Contents — Issue Four, October ‘11 32

Know Your Blood Windy Osborn and Andy Jenkins

44

Tom Blyth “I rode to an emo song... It gave the section an epic quality”

58

Jamie Bestwick “I’ll be lucky to get two paragraphs next to the Tit Count in the Sunday Sport”

74

Edwin De La Rosa “I’m there, asleep on the couch, face down, butt naked, with my dog Jerry asleep on my ass” Jambul “Machete to the head – still ain’t dead”

88 98 136

16 22 26 104 116 126 130

A Chronology For Survival “I call him The Last Mohican. Where are the other personalities today? He’s the last one” Brian Castillo “I get a lot of shit for riding the same spots everyday but I’m 35 and I don’t care any more” Comments Bikes Colts: Josh Roberts Strays X Games Quitters: Ross Tanner Video Days: John Dye

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Style

by Charles Bukowski Style is the answer to everything.

A fresh way to approach a dull or dangerous thing.

To do a dull thing with style is preferable to doing a dangerous thing without style.

To do a dangerous thing with style, is what i call art.

Bullfighting can be an art.

Boxing can be an art.

Loving can be an art.

Opening a can of sardines can be an art.

Not many have style.

Not many can keep style.

I have seen dogs with more style than men.

Although not many dogs have style.

Cats have it with abundance.

When Hemingway put his brains to the wall with a shotgun, that was style.

For sometimes people give you style.

Joan of Arc had style.

John the Baptist.

Christ.

Socrates.

Caesar.

Garcia Lorca.

I have met men in jail with style.

I have met more men in jail with style than men out of jail.

Style is a difference, a way of doing, a way of being done.

Six herons standing quietly in a pool of water, or you, walking out of the bathroom without seeing me.

Masthead Editor Daniel Benson benson@thealbion.cc Publisher Tim March tim@thealbion.cc Associate Editor George Marshall george@thealbion.cc Associate Editor Steve Bancroft banners@thealbion.cc Art Director Robert Loeber rob@thealbion.cc

Contributors Rhys Coren, Jeff Stewart, Olly Olsen, Cory Beal, Andy Jenkins, Windy Osborne, James Newrick, Joe Cox, Adam Blyth, Scott Barker, Ross Teperek and Cody Nutter.

Thanks Bob Scerbo and Vanessa, Dub Jack, Pete Sawyer, Amy Silvester, Johnny ‘I smell Wi Fi’ Elia@Ride UK, Kerry Bestwick, Adam Blyth, Dan Cox, Safe Nath, Sandy, Chico, Sean McKinney, Long Beach Dave and Denise, Angel Nastazio.

Distribution The Albion BMX Magazine is avalible at all good bikes shops in the UK. See thealbion.cc for more details.

Contact Inquiries: info@thealbion.cc Advertising: ads@thealbion.cc Mailing List: maillist@thealbion.cc Subscriptions: subs@thealbion.cc Editorial: editorial@thealbion.cc Competitions: comps@thealbion.cc

Logo and icons designed by Ross Teperek. This issue is typeset using the Plantin font family, designed by Frank Hinman Pierpont in 1913. Albion Didot was designed exclusively for this publication by Robert Loeber. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted in any form without premisson from the publisher. The publisher cannot accept responibilty for errors in articles, advertisments or unsolicated manuscripts. The opinions and words of authors do not necessarily represent those of the publisher.

16

Comment is Free?

The birth of the Internet and social media has given people an almost utopian space to discuss, debate and talk.Why, a few decades later, has this space become one so often used to vent one’s spleen? The Albion talked to Adam Grandmaison, founder of thecomeupbmx.net, about the mentality of anonymous commenting.

Words by DANIEL BENSON Illustration by BRADLEY JAY

17

O

n a Halloween night in the late 70’s, Edward Diener and a group of researchers selected 27 houses for an experiment on the behaviour of children in Halloween costumes. When children entered the houses, a confederate offered the children a bowl of sweets, saying that they could take one piece for each person present. The confederate then left, allowing the kids to make their decision. Diener found that the children who had their faces covered were much more likely to take more than one piece of candy than those whose identity wasn’t obscured. Diener was mainly looking at crowd mentality, why groups of people act the way they do, when people lose a sense of self. But with the birth of the internet, his experiment gained a new angle, one which focused on the anonymity that the internet has given, and in turn, how this relatively new platform for free speech can often become one that descends into criticism and irrational comments.

Whilst comment boards and blogs have been part of BMX for a good few years now, it wasn’t until thecomeupbmx. net that opinions and comments became consolidated in a particular area. Adam Grandmaison has created a stage on which anyone can comment. Essentially, it’s a liberal space, yet paradoxically, it’s one where riders can go to offer criticism to other riders. The question is, how do you moderate this, without taking away a person’s right to have a say, just for the sake of those who solely use it as a place to spread negativity? It’s a double edged sword, and one which may fix itself when other social media such as Twitter and Facebook become integrated into commenting.

Yet as the philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer realised 160 years ago when discussing anonymity in print, people will always think twice before writing if their anonymity isn’t disguised.

“Anonymity is the refuge for all literary and journalistic rascality. It is a practice which must be completely stopped. Every article… should be accompanied by the name of its author; and the editor should be made strictly responsible for the accuracy of the signature. The freedom of the press should be thus far restricted; so that when a man publicly proclaims through the far-sounding trumpet of the newspaper, he should be answerable for it, at any rate with his honour, if he has any; and if he has none, let his name neutralise the effect of his words. And since even the most insignificant person is known in his own circle, the result of such a measure would be to put an end to two-thirds of the lies, and to restrain the audacity of many a poisonous tongue.”

The Albion: Why do you think that, when done anonymously, free speech often descends into criticism?

Adam Grandmaison: I think that to someone watching a video, something positive usually doesn’t feel urgent to say.

I read a lot of other blogs outside the realm of BMX. Tech blogs, rap blogs, news blogs, MMA blogs and I’ve probably left less than 20 comments in my whole life on any of those. But I would say most of them have been critical y’know? If I am on ‘Nah Right’ and I download a new song and I love it then I’m probably going to just listen to it or show my friends, maybe link to it on Twitter or something, but say there was something I really took issue with, then

I guess I might comment. I can see it from a reader’s perspective on my site for sure. I don’t mind it. I like reading criticism more than reading praise.

Why is that?

Praise is just so easy. Well-done criticism is hard. If you were reading the newspaper and you saw the movie reviews and there were three movies with good ratings and then one movie with a one star out of five, I’d probably read the bad review. I mean if something is critical you can at least assume there’s some thought behind it.

I always read bad restaurant reviews in the paper. I actually enjoy reading them. I think that says a lot in itself. Often though, with anonymous blog posts, and don’t think this is just your site, this predates thecomeup, bmxboard, transgression, streetphire and anything to do with BMX, the comments seem like personal outbursts of anger.

I mean it’s a new thing for society as a whole in a way... If you were a famous pro rider in 1990, you probably had a ton of people telling you how great you are, you saw pictures of yourself in magazines and ads and you probably almost never heard anything bad about yourself. In 2011 every pro rider can read about a bunch of people talking shit on them. In that way, our society is really quite different now. Personally it really made me develop a more advanced sense of self. Knowing that if I film a clip or if I write a sentence on the site, that I’ll have people commenting on it without any fear or reprisal.

Well, I was going to bring this up later, but since you mentioned it, out of all the people on your site, it might be you who has been up for the most abuse.

Oh yeah for sure, because I’m the only person involved in every single post!

Anonymous blogging has no chance of reprisal like you said; it’s essentially guilt free. It must be hard for you to deal with, as well as countless other riders, who have to read really personal, negative remarks that don’t even offer criticism?

It doesn’t phase me. I’ve definitely dealt with riders who pretty much hold me personally responsible for them having to read the comments though. My perspective on it is obviously that if you want to be a pro bike rider, you need to toughen up a little.

Do you think that, given your outspoken nature, you almost show that it’s ok to have your say? You always use your name though, which I don’t think anyone can argue with, but what about the guy calling some pro a ‘nigger’ on one of his web videos, which I’ve seen in the past?

Well first off I don’t really delete comments ever except for that. Racist stuff, anyone talking about someone’s family or really pushing the line. probably every comment I’ve deleted in the past few years has had the N word in there.

People having opinions, I’m all for, but I don’t want to be involved in facilitating racism or anything like that.

Even giving someone a forum for that kind of thing feels wrong. So that’s one of the few things I’ll delete.

I know you’re not man and I’m not trying to say you are. You made it clear before that the one thing you won’t tolerate is racism. I remember that comment sitting there for a few days. It was a year or two ago and I felt terrible for the rider whose video it was. It might’ve slipped through

18 the net, maybe you took it down eventually, but my point is, not about the site, but the users.

What do you feel about people putting rubbish like that on the site without reprisal?

It’s wack. That stuff is the worst. But at the same time I think it’s obvious where it’s coming from. That’s just the standard last-ditch attempt to offend someone. If they said this guy was a bad person, well at least that’s an opinion. Someone might really think that, but saying that is just an attempt to be shocking really.

I understand about the need for an open platform to speak, but where do you draw the line with censorship?

I’ve probably deleted less than 50 comments this year.

I don’t run into that stuff too often. Like I said earlier, I just delete racist stuff and people talking shit on people’s families… It’s weird owning the platform for people to say stuff like that. In comparison, Facebook won’t delete holocaust denial communities on there for free speech reasons and that’s been really controversial.

Free speech is a very tricky subject, and I think with a site like yours you’re right on the cusp of it. It seems that being anonymous gives users the

“ IF YOU WANT TO BE A PRO BIKE RIDER, YOU NEED TO TOUGHEN UP A LITTLE

”

right to say what they want without repercussion.

Do you feel like it’s the few people who abuse that?

Yeah I mean it’s a real fringe thing. I think most of the comments are pretty respectful and even then the ones that aren’t are usually still just opinions. You know what it’s like... Honestly I think the comments are closer to a bunch of friends sitting around watching a DVD than the conversations you see taking place online in some other places, because you and I both know that if we’re sitting around watching a video, we’re going to criticise and joke around about every little thing just because it’s fun. Can I just say this... I see people say that the Internet ruined BMX, but talking shit has been a big part of BMX since I got into it. It’s always had that mean edge to it. I love that shit. That’s where I’m coming from with the site, I grew up in a little scene where you just ripped everything apart. I’m pretty sure you did too. I like that.

It makes you tougher. Like if I showed up riding when I was 15 and I had a green shirt on, everyone would make fun of me and I’d argue back with them.

I think the Internet has made BMX a lot more interesting. This is more about the anonymous side of the comments. Obviously, when you got

the shit ripped out of you as a kid, somebody did it. It’s like heckling at a comedy show. If someone stands up to give a comedian shit, it takes some guts. Much like you would do with the Internet, I don’t see you as a guy who would hide behind an avatar to give criticism, you’d man up and use your name. This is more about those who don’t, why do you think you’d say some bad stuff, whether that’s racist, sexist and generally so bad you have to take it down, or just casual nastiness without using your real name?

Just to be able to have their say. Most people commenting anonymously, it wouldn’t matter if they used their name because it’s some 16 year old kid in Kansas. If you read bmxboard or bikeguide, you can pretty much figure out who most of the dudes are on there, they have their Facebooks linked in their profiles or whatever and they’re probably just as nasty as the comments on TCU. Yeah I can see that, I’ve seen worse stuff on other sites than on thecomeup over the years. But nobody can argue with your position as a big influence in BMX, so when one guy stands up and says some shit, it has a much greater effect.

Yeah totally. I’m not scared to have an opinion and I’ve gotten about a million threats over the years and I still go wherever I want and do whatever I feel like and nobody has ever come up and said anything to me. It’s more like a long running joke now.

I think that, given your outspoken nature, you almost attract the negative comments given on videos. For as much as you might think people hate you, there’s probably just as many who see you as an influence.

I’m sure that the fact that I’m influential or whatever is the reason for people not liking me. Just that I came into the game without any real credentials and all of a sudden everyone was reading the shit I was writing every day. My only credential was the fact that I ride BMX every day and I have strong opinions, which to me is just a byproduct of being smart and thinking about things in depth, being willing to look below the surface. A lot of people in the industry don’t like that I have strong opinions, but those people are too fucking stupid to have a strong opinion even if they wanted to.

Do you see the comments section on the site as progressive for BMX? The comments, probably not. It’s not something that hasn’t been done before. You’ve always been able to talk about BMX online without using an identity; the comments on TCU are just probably the most mainstream, popular version of that concept.

Given that you don’t see the comments as that progressive, do you not see it as beneficial to mediate them better? Now, before you start on this one... What interests me is how you censor this, as I’m all for free speech and if you cut that out, you take away a place for people to give their opinion. It’s a classic catch -22. For all the people who don’t just say shit anonymously, they lose their right to speak There’s this tech blog Techcrunch that I lovingly check every day and their comment section is all Facebook. So you can’t comment unless you have Facebook. I’ve really thought about switching to that, it could be great. But I

19

20 have a soft spot for the anonymous comments too. I think it’s a part of why people love TCU. It’d be a big risk.

Surely that’s where it’ll end up anyway?

The thing with Techcrunch is that there are a lot of great discussions happening. I read the comments on almost every post that I read because they’re usually pretty interesting. TCU comments are interesting but in a different way, way more chaotic. I’m pretty comfortable with it the way it is.

Do you think that if you did link it up just through Facebook, people would even bother commenting, or just push the ‘like’ button instead?

Yeah that’s the question. I feel like commenting in general is on the way out. I just think it’s becoming less popular; people go on Twitter or Facebook for that stuff.

I could see it happening eventually but I’m not really stressing it.

I can see it going that way, maybe the riders of the future won’t have to put up with any abuse, as it’s all linked back to genuine profiles. It’ll be like the early 90’s again! One thing I thought you might’ve brought up, is whether you see the site as monitoring itself?

What do you mean?

Ok, for example. Nigel had a video on a day or two ago and.... Man, I’m sorry to play the race card again but it’s a perfect example! Some guy, with a made up name said ‘niggas will always be niggas.’ It was the first comment, then straight after it some guy said ‘and racist assholes will always be anonymous.’ Something came up that was essentially abusive, but a user turned it on itself and made the commenter look stupid.

Yeah, that’s true, I mean I honestly think people kind of waste time on that shit sometimes. There’ll be a Garrett Reynolds edit and the first ten comments will be bugging out about how good it is – and I’m using Garrett because his edits are usually amazing - and then one dude will comment and say that he sucks or whatever and then there are ten comments of dudes arguing with that one person, which is just a waste of time. If you say something really ridiculous... you’ll get called out for it.

They’re good examples, but it isn’t always like that. I can see a place for the commenting anonymously; even the harsh stuff is sometimes amusing. But for me it seems regressive, which I think you agreed with earlier. It’s unfortunate for the person in the video when you see people attacked by a lynch mob of bile filled comments. I can’t see how it helps BMX. I can see a pack mentality when it comes to the site, and I can see why people in the industry think you fuel that fire.

The way I think of it, it’s just an open platform for people to talk. If people think the comments are overwhelmingly negative, that says something about BMX itself. To me though, if you’re a grown man in the industry you need to have some perspective of what is going on there y’know? Grow up, read it and take it with a grain of salt.

I think it says a lot about BMX, but it’s a good point. It probably says a lot about much more than just BMX. I think for a site like yours to flourish, it almost requires this anonymous element. You’ve let that run and the site’s gotten huge. Everyone likes gossip, whether that’s in

print or the Internet. I think you lose a lot of selfawareness being anonymous, and people feed off each other to give it a group mentality.

I see the site’s analytics and it’s pretty evident that most users don’t even check the comments. I think that surprises some people. I think that affluent guys like you or me are much more likely to check the comments. We know a lot of people so that stuff is interesting to us, I think to the average reader they watch a video and there’s no reason to look at the comments because they don’t really even know much about a particular rider, besides that they like his riding.

Do you think that it’s a small minority who actually leave comments? Whether that’s anonymously or under their name?

Oh yeah it’s totally less than 1% of the people who check the site that leave comments.

And they’re more often than not the same people you reckon?

“ IF PEOPLE THINK

THE COMMENTS ARE OVERWHELMINGLY NEGATIVE, THAT SAYS SOMETHING ABOUT BMX ITSELF

”

The most comments a post has ever received has been like 400 or 500. More than 20,000 people check the site a day and a really dope edit is going to get like 50,000 views in a couple of weeks. So it’s probably less prevalent than people think, but obviously quite a few people read it. I couldn’t really say that they’re mostly the same people; I don’t have any reason to think that exactly but that might be the case.

Well, we should probably tie this up then man, or I’m going to end up cutting it and having to edit you down, which would be ironic in a way.

Have you got anything else you want to add to this, about this, about anonymous commenting?

I think people have to look at it from a bigger perspective... For the first 20 or 30 years of BMX history, you got your information on BMX from magazines, where the content was pretty much directly controlled by the advertisers and still is. Completely stripped of any sort of controversy for the most part. Now, thanks to the internet we have the exact opposite where every little 14 year old retard can comment whatever he wants and that’s way more appealing to me.

Y B IRLCL U E LL P

k

n Photo by Du

Telephone: +44 (0) 1977 278167

General Enquires: info@zealbmx.com

22

Bikes that outlast their riders The history of James Newricks Standard TRLS250

I’m fascinated with the history of objects. An old writing desk holding an array of papers in its drawers, science fiction stories, entries for periodicals, the history of a man and his thoughts. An old toolbox with the saws, chisels and planes of a craftsman, all used to create greatness in mahogany. An aged military uniform and medals, all the action, conflict and emotion they would have seen.

An old guitar, a tobacco pipe, a gun.

As time passes the objects we carry daily and hold dear, enduring good times and bad and seeing all that we see, become more than the soulless and functional products of their intention. The objects we grow to rely on become chipped and scratched and very often they break. An object’s scars define specific moments and events and they cement a deep relationship with their owners. Something built to last can change owners many times. Reliable, strong and dependable objects carry within their construct stories of adventure, happiness or neglect. We can guess by looking at the dents and scratches but these stories remain untold and held secret by the mute object.

Few objects are loved like a bicycle.

When S+M pro rider and legendary BMX videographer James Newrick bought his Standard TRLS250 in 2004, it was a bleak winter evening and the deal went down under the cover of darkness. Newrick recalls Scotty Bronxton-a heavy set and bespectacled trails rider-driving a hard bargain for the virtually unridden frame in a poorly lit multi-storey car park.

Standard Byke Company have a history of producing near indestructible frames and components. Rick Moliterno always had the mantra that you should be able

to beat the hell out of a bike week after week and have it coming back for more. I can imagine Newrick’s excitement upon purchasing his TRLS250, at the time Standard Bykes had one of the hottest teams around and their frames were the pinnacle of BMX technology.

After six months of riding the TRLS250 Newrick became sick of the iconic Standard headtube gusset. Much to the disapproval of everyone in the Buff House, Newrick decided to remove it using Carmine Fortini’s Dremel. Newrick broke the drill bit and Carmine flew off the handle in typical Italian style. “You don’t fuck with another man’s drill bit.”

Newrick thoroughly kicks his TRLS250’s ass in his classic NSF3 video section. The bicycle goes through countless component changes and four paint jobs: gloss black, silver, bright red and matt black. Newrick put untold dents, gouges and stress on the newly gusset-less frame, but still in line with Moliterno’s wishes, it was ready for more.

When Newrick got on S+M he retired the TRLS250 leaving it to rot in his wardrobe. Soon after the Buff House ended catastrophically. The final scene was haunting and apocalyptic, many of the residents possessions were strewn in the street, builders were furiously pulling the place apart and nobody had a plan about where to lay their heads next. Resisting their predicament momentarily, Newrick and Lewis forgot their recent differences and enjoyed a rare moment of warmth, shaking hands and wishing each other luck in a world turned against them. Half in charity, half in desperation Newrick handed his TRLS250 on to Lewis.

Words by OLLY OLSEN Photography by JAMES NEWRICK

24

The TRLS250, resembling nothing of its former glory, was up and running again in a new and unhinged form.

Lewis rode this bike when he and I travelled Europe for ten weeks in 2007. It made it up the French Alps, it went to Barcelona and Tarragona in Spain, it rattled over the cobbled streets of Prague, Lyon and The Hague and it bunny hopped curbs in super-cities like Berlin, Rotterdam and Amsterdam. Here’s an entry from my 2007 travel journal that concerns the bicycle piloted by Lewis in Amsterdam: We finally sweated it out all the way to the city and then on to the train station to meet Lewis. Lewis was haggard looking, not slept, soaking and possibly stoned. Not too far from how he always looked. He broke a broad smile upon seeing us. Good lad. After following Lewis’ example and smiling through the less than perfect weather situation a much needed falafel sandwich paved the way to an expensive and water logged camp site. More rain looked imminent. At a not worth riding suburb located skatepark. Mexican John took it hard to the elbow jumping a four foot Skatelite spine, a great start to the riding.We rode about in the rain, I winged a lot and didn’t see anything noteworthy. I was soaked with a nasty case of shit stripe from my tyres in a city that held little interest for me. I felt for Lewis in the rain. I’ve heard his ride described as Homer Simpson’s spice rack in bicycle form.

This isn’t far from the truth, it’s a rusty and malfunctioning collection of hand-me-down parts clashed together much akin to Frankenstein’s monster only without the loving touch of life giving electricity. It is in a word - rubbish. The plane ride from England had not been kind, turbulence had rattled a pedal loose and the locknut was forever lost in the hold. At one busy city intersection Lewis’ pedal fell off sending him first into oncoming traffic and then back into a grass verge.

Then it fell off again and again and then again causing him to almost fall into a canal. Then it fell off again. The crew was eager to smoke some skunk. A couple of coffee shops later and the kids were crabbed out, Squidward represent. I stuck to coffee, my first was black and good and hit home warming the very core of me, the second was milky, rushed and sickening. I doubt many people order coffee in these places. The sun was finally out and around six we found a skatepark with a big bowl and no locals. No one dared to jump a big hip with ‘bad memories’ emblazoned on it. Through crab-ovision the crew managed to carve some decent lines and bust a few grinds. Lewis’ pedal was still a nightmare and after much personal distress I removed the rusty pedal axle from his cranks using a bent 15mm and a crafty triangulation technique learned from years of working with bikes. Lewis then covertly stole a plastic pedal off the most sorry looking Amsterdam lady cruiser locked up outside the park. Ninja.

By the end of our 2007 trip Lewis had covered the TRLS250 in hardcore dance stickers, adding to its rusting appearance and general neglect. He rode the bicycle until 2010 when the components reached a terminal stage. In the summer of 2010, Lewis’ girlfriend contacted me with the thoughts of getting him a run around BMX for his birthday. I got him a cheap Mongoose and asked his girl if she could bring in what was left of his old bike to see if I could salvage the Profile cranks. I managed to remove a cross threaded pedal and re-tap the left hand crank arm, I found some axle bolts, acquired some bearings and got the vintage cranks installed on his new ride.

This left the TRLS250 frame in my possession. It hung lonely in the loft with a broken Jim C pedal zip tied to it until November when clearing for Christmas began and I had to take it home. I tried to give it away but no one would have it. I was narked, it was a classic frame with a strong heritage, but all anyone saw was an American BB, regular headset, rust, bad stickers and mangled dropouts.

In February of 2011 I had to move away from Newcastle for a few months. I laid the Frame on EL-Boosterino, my apprentice at the Hopkirk’s Cycles and told him to build it up as a project bike, which he surprisingly had quite an enthusiasm for. Booster built the TRLS250 with a motley bunch of scrounged and begged parts creating the perfect bike for leaving outside a shop and diving in for a 20 deck of snout or riding to a beer garden on a lazy Sunday afternoon.

With plans of meeting up for a photo for this piece Booster removed the bike from his garage and stood it in the front garden. In the time it took to grab a sandwich and a cup of tea and from quite literally right under his nose, the bike was stolen. But Walker will do that to you, you think you’re getting to know the place, you start to recognise a few locals, you mow a neighbor’s lawn, you chit chat with the guy in the paper shop, maybe you even make a few older friends down the boozer, but eventually POW! Your bike is gone.

Booster is adamant he’ll get the bike back. Conversely I think we’ve seen the TRLS250’s final chapter played out. The thieving scum may derive some joy from the bike’s characterful ride or begin to appreciate its rich history, they might even work out one of its stories from looking at the damage. I think it’s more likely that they’ll swap the bike for a tenner’s worth of Squidgy Black and smoke the sweet night away.

26

Colts: Josh Roberts Scott Ditchburn’s young Welsh apprentice.

On the murky banks of the River Dee, in the shadow of a power station in North Wales lies the small town Flint.

Other than a small Woodward branded skatepark, the town has very few spots and is an unlikely breeding ground for progressive riders – camp Woodward it is not. The fact that one influential rider has come from Flint is incredible, two is a miracle. Here Josh Roberts talks about the joys of growing up with Scott Ditchburn as a role model.

Ditchburn: What’s your name Joshua?

Josh: Joshua Roberts.

Dithcburn: How old are you Joshua?

Josh: Eighteen.

Ditchburn: Where do you live Joshua?

Josh: Flint, in North Wales.

Ditchburn: Ah Flint…nice place, the armpit of the world.

Albion: Tell us about Flint Josh.

Josh: Flint isn’t very big, as Scott said it’s a shithole.

It’s just below Chester and there’s fuck all there, there’s nothing to do but smoke weed, rob shit, drink and fight.

There’s a lot of fights on in the evenings over nothing.

Albion: How did you get into riding then?

Josh: Ditchburn was the first person I saw ride. I walked past the skatepark when it was first built and saw Ditchburn there riding on his own. He was just doing whips and spins, I was thirteen and was just shocked to see people do that on a bike. I’d never seen it anything like that before.

Albion: How long after that did you get your first bike?

Josh: I already had a shitty Mongoose Sniper. I started

to take that down the skatepark. At first I had my pegs on the right. Scott saw that and told me I had to have them on the left, because I rode left foot forward. He pretty much taught me everything, which side to grind, everything from how to drop in to how to 540 a volcano.

Scott made me learn tricks by doing it three times in a row. He used to say things like ‘do it this time or I’ll beat you up.’ He used to beat me up but he’d also help me too. I remember when I was dead young at the skatepark and this older lad came over kicking off and Scott told him to do one and he shit himself. Scott stopped bad shit like that happening to me.

Albion: Scott, what made Josh stand out and worth teaching?

Scott: Josh just stood out as talented. I knew if he stuck at it he’d be good. The other thing is, Josh was the only lad his age who was actually sound and you could hang out with and happily take on a trip. I taught him everything he knows – I groomed him.

Josh: That’s right. I was groomed by Scott Ditchburn.

Albion: Josh, did Scott tell you to take your brakes off?

Words and Photography by GEORGE MARSHALL

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28

“ I WAS

GROOMED

BY SCOTT DITCHBURN

” Josh: No, they were already off. My wheels were always buckled. I’ve never ridden with a brake.

Albion: You ride quite similar to Scott, do you agree?

Josh: Growing up I didn’t get to see many other riders other than Ditchburn. It was only when I broke my leg I started watching old videos and saw some other styles.

I just watched all old Edwin footage and Animal videos and saw all these tricks that were new to me. But back then I didn’t ride any street, I just rode the park in Flint doing the tricks I saw in those old Animal videos. I grew up riding a skatepark with four pegs, no brake and Bob Scerbo bars.

Albion: Did you just learn everything in one skatepark

in Flint?

Josh: Yeah basically. That’s where I learnt to do whips and bars, and grinding on the ledges and that. I learnt everything in that one shit park. I spent hours there. I was kicked out of school at 13 so I just went to the skatepark all day learning stuff.

Albion: What did you get kicked out of school for?

Josh: I got kicked out for being suspended too many times in one term. Once I got suspended for two weeks for turning the lathe on and chucking bits of wood into it and watch them spin back out.

Dub Jack: It’s worth saying for the record that Josh is a lot more educated and a lot better behaved than most of 9/12/11 11:56 AM

BEN HUCKE SEVENTIES.CO.UK THESHADOWCONSPIRACY.COM

FACEBOOK – HTTP://ON.FB.ME/SHADOWBMX

30

Opposite tooth hanger, Leeds. his other friends.

Albion: What did you do after you were kicked out of school?

Josh: I got moved to another school where I only had to go for half days, so I’d be out riding for the rest of time.

I went to college briefly, quit and I’ve just ridden all the time since then.

Dan Lacey: I’ve heard a lot of stories, but what was a regular day for you before you found BMX? Josh: Me and my mate Pete just used go out and menace. We used remove car number plates and swap them round with other cars, or just like pouring tubs of tar over cars. To think about the stuff I did when I was younger is strange, I think ‘why did I do that stuff?’ Just bored I guess, I need to move on from Flint. I want to get

out of Flint for good, if I stay here I’ll end up doing stupid stuff. I don’t hang around with the best of people. I have to go riding alone a lot, because I don’t have people in Flint to ride with. You can’t go out and ride street on your own, you can’t session a handrail with no one to look out for you. Hopefully I get to move to Liverpool this year but we’ll see what happens.

Ditcburn: Here’s a question. How did you manage to get better than me when I taught you everything you know you little bastard?

Josh: [Looks uncomfortable – no comment].

Albion: Any thankyous?

Josh: Nah. Ditchburn: Oi where’s my thanks?... Shut up Josh. End it on that.

Alex VAlentino

photo: Vincent perraud

Know Your Blood — Windy Osborn and Andy Jenkins

III.

32 I.

II.

Words by JEFF STEWART

H

eritage is something that comes or belongs to one by reason of birth; valued objects and qualities such as cultural traditions.

Bob Haro made a comment to me about how surfing is a much richer sport than most because surfers seek their heritage, they know the beginnings, the sources of their art from, the origins. They see it as essential, and it brings them closer and bloods them into the form, it makes them part of it. When one knows the lineage of a form, the past goes from being ancillary to a family tree of knowledge. It isn’t terribly important to a lot of riders today to know anything about the past, about the roots of BMX, but to respect the art is to know the art, and we’re in a good and rare position now to have the origins of BMX Freestyle alive and talking.

Bob Osborn began BMX media for the masses. An accomplished photographer and creator of Bicycle Motocross Action in September of 1976, (which was later renamed BMX Action) he also had the eye for talent, as well as a home for it, often housing those on staff and launching such careers as Bob Haro, Spike Jonze, Andy Jenkins, Mark Lewman, just to name four off the top, as well as spawning the staffs for Freestylin’, Homeboy and Go magazines. Without Osborn, it is safe to say that there would be virtually no road paved for BMX media, and its development would be decades behind where it now stands.

Osborn had two children, Windy and Robert Lewis, known as RL to the Freestyle world. Windy, three years older than her brother, was a born photographer, shooting the first cover of the magazine at the age of 16, beginning her legacy as one of the best photographers BMX will ever see. While her brother innovated flatland, Windy shot the photos and took the sport of BMX to a level of professional respectability, far ahead of her time, and continued breaking ground with her photography after the magazines ceased to publish in the early 90’s, and remains an accomplished photographer, as does her father. BMX Action and Freestylin’ were tapered off into Go magazine before the recession of the 90’s and mismanagement made its inevitable usurpation. “The magazine had cancer” are the exact words from Windy as she bitterly recalls the death of what she cared about so passionately.

The wrong people in charge of the right thing has destroyed many good things, and nothing is fully protected from that formula. Still, the impact of Bob Osborn’s vision is present and irreversible, and is projected strongly in today’s BMX media, and the works and life of his daughter. Now, 51, she is the mother of two and lives in Carmel Valley, California, working as an account executive for the Monterey County weekly, a local alternative paper.

Andy Jenkins, who was the editor of Freestylin’ before launching the fast-lived yet highly regarded Homeboy Magazine, lives in San Pedro with his wife and kid, and works at Girl Skateboards. His contribution to BMX and his eye for content, as well as his writing and artwork, have made lasting impressions for the standard of BMX media, to this day. I have been assigned to feature these two as a feature of icons, if you will, honoring those who went before us and cleared a path for those who were to be next, those getting ready for their journeys.

I am sitting in Ron Wilkerson’s café, Samba Rock, in Santa Cruz. It’s another perfect day in California. Wilkerson’s wife, Vanessa, runs the café while her husband is out with Bancroft, shooting the pool shots for the first part of Hell on Wheels that ran in issue three. I’m sitting across from Windy, who is still as astonishing as she ever was. There wasn’t one American BMXer alive who didn’t have a crush on her.

I’ve never met her in the flesh, and I’m still making the adjustment from magazine image to person. She is nothing short of stunning sitting across the table. I reach across and hit record: I. Ugly Beauty #18, 2003 II. RL Osborn, N/A III. New Depression Refuse #10, 2011

33

Windy Osborn “My parents were divorced when I was eight. It took five years, but my father finally won custody of me and my brother. I wanted to live with my dad because I knew he would make something out of me. My mother, she was wonderful, but I knew with my dad I would turn into something. I was shy, I was ugly, and I had no direction in life whatsoever, and I knew that my dad would kick me in the ass and make something of me.”

“So you were 13 when all of it started, so to speak?”

“My brother and my father were racing motorcycles, and my dad knew how to work on engines and he knew how to weld. He had all these hobbies. He was a fireman at the time and also dabbling in photography. That’s when the kids were starting to build dirt ramps in the corner lot and ride their bikes and jump, and act like the motorcycle riders. We would go to the dunes on the weekend, but then we’d come back and we’d have to wait weeks to go back.”

“Which year was this?”

“1973. RL was nine or ten. Our house was like the place to hang out because we always had the ramp out front, and my dad started modifying my brother’s Schwinn, welding motocross bars, putting motocross tires on it, so that’s how it evolved.”

She stares at the recorder and smiles. She taps the table and looks at me “So I was the third wheel, or the third thumb of the family. There was a track in Redondo, and my dad would drag us out there so RL could race. My dad was the race starter, and he stuck a camera in my hands and said, ‘Here, play with this. This is what you do. See what you get.’”

“Was it organic, like an immediate feel for it?”

“No. It was a Minolta, and he told me what to do and I took a few pictures and it was fun because I was really shy and I didn’t want to talk to the boys, but when you have a camera in your hand all of a sudden people pay attention and they want to get their picture taken. So I took some pictures and my dad developed them and he told me that I had a good eye, and I thought he was pulling my leg. So that gave me something to do. He wanted us to be involved as a family, in a constructive fashion. I didn’t know what I was doing back then, it was fun, my dad taught me how to develop my own film. We had a dark room in our house. Between the ages of 14 and 21, I was all over the map. I wanted to shoot pictures, didn’t want to shoot pictures, I traveled to cover races and shoot, and I wigged out a few times, too. You know, being a teenager is tough. But I remember it was somewhere around 21 or 22 everything clicked, and I really wanted to get serious about it. Coincidentally, my dad was getting into fine art photography and when he was done with BMX. Then it was me and Steve Giberson, then Spike [Jonze] came on, and that’s where it took off.”

“And look where it’s gone.”

IV. Joe Johnson, 1988 V. Toby Henderson , N/A VI. RL Osborn, 1985 VII. Ron Wilkerson, N/A

34

She laughs and nods.

“The XGames. That came from us. Motorcycles weren’t doing what they’re doing now until BMX Freestyle came along, you know? It’s because of what we did, taking those first pictures and making that magazine and going international; that is the reason why it grew, it got bigger. It’s so interesting, the power of ink.

That’s why ink will not go away. And media and internet and all of that, yeah, it’s important, especially today. It makes things grow and travel at the speed of light. It’s out of control. I mean really. There has to be a cap to it.”

“I read on-line last year that by 2018 there will be no more printed books.”

“Well, there’s a tree factor in there, too. But still. Okay, so where are you going to find the joy to where you grab a book and you go curl up in a corner somewhere?”

“Good question.”

In high school, Osborn signed up for a photography class. Upon seeing her work, she was asked to teach. I ask her if it brought her out of the shadows.

“It did, because you have to get the shots that you want from people. It was interesting. In hindsight, why I am so good at sales now, is back in the day when I would do private shoots for the magazine, most of the time they were younger than me, and they were boys, and they were shy, and I had to make them feel comfortable instantly, and to get them to trust me, and to get them to do what I wanted them to do so I could get what I wanted to get. So there were a lot of people skills developed. “ The café is slow that afternoon. She looks around and stretches, sips her drink and stares at the table.

“But then, getting a photo session with BMX Action, or Freestylin’ was an honor. I mean, we took a lot of kids that were unknown, we took these people and made stars out of them. But at the same time, I had so much responsibility on me, I had to pull off these wonderful shots to make the magazine interesting. But it was an amazing time.”

I’m thinking back to all the photo shoots I’ve seen in the old magazines. Old ads pop up, and big spreads featuring riders. It’s something amazing, really, at the amount of work she’s done, the output of high-art given to BMX from her mind and lens.

“My focus was on art, to make pictures that would blow people’s minds. I mean, look… To fly into London on a Friday, cover a competition on Saturday and Sunday, and fly out on Monday, and drive there, and get on that ramp. I know that all the other photographers probably didn’t know who I was. And I was all over it, and I got some fucking good stuff. That excites me, because they were like, ‘Who is that chick and what the hell is she doing on top of this ramp?’ And nothing thrilled me more than being in those situations over all those years and the more that I was chased out the better the pictures I wanted to get, because sooner or later they were going to see it in the magazine and go, ‘Oh shit, I tried to chase her out.’”

IV.

V.

VI. VII.

35

VIII.

36

IX.

X.

XI.

VIII. Master Cluster (Andy Jenkins, Spike Jonze and Mark Lewman), 1993 IX. Club Homeboy,Winter 1987 X. New Depression Refuse #7, 2010 XI. (Riders Unknown)

37

XII.

XIV.

38

XIII.

Niko’s. San Pedro. I’ve followed Andy Jenkins from the Girl Skateboard headquarters, which sits just down the 110 freeway. Not a bad gig for him, no long freeways to deal with. Home is with his wife, Kelly and their 15 year old son, Emmet. I order a Jack/Coke, but I find out they only serve beer. We order Guinness. Windy had mentioned it a few times over coffee, about the big photos; being ahead of its time. As the formative editor of Freestylin’ Magazine, Jenkins had a serious hand in the evolution of BMX. A skateboarder at heart, he took the artistic freedoms of skating and applied it to the editorial and feel of Freestylin’ - which in my opinion counts greatly for its success and legend. During my time with Windy, she talked highly of Jenkins, as does everyone else who has known him or his work. He’s another person Bob Osborn discovered, as I’ve mentioned earlier, but what I saved for now is his place in the history of BMX, the high honor owed to him for being an innovator of ink and image, for taking it past the norm. Because of his work, magazines today know how to make a good magazine great, and everyone who has read Freestylin’ can back that up with zero hesitation. I look out to the street and think of the town. I’ve always liked San Pedro. It’s good to be here. I take a long drink and look at Jenkins.

XII. New Depression Refuse #4, 2010 XIII. New Depression Refuse #9, 2010 XIV. Josh White, 1987 XV. Craig Johnson, 1987

XV.

39

ANDY JENKINS “I started doing zines back in ‘85. I was in a band, like a punk noise band called Factory. The three of us were art students and we spent time doing a zine. I found a zine called Swank zine. Have you ever heard of Swank?”

“Of course. Wait, isn’t that a porn mag?”

“No. Well, it is, but there was a skate zine called Swank, after Todd Swank, who was a photographer/pro skater back in the day. I found one of his zines in a record store in Del Mar and started trading with him, and he had addresses for tons of other people in there and I started trading with them, and it turned into this crazy thing where I did like 20 editions of Bend zines. But they’re in all different forms, from everything like a Xerox piece of shit, 8.5 x 11 folded in half, to like handmade books. We did one for Club Homeboy called Loft, me and Lew [Mark Lewman] and Spike [Jonze] did that for Homeboy.”

“Good magazines are powerful. Tim March just sent me a skate article written by a guy named Izan from Skateboarder magazine, 1975. He said it inspired him to want to do a magazine. Even back then, as a really young kid.”

“That’s when I discovered BMX Action in the mid to late 70s, before I started racing. We’d built these shitty BMX bikes out of old Schwinn Stingrays and crappy five-speed department store bikes, taking off all the gears, took the slicks off and put knobbies on them, box bars and ten-speed seats and you had a BMX bike.”

“Windy had a lot of good stuff to say about you, about when Freestylin’ came out. Break that down.”

“Well, Freestyle BMX was getting so popular. It started out with BMX Action doing Freestyle articles every so often, and then in ‘84, they decided to split and do another magazine, that’s when they started Freestylin’ and they had an editor for that, but he was an older dude, he didn’t ride or anything like that and they wanted a kid in there, somebody who kind of knew what was going on, and I lucked out and got the job, from a thank you letter I wrote. And I got a call from Oz [Bob Osborn] when I was in art school in Denver and he asked me if I wanted to come out here and interview for this job and I was like fuck, it’s my dream come true, you know? So I went.”

He looks into his beer and at the recorder, “It’s funny, because Haro had moved in with Oz in the late 70’s and when I came out in ‘84 I ended up living with him. He was like my surrogate father. Steve Giberson was living there at the same time. He was the editor for BMX Action at the time. None of us had gone to school for writing, but we had Don Toshach there, and he had gone to college and actually knew how to write and he showed us why this worked and that didn’t, so it was fun, almost like a big joke, but yet it wasn’t. Oz was a really intuitive man, and he saw things in me that I didn’t know existed at the time.”

“Everybody that he discovered went on to become widely successful at the very thing for which he’d discovered them. It’s fucking interesting.”

He laughs, “Right. He was relatively young then, too, late 30’s to early 40’s. To me he was the old man. I’m older now than he was then. I took a cue from that when I was working for him, when we needed another writer. That’s when we hired Lew. Oz entrusted me to do the hiring, and I got Lew out there, then Spike came soon after.

And then the three of us stayed together for quite a while during different magazines.”

“How was it watching Spike blow up the way he did? I mean, he’s responsible for two of the best movies I’ve seen, or at least two of the most original.”

“He’s a person who really gets along with people, like he’s a real people guy. He knows how to deal with people, knows how to charm people. He was a charming kid. Smart. I saw it coming way down the road.”

I bring up Homeboy magazine, Club Homeboy, the cult of it.

“Homeboy magazine lasted seven or eight issues, big photos, fun to do ahead of its time, but when everything started going and when Homeboy folded, I went with it. At the time Lew was the editor of Freestylin’, Spike was shooting for Freestylin’ and my sister was the 40

XVI.

XVIII.

XVI. Lightening Bolts, 2008 (Nike commision for Bejing Olymics) XVII. Eddie Roman, Club Homboy pull out poster, Winter 1987 XVIII. Birth, 1976

XVII.

41

art director. So there wasn’t any room left for me, so I went.”

“I remember the big photos, the caliber or it. Windy had said it was ahead of its time. Where did you go afterward?”

“I started freelance work, design and illustrations. I did ads for a few different bike companies, like CW and Redline. That dried up quick because the whole industry was kind of floundering. So when that happened, I moved over exclusively to skateboarding, to an already blooming industry.”

“Right into skating?”

“I’d been skating since I was little. In the 70’s we lived in Florida for a time, and everyone had skateboards.”

Where in Florida?

“Tallahassee. My dad was in the Air Force and we were on the base near there. Panama City, Tallahassee area.”

“That place is a hellhole.”

“Yeah, I know. Short period of time for us. Basically everyone had a Makaha board or some plastic piece of junk toy, but that’s how I started skating, on one of those. It wasn’t until I moved to California that I was re-introduced to it. That time frame was big. Like in junior high I made a skateboard in wood shop, so I was still kind of into it, so all through the 70’s. And ‘79 was when I started racing BMX, and at that point it became all BMX from then on, until I moved to California when I was 19, and from there I started skating.”

“You never rode flatland or street or ramp.”

“No. I was a total racer. I loved racing. In fact years later, I raced again but I raced motocross, not bicycles anymore, because I’d grown up racing motorcycles. My dad was a big motorcyclist, dirt bikes and stuff. My goal was to race motocross but I couldn’t afford it, so I wound up racing BMX instead.”

I drain my glass just in time for the waitress to appear with another.

I drink the first layer and watch Jenkins look around the place. He has a lot in common with Haro, soft-spoken, gentle-mannered.

He’s silent for a few moments then remembers something. He folds his hands on the table, “It was interesting being at Oz’s place. There were always these head honchos from manufacturing showing up, like, ‘Here’s some forks with foot-pegs on them, fold out foot-pegs, and a seat with a roller on it’ and all of this crazy shit, you know? They wanted to make sure they got decent editorial. But it actually turned into a weird thing because I wouldn’t write anything good about stuff that I thought was shit, so I told the truth and I got in big trouble for that, actually.”

We laugh. “What happened?”

“Like CW came out with their first bike, and it was a piece of shit. I don’t remember which one it was, I just remember it had platforms and shit all over it and it just looked dangerous. It was the very first one, before they had a team.”

“Wait! I remember that one. It made no sense.”

“Right. It was just total bullshit. I wrote that. Oz was cool, he was like, ‘That’s how you should do it, but keep in mind that these are the people that are paying your check, because they’re buying all the advertising for the magazine, so it was a touchy situation, but he let me know that whatever I wanted to say was okay, as long as you realized that there was a fine line there. But I never cared about that fine line, I was thinking if they’re going to hand me a piece of shit, I’m going to write that it’s a piece of shit. I mean, eventually they came out with better stuff, but I hope that the honesty helped advance it.”

We talk about his writing. I have the writing-as-one-of-the-onlythings-that-keep-me-sane disease as he does. We talk about the obsession with it, and with the other forms that keep it all from coming unglued. The beer keeps arriving. He leans back and looks out the window and stares at me, “I just try to delegate my days, man. Just keep surviving.”

XIX.

XIX. Rudy Johnson board graphic, Girl Skateboards XX. Josh White, 1987

42

XX.

Blyth

45

Wolf Among The

Flock TOM BLYTH INTERVIEW

Tom’s family home is idyllic. A characterful old farmhouse with numerous workshops and stables sat in the sleepy Yorkshire village of North Cave. Tom’s parents keep horses and motorbikes, a stream trickles along the bottom of his garden which contains a vegetable patch, sun house and barbecue area. Tom and his brother have their own sitting room that sticks out from the rest of the house.

Guitars and extreme metal merchandise cover the walls, a book of photography

by Peter Beste documenting the corpse paint slathered warriors of the Norwegian black metal scene sits in the corner. A scene widely know for controversy, church burning and murder. A scene which produced as many great thinkers as it did flaming-torch-wielding-maniacs. A scene which fascinates Tom, a Viking of a rider with long flowing hair and T-shirts covered in satanic imagery.

I find myself sat in the kitchen at a thick farmhouse table with Tom’s Dad, he’s recounting old trucking tales and road bike fables as chickens cluck in the middle distance and dogs sniff around outside the door. Tom’s Dad clasps a hand injured in a motorbike injury and as he turns the conversational subject matter to his son I can tell he’s filled with admiration and respect. Tom’s a great dude with a great mind who will earn your respect.

Words by OLLY OLSEN Photography by ADAM BLYTH, JOE COX and STEVE BANCROFT

46

I

n the Heavy Metal lounge that adjoins the kitchen Tom is loudly playing the album Witchcraft Destroys Minds And Reaps Souls by Coven: a 60s occult psyche band. As Tom’s Mother busies herself full of middle England niceties she struggles to be heard over the demonic and satanic chanting from a lengthy black mass. Tom’s parents appear unfazed and presumably they’re used to scenes like this. They’re comfortable with Tom’s choices, they respect him for who he is and they sway from giving him a hard time. I sense this liberalism with their son has had a lot to do with the man he has become: free of mind, prepared to make difficult choices and form strong opinions.

The scene in the kitchen could have easily been construed as Tom having never grown up, a man clinging on to teenage rebellion, a waster, a fucking Goth or whatever you’d want to label him. This couldn’t be further from the truth. Tom is a thinker, meticulous about his riding, meticulous about his music, and meticulous about his belief. He lives a simple life, has few possessions and is totally comfortable with the skin he’s in.

Tom left Hull at the age of twenty to study Zoology at university, to get out of the six day week car salesman racket and to allow himself more time to ride. When he appeared in Sheffield in 2003 the scene was still largely unknown. Highly influenced by Mike Aitken, Tom applied his all round style to Devonshire Green skatepark and was noticed almost instantly by the Cox brothers, namely Joe and Dan. In a scene revolving around street riding, banter and cheap digs the nickname ‘Tom Aitken’ stuck fast as a response to his red Fit and Aitken influenced style. Eventually Tom was asked if he would like to film a part for Joe’s upcoming video project after being told in no uncertain terms that there would be a strict ban on skatepark footage. Tom had landed in Sheffield at the perfect time, the video project would become Voices, arguably the greatest BMX film to come out of England.

Albion: Voices was a massive video, a turning point, a tidal wave out of nowhere, what are your thoughts?

Tom: I think the climate made Voices a successful video. People weren’t putting out many scene videos, the whole web vid thing hadn’t really taken off, people still anticipated and were excited about seeing new videos.

I don’t know if you could do that now. If Joe had just put his Voices section straight online it would never have been the classic part it is now.”

It wouldn’t have reached cult status either. With the strength of many coming together, Voices became more than the sum of its parts. What was your relationship like with Joe while filming?

Joe’s really easy to work with, he’s not the most reliable guy or the most driven guy and he can be pretty lazy at times but once you get him going he’s rad. There are all these clichés about genius being close to madness, Joe is exceptionally good at what he does but along with that comes a certain eccentricity. We all knew that he would do a really good job on that video.

Your section is a beautiful piece of film and considered along with Joe’s as the best on the video, did you have much input in the editing or the choice of tune?

Joe was totally in charge of editing the section. The song Consequence by The Notwist was something that both of us wanted to use. I didn’t want to use anything super metal, it would get lost in translation and put a lot of people off. People seem to either love or hate that Notwist song. I used to get shit because I rode to an emo song, that wound me up, it’s obviously not an emo song.

It has this dreamy sound about it, it gave the section an epic quality.

One of the most controversial points of your video part is the foot-down-ender when you three’d the Tunnel Banks gap in Liverpool, what do you think of it now in retrospect?

I still like it. Me and Joe talked about it just after it happened, we both felt like it had a bit of character about it, neither of us looked at it as being detrimental to the part. I’d already done it once and blown off the back, the second time I did it I slipped a pedal. I don’t feel like slipping a pedal is a big deal. I was hurt, I blew my ankles up and I wasn’t in the position to do it again.

There’s a good feeling when the section ends, it puts a bit of emphasis on the three as the last trick. I didn’t pull it totally clean so obviously it was a difficult trick to do You were one of the first to push the big three.

I’d like to think that I did spur that little movement into life, I’m sure it would have happened anyway. For a few years after nearly every part you saw ended with a bigger three and I thought it got a bit unimaginative, the big three became the stock ender I mentioned this to Newrick once and he almost bit my head off, maybe at the time he was in that mentality as well.

Newrick was doing them around the same time. Marty Meeneghan went and did that Tunnel Banks three again at Battle Royale and he didn’t plant a foot. The caption in Ride was a little dig at me, it said “no foot down”. Until that point I hadn’t been in the position to be criticised but after Voices we had been placed on this pedestal. Sheffield was the street epicentre for a while and that came with a certain amount of baggage. Now that people had put us on this pedestal there were certain members of the crowd that wanted to knock us off. Growing up in England everybody was critical of the Hastings scene simply because if you wanted to get hooked up in England you had to live in Hastings. It was a role reversal overnight, all of a sudden we were the establishment and if you wanted to get hooked up you had to live in Sheffield.

Do you think the big three causes a lot of beef because you were involved in the controversy with Tom White and the New York scene.

I hadn’t considered that Tom White would probably feel the same way as I did when someone took a pop at me in a caption. MACBA was an iconic set and Newrick thought it would be sick to get footage of us training it.

No one gave any thought to the fact that someone had tried it and failed. It certainly wasn’t designed to rub anyone’s nose in it. I decided it would be funny to say something really obnoxious, out of character and jock like. When we landed at the bottom of the stairs I just said “In your face Tom White” and everybody laughed.

The joke was on me, it wasn’t intended to cause a fight it was just a spur of the moment thing. The next thing I know I open a copy of Ride Magazine and Banners [Steve Bancroft], in his infinite wisdom, has taken it out of context. Suddenly there’s all this internet controversy going on. Joe was team mates with Vinny Sammon and it appeared he was the most irate about it. Joe was on MSN trying to mend these bridges that me and Jim had burned. New York took it really seriously, they took it as

Cox

Over Pegs, Sheffield.

47

Blyth

Wallride to one footed flattie, Hull.

48

‘these kids are really trying to knock us down’.”

You wanted to follow your Voices section up with something pretty special. Was it devastating to blow your knee out on a trick you’d already pulled almost to perfection?

Filming for Tomorrow We Work had been really slack up to that point and Joe wasn’t motivated. I thought ‘great we’re in Barcelona we can get a good body of footage together.’ I was still playing around with 360 lookback bunny hops when we came on that famous little double set in Barca. It was an intermediate set and I thought it’ll help me step it up towards doing a big one for my part. First try it went how I thought it should but I didn’t quite click the lookback in as much as I wanted. I hate turndowns on street as a rule, people don’t usually get time to put them in right. I tried the trick again but when I went to do the lookback I stiffed, it stunted my rotation and I realised I wasn’t going to make it round. My foot hit the pavement before my tyres and that was it for the next year of my life, torn ACL. After that Joe hit his stride and made another awesome video that I had little or nothing to do with. I feel there was a sense of expectation on me and people might have thought that I would have bettered my Voices part. I ended up having a split part with Sanders and I didn’t get to do any of the stuff I really wanted to. I couldn’t even tell you what song we rode to in that video, I totally lost interest in the project. I feel like I’ve never followed up that Voices section, I still feel like I have something to prove. I don’t want to be a one hit wonder, I wanted to put something out that was going to better it. Unfortunately the terminology is a bit grand but I would like to have left a bit of a legacy for myself. I haven’t been able to do that and that’s possibly why I’m still trying to get footage together while Joe and Dan have taken more of a back seat and are happy to just ride for fun and not worry about coverage. I’m working on a new FBM part, hopefully it will do me justice.

Five years on FBM, talk about your signature frame?

We’ve been working on the Bell Witch for two years and we’ve got one at Interbike right now. After the first prototype I wanted to make a few changes, I’m a real perfectionist and it’s got my name on it so I want it to be exactly right. The graphics are done by French, an illustrator who did the artwork for our band. He came up with something different. A lot of companies are happy to put stock fonts on their bikes or have one in house design guy do all the graphics. It has left things a little flat. We know what makes a good BMX frame, there’s nothing too wacky out there in terms of design, no one’s bringing out Jad frames or anything crazy. That’s why we wanted to do something different with the art work, to make it stand out.

What do you think FBM would have said if you’d asked for a monocoque or some Jad frame shit?

I don’t think they would have been too stoked on that, I almost wish I’d have thought of it, just to tip Crandall over the edge.

What’s your relationship with Crandall like?

Were good friends but that can complicate the business relationship. Crandall is a cool guy to be around but like anyone he has his ups and downs. There are times when our best ideas will clash, we’ll have a difference in opinion or sometimes he’ll have what I feel is a really bad idea and get really attached to it. If I feel it’s important that he lets go of it maybe we’ll come to blows over it.

Sometimes I’ll take a step back and think, it’s his bike company, let him do what he wants. He’s open to suggestion and critique, you just have to be delicate with him. FBM is something that we all care about, riding for 49

Cox

Barspin gap, Sheffield.

50

FBM is different, you’re really involved in a way I don’t think you are with other companies.

For our generation FBM certainly encapsulated the truth and spirit of what BMX is all about rebellion, campfires and going wild. Does it feel how you expected it to feel to ride for them?

There’s a side to FBM that has never changed. You go away, camp out, sleep rough, drink beers, barbecue and ride bikes and that’s exactly how I thought it would be as a kid. The core elements of the company are still the same, it’s still about riding bikes and having fun. The character list has changed somewhat. Crandall’s got his head screwed on, he doesn’t expect any of us to fill a gap left by someone else, he just wants us to be ourselves.

Nobody is there because they’re a good fit for someone who’s left. As much as I enjoyed watching Lou Bickle eat lightbulbs there’s no one there that’s going to do that now, even Kenny Horton probably draws the line at eating glass.

‘Draws the line at eating glass’ there’s an album title in there somewhere. I cannot imagine you breaking bottles over your head Tom. I’ve never broken a bottle over my head, it’s not really in me, I spoke to Crandall about that before and he said that’s just what they were doing at the time, it just so happened that they filmed it and it went on the videos. He doesn’t want people on the team to do stuff like that just because it’s an FBM trip.

Now you’re on FBM, you have to eat glass.

If we tried to do all that stuff you’d be able to see through it, none of us want FBM to be contrived. The team is a really diverse group of people, there’s heavy drinking and partying guys, some of us are just chillers, Eric Hennesy is straight edge, Joel Barnett didn’t drink, he’s an evangelical christian, me anti-theist, a whole plethora of personalities on the team but everybody still gets along.

FBM has a bit of a rep for heavy drinking but for a long time you were what a lot of people would describe as straight edge. How has that journey been for you to find yourself on FBM as a drinker?

When I first got on FBM it was a concern of mine because I still wasn’t drinking. I was really turned off by your English common man, lad culture. I think that’s why I rejected drinking and wanted to remove myself from it. As I got a little older and came to terms with the fact that I didn’t drink I realised that drinking wasn’t the difference between me and those people. The difference between me and those people is much deeper ingrained than that. It’s important not to be too dogmatic about anything in life whether it be your lifestyle, your religion or anything. Being too dogmatic is a negative thing, you shouldn’t be afraid to try new things if there’s a chance it’ll make you happier. That was my attitude then and that’s my attitude now.

Do you feel happier as a person?

Yeah, I think I do, I wouldn’t put that down to simply because I drink.

Yeah that would be a bit of a bad role model message.

Drink your problems away kids, it’ll be fine.

You were living in the Hate House, was it was hard to fit in with the rowdy Corporation scene?

It put me on the fringe of that group instead of in the centre, I’m more comfortable with that anyway. Most of the people who lived there were intelligent and open minded enough to realise that if somebody drinks and takes drugs it is not the be all and end all. I didn’t tell them that they shouldn’t be drinking and they never told me that I should. With the exception of Jim, he told me that ‘I would be a much cooler guy if I drank.’ I remember it vividly and he delivered it totally dead pan.

How did you get into metal and more extreme music in the first place?

My mum let us order CDs out of her Britannia music catalogue, we ordered And Justice For All and The Black Album by Metallica. We were pretty hit and miss, we ordered a Dog Eat Dog CD and it was just fucking awful. Nowhere Fast was a big video for Metal it had a lot of cool music like Slayer and Metallica. By the time I reached Sheffield the hardcore and metalcore thing was massive. I really like the first Through The Eyes Of The Dead EP they take their name form Staring Through The Eyes Of The Dead the Cannibal Corpse song, so the lame metalcore stuff eventually lead me into real death metal. Immediately I felt death was what I had been looking for. Because it is underground music it’s not obvious that it’s there, sometimes you have to take a funny route to get to it. These days I listen to a lot of death and black metal but I also like doom and a lot of psyche stuff as well.

How did your band Parasitized come together with your brother Adam?

Adam had been playing guitar since he was fifteen but I’d never learned to play anything. When he decided to start a band he asked me if I’d do the vocals. I would sing along to bands I liked in the car so I could already do a death metal growl but I didn’t really see myself as the front man of a band. I said I would fill in until they got someone permanent and I ended up really enjoying it. It was something I could do with my brother and I liked the creative outlet of writing lyrics.

We started in 2004 with our first band, it has mutated and evolved over the years and now it’s a pretty technical death metal band.

Your lyrics are quite inspired, they’re quite deep, what do you pull on for lyrical content?

As much as I like bands like Cannibal Corpse and Exhumed it never really appealed to me to write gore lyrics. I’m interested in religion and philosophy and I read a lot to generate ideas. I’ll take something someone else has written and adapt it or go off on my own tangent.

If I think that someone gets something spot on then I’ll adapt what they’ve said into a song. I’m careful to be really honest and say this isn’t something I’ve written.

I wrote a song that was an adaption of a passage form

“ DRINK

YOUR PROBLEMS AWAY KIDS, IT’LL BE FINE

”

51

Bancroft

“ NOT ONLY

ARE THE CLAIMS OF RELIGIONS FALSE THEY’RE ALSO IMMORAL AND HARMFUL

”

52

53

54

Bancroft

Pegs to over bars, Leeds.

Nausea by Jean Paul Sartre. I wrote another one that was about Caligula, from the play by Albert Camus.

With guttural vocals you very often need to read along with the lyrics and then you can instantly hear the words within the growls and you form a deeper connection with the music.

I do try and enunciate it properly when I record vocals, I spend a lot of time writing lyrics so I want people to know what I’m saying. A lot of the time you do have to read along. I joke about it, like I don’t know why I spend all this time writing lyrics that people are never going to hear. I wouldn’t feel happy writing any old shit, if someone takes the time to listen to my music then I want them to be able to read the liner notes and read the lyrics and think this is cool rather than ‘oh well it sounds good but that guy is an idiot.’

Plus it gives the band an extra dynamic.

I wouldn’t feel right standing there and screaming and shouting about something I didn’t feel strongly about.

Do you get a rush of power on stage as a vocalist?

Yeah you do feel, aggressive is the wrong word because you don’t want to hurt anyone, but you do feel a certain release standing in front of a load of people. There is a certain release to that style of vocal in general. Powerful is a good word.

How do you get in that mindset on stage where you’re just going to go fucking wild, is it similar to dropping a hammer?

It’s really different. It’s not difficult to get wound up on stage because it’s nerve wracking. It’s easy to get in that mindset when the four guys behind you start playing some really heavy shit.

Whereas with riding if you’re going to drop a hammer you have to put yourself in that place. It’s easier with the band because there’s no risk of injuring yourself when playing a metal show, well saying that, it depends on what show you’re playing.

The dudes in extreme metal seem a bit more thought out though.

There is a stereotype that if you listen to metal you’re basically just a shaved ape and all you want to do is stomp around a mosh pit and punch someone in the face and, yeah, there is that element to it. Funnily enough that tends to be in the more commercial sector of metal and the more extreme you get the more cerebral the people appear to be. I don’t know why but I’ve always been attracted to the fringes of things, I like to sit on the outside of a group, I don’t feel comfortable being in the median.

I don’t know if that’s why extreme music appeals to me in the way it does. It’s evocative and it stirs up certain emotions because it’s heavy. The element of revolt appeals to me but in a much more intellectual sense than if you go to a fucking Hatebreed gig and it’s just dudes pounding each other. If you listen to bands like Immolation or something with really anti religious themes like Behemoth and any number of black metal bands they’re educated and intellectual people who are writing really great lyrics that you wouldn’t see in any other genre of music. I find that more intellectual approach appealing.

Have you ever wore corpse paint Tom? I’ve dressed up as King Diamond on Halloween and we nearly wore it as a joke at a Zyklon show but I’m glad we

didn’t, they probably would’ve kicked our asses. The gig was with Zyklon and Blood Tsunami - both bands have got ex Emperor members. For those who don’t know, Emperor is a Norwegian black metal band who started in the early nineties. Emperor were around at the time of the Norwegian church burnings and also implicated in them. The drummer who plays in Blood Tsunami was convicted of murdering a homosexual guy.

Faust.

Yeah that’s right, Bard Faust, he murdered someone in the Olympic park in Lillehammer. It’s interesting how we’re talking about this immediately after talking about how it’s not extreme music that makes you want to punch people in the face. Norwegian black metal has that really violent element to it as well. The church burnings were an anti religious statement, the murder was another unfortunate element of the music. There’s a whole scene of nationalist socialist black metal and those dudes are not into mixing races or homosexuality and we mentioned that the fringe elements were full of intellectuals but it’s not a utopian scene. Unfortunately, for as many intellectuals and artists and reasonable people you get listening to this kind of music, you also get the people with hardline political agendas.

How does religion coincide with the music you listen to?

It does coincide with the music I listen to, it’s a happy accident.

I used to be quite agnostic, the more I read and the more documentaries I watched around the subject the more apparent it became that not only are the claims of religions false they’re also immoral and harmful. I’m pretty intolerant of religion in any form. I would describe myself now as being an anti-theist rather than saying I was an atheist.

Is it the excuse for war mongering or homophobia or what is it that you don’t like?

Everything about religion turns me off. What religion has been very good at in the past is persuading people not to think, to live on faith. That’s why religious groups are so prolific, they prey on ignorance to gain followers, promote ignorance in the form of faith as a virtue and make the earthly and cosmic punishments for doubt so severe in order to maintain their power.

I think religion is the first and worst attempt that we’ve had at understanding why we are here and why the world is the way it is. I think we have far better mechanisms for understanding that we shouldn’t be tackling world problems in the present by looking to ancient mythology.

Do you see religion as an engineered form of control?

I don’t like the false promises, I don’t like the element of control, I don’t like that religion is obviously ‘man’ made and when I say man made I mean by men rather than women. You only have to look at how nearly every religion is oppressive towards women. Religion doesn’t explain anything that can’t already be explained without it. There isn’t a problem I can think of that the existence of a god explains better. We talked about Occam’s Razor, there’s this philosophical principle that when formulating a theory of how something is you chop out

“ WHEN WE

LANDED AT THE BOTTOM OF THE STAIRS I JUST SAID ‘IN YOUR FACE TOM WHITE’ AND EVERYBODY LAUGHED

”

55

Cox

Double kink icepick, Sheffield.

everything you don’t need. In every given theory you can cut out the existence of a god because it doesn’t explain anything that can’t already be explained and there are things that can’t be explained right now but adding in a god figure doesn’t explain them either. All it does is defer the question. If you have this idea that you need a god to create complex life then you have to accept that something created that god also, so all you’re doing is deferring the question and you end up in an infinite regress.

Do you consider it important to be educated about religion?

I’m very anti religion, although I’m very interested in it.

I think it’s important that people read about it and understand it because some of it is brilliant as literature but mainly because it’s good to know your enemy. I don’t feel that religious people are my enemy but religious organisations are. I like to be well educated about it and I like to know what I’m up against.”

And with that, I had to leave Tom and the tranquil village of North Cave. I’ve learned that Tom is a man close to my heart, over the years he’s lived with a bunch of my friends, we’ve travelled in the same circles, and we have similar taste in music but for one reason or another our paths have rarely crossed and our conversation has never amounted to more than a few words uttered on a small number of occasions. As I travelled very conservatively back towards Newcastle I was left with a sense of reinvigoration for the characters in BMX. I saw in Tom a man able to resist and oppose the pollutants of modern life both inside and outside of BMX. A man both confrontational and eloquent standing tall in a crowd of spineless apologists and lifeless conformists. A man speaking his mind but also making perfect sense. Increasingly these two traits rarely coincide in one vessel.

56

“ JIM

[NEWRICK]...

TOLD ME THAT I WOULD BE A MUCH COOLER GUY IF I DRANK

”

59

Best Of The Best JAMIE BESTWICK INTERVIEW

Jamie Bestwick has been riding BMX bikes for over 30 years, for most riders today that’s three generations of BMX history. Back in the 80’s Vert was King of BMX feestyle with thousands of riders turning up to contests. As a contrast, jumping down stairs was something you did whilst you rode your BMX bike to somewhere else. Vert was in its ascendency. Since those early days every big name rider from the enigma that is Jerry Galley to ‘The Beast’ Jay Miron has shared the deck with Jamie. His resounding success at what he does has seen off the two biggest names in BMX of all time, the legends that are Matt Hoffman and Dave Mirra, both of whom are now enjoying semi retirement and an end to the bruising and battering on the egocentric battleground that Bestwick has marked out as his own backyard and has defended with such focus that he is known for giving no quarter to any challenger and in turn expects none back. If the Gods do have a hammer then Bestwick has possession of it and a cursory glance at his past five X Games runs and you’ll see he’s had it for some time. To put these momentous achievements in perspective imagine Craig Campbell turning up at X Games this year and giving Garrett Reynolds a beating. . . It really does beggar belief.

With gold medals come gold medal salaries and gold medal lifestyles, neither of which are alien to the world’s most successful X Games competitor, but being an Englishman in a country as blindly patriotic as the USA has meant that gold has not always shined as bright as it might have done or had wanted to. The USA loves a winner, rewards winners but the fans prefer them to be Americans. Bestwick misses the UK I’m sure, and we miss him but where else could he have gone to dream but the land of the brave........................ here the story begins.

Words and Photography by STEVE BANCROFT

61 [X Games] It’s midday at The Staples Centre in Downtown Los Angeles, the sun is shining and the streets are alive with extreme haircuts, scantly clad PR girls and Monster Energy logos. This is the first day of X Games 17 and the day I’m due to meet the current BMX vert champion for a weeklong shadowing exercise. On a map of the extreme city, I find the vert ramp with my finger.

It’s the first time I’ve been to the X Games and, walking around the sprawling venue, it’s all rather overwhelming. It seems young Americans need Extreme to live.

They’ve been bred so as to be dependent on a daily fix of something loud, bright and dangerous and this place is the heart of Extreme. TV and the internet are the main arteries through which Extreme is distributed and, this year, Skateboarding, MotoX, Rally Car and BMX are the wheeled vehicles identified as the most effective mediums to distribute Extreme fixes to the masses.

The vert ramp is on the stage of the Nokia Arena, a stage that is frequented by the likes of Justin Bieber and Lady Gaga: the most famous people on the planet. The air-conditioning is on and it’s cold and empty inside.

It’s practise day, the arena isn’t open to the public, so I climb up to the ramp and look for the man whom I’m to shadow. I find him and join the queue. I’m third in line.

He’s not sat behind a desk signing posters or anything official like that, he’s just stood near the ramp watching.

Some people have entourages, others have a posse or a crew – Jamie Bestwick has a queue. ‘A queue’… How very British.

When it’s my turn I shake his hand and say hello, he’s polite and professional and sounds almost nonchalant.

He has the demeanour of a man ‘going through the motions’ rather than one of a defending champion, there to gallantly defend his title. His calmness isn’t a surprise, Jamie is far and away the best vert rider to have ever graced a ramp – of that there is no dispute – but I thought he would at least be acting like there was a competition on this weekend.

Jamie has won gold in X Games vert for four years on the trot. I’m reminded of this fact through the looped interviews being played on the gigantic television screens all around town X. He’s on for the much coveted and much hyped ‘5-Peat’: an X Games first. ‘5-Peat’ is a phrase coined by someone in marketing at ESPN in a vain effort to make things sound more exciting and divert attention away from the fact that Bestwick winning five times in a row is actually quite boring.

[Practise] Bestwick watches attentively as Tabron drops in for his first run on the ramp. “Here goes Simon” Jamie proclaims in a still distinctly northern voice. Although he doesn’t act like he is – and although he doesn’t need to – he still surveys the competition, keen to make sure no one has upped their game by any considerable, potentially threatening, amount since the last time he saw them ride. And unsurprisingly given the snail-like rate of progression amongst the vert elite over the last 10 years… they haven’t.

We agree to shoot some photos there and then, while the Nokia Arena is still relatively quiet – before the 15,000 screaming kids and just as many TV cameras show up tomorrow. His bike is freshly painted in mint green. While he does exchange pleasantries with his fellow competitors on the ramp, he doesn’t appear to be especially pally with anyone. He takes up his starting position, sitting alone on the far corner of the deck. His first run is a statement, and a bold one at that. His first air on each wall is a comfortable six feet, and that’s all the water testing he needs. With the two cautious walls out the way a green light flicks on inside and he’s up to 10 feet by wall four and by wall five he’s ally-opping the whole width of the ramp. His airs are silent and flawless, floating out effortlessly before lightly brushing the coping with both tyres as he dives back down towards the flat bottom.

Floating around high up there in silence, with his bright clothing and light coloured bike, there’s an almost angelic quality to his riding. As Jamie cruises gracefully above I look across at the other athletes on the ramp: they’re all sat watching with envy. Jaded expressions creep across faces as the realization they are competing for second place sinks in. And it’s for good reason, Bestwick has dominated vertical half pipe riding for over a decade. He is the most decorated rider in the history of the sport with seven Dew Tour Championship Cups and eight X Games gold medals among his vast cache of shiny contest keepsakes. Watching the practise session induces a feeling of sympathy, the vast chasm between the elegant grace of Jamie and the awkward stiffness of the others really emphasises just how out dated some riders have become.

After shooting photographs I decide to get a few words with some of the other athletes, to see what their impressions of Mr. Bestwick really are. I introduce myself first to Chad Kagy, he was the last rider to beat Jamie in an X Games final, way back in 2006. We shake hands and exchange pleasantries as I explain that I work for a UK based BMX magazine. The conversation is going well until I reveal that I am in fact not there to cover the contest itself, but I’m working on an interview with Jamie. Kagy’s mannerisms turn hostile. I ask if I could get a few words on their relationship and whether he was willing to make a prediction as to the outcome of tomorrows final. Kagy mugs me off. He claims he doesn’t have time and mumbles something about Mega Ramps as he gives me the shoulder and walks away. Another encounter with a top five rider goes the same way and it’s not until I speak to the ever cheerful Simon Tabron that I get a positive reception. In hindsight his kind words may just have been the patriotism of a fellow Brit, but it was warming to discover it wasn’t a full deck of animosity.

So with practise wrapped up and all but three competitors resigned to the fact that they were just there to make up numbers, I leave Bestwick to smile and wave his way through the long string of interviews and signings he has lined up for the afternoon. Later that night is Mega Ramp finals, the event where grown men dress like astronauts and fling themselves off a ski jump. No one pulled anything. It was embarrassing to watch. Never

have the motivations of money been so apparent in BMX as during Mega Ramp at X Games. Take away the prize money and how many people would be strapped into their space suits up there on the tower block high roll in? None, that’s how many. And if it weren’t for fear of sounding self-indulgent then I’d say that when Kagy snapped his leg in half on his 3rd run, it was at the hand of karma in response to his earlier rudeness.

[The Night Before] Vert Finals is tomorrow and I’m keen to see how Jamie goes about preparing for the biggest event on his calendar. We arrange to meet in the bar of the hotel where he’s staying, the JW Marriott. I feel under dressed just hearing the name. The hotel is among the most lavish in Los Angeles, a colossal building that dominates the skyline with its mirrored exterior and neon light show.

Walking in through the giant glass doors I feel poor. I glance around the busy lobby and bar area across a sea of tattooed Extreme athletes and platinum blond airheads. While I figure out how I’m going to find Jamie I reach to a table and pick up a drinks menu: $80 for a glass of red wine. $280 for the bottle. . . I hope this chat doesn’t drag on.

I find him by the bar and immediately there’s a fight for my attention. Blond hair, enhanced features and hot arses go head to head with the world’s greatest vert rider.

The combination of my English manners and not being famous means I turn to chat with Jamie. These girls are reserved for famous people. “How do you deal with distractions like that?” I ask nodding to a cluster of dolled up cute girls. He said he was used to it, he’d seen it all before. “This is LA” he continued “they all come out the woodwork – all wanting in on the action. Even when I was back in the dingy pubs of Derby, I was never that bothered with girls. I’d just go out for a few beers and then get up and go riding.” It’s the first conversation of many that we will have over the next week that focus on his unwavering determination, professionalism and commitment to the task in hand. Not succumbing to temptations like these is a testament to his dedication, for they are the most tempting temptations I’ve ever seen.

The bar is busy and loud. To keep themselves afloat, the inflated Extreme egos demand much attention, and that creates a lot of noise. But Jamie isn’t like that; at 40 years old and happily married with a young son his agenda is one more focused on bike riding than hedonistic narcissism. Frustratingly he’s not offered to buy me a drink yet, so in an attempt to be polite I ask if he wants a beer.

“Just a coke for me please mate” My wallet breathed a sigh of relief. We stand and chat, I cut to the chase “Are you going to win tomorrow?”

“I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t think I was going to win.”

He replies in an instant.

“You nervous?”

“Nah, I just want to do well. I don’t get paid to come in 10th.”

The conversation sways around to today’s practise slot and his dominance of the session. We talk about how competitive it is at the top and how hard it is to have meaningful friendships with people you compete against. “Do you think it’s fair to say none of the other riders really want you to be here?” I enquire.

He laughs “Yeah, if I were to sleep in late tomorrow and miss the contest then a few of them would be more than happy.”

I laugh too because, in my mind, I’m thinking a few of 62

those riders would prefer the rather more sinister scenario of him not waking up at all. We exchange a glance.

And I’m sure that’s what he was thinking too.

We chat some more about English stuff and his past life in a small town near Derby. Despite the glitz and glamour of his surroundings and his undeniable fame, Jamie speaks in a down-to-earth voice, free from the attention seeking tones that can be heard all around. He’s a friendly, polite and funny chap. Good easy company. We talk about his past in England, his working class youth and about how booze, bling and bimbos is never a good mix. I say goodnight and leave him to it.

[Finals] Today is finals day and Jamie is looking calm and refreshed. He has an air of confidence about him that is only afforded to those who have put in the work. It’s a sureness of a world-class athlete. The appropriateness of referring to a rider as an ‘athlete’ is much contested in BMX politics. But whether you want to admit it or not, to compete at this level requires intense training, physical agility and mental focus.

The lights in the Nokia Arena drop and a silence of anticipation descends. Spotlights swoop in giant circles, illuminating the crowd and ramp in a strophic effect.

The music crescendos and Americans are out of their seats, all clapping and screaming. If I didn’t know better I could be fooled into thinking that an actual contest was about to happen – a fierce battle between the world’s elite to see who will emerge victorious and be crowned as the undisputed best vert rider on the planet. But in reality, behind the TV cameras and faux hype, Bestwick has it sewn up already. When his time comes he drops in and lays down four flawless, perfectly polished runs and wins gold. His runs are so shiny you can see his face in them. Stevie McCann put up a valiant effort in his first two runs, laying down a couple of really solid efforts, but he ran out of steam way before the end and Jamie won his 5th consecutive and 9th overall X Games gold medal without really even breaking a sweat. The hard work had all been put in long before the X Games 17 finals clock started ticking down. In every aspect of the word, Jamie Bestwick is very much an ‘athlete’.

[State College PA] After X Games the plan is to fly to State College and stay at the Bestwicks’ place for a week. I meet Jamie and his wife Kerry at Philadelphia airport where our flights from LA have joined. It’s been a long day of delays and they’re both feeling the effects of letting their hair down for a rare blow-out to celebrate Jamie’s latest gold medal [although the competition might not have been the closest on record, the prestige of winning gold is still a massive deal – and even if it wasn’t – $40 grand is $40 grand!].

It’s 2am when we land at our final destination. Our flights were 9 hours late getting in. When we walk into the baggage claim area of State College’s tiny airport, Jamie is greeted by a guy of about 18 holding a small cake with the number five stuck on it. Visibly taken aback, he thanks the cake guy profusely and poses for a photo with the mysterious, but dedicated local fan. Winning five consecutive X Games medals is a big deal in America. X Games is beamed into every household in the country [. . . in 147 countries to be specific]. Jamie Bestwick is a big deal around here.

Indian Seat Grab, X Games 17, Nokia Arena, Los Angeles, CA.

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Downside whip, Cloud Nine, Woodward, PA. 64

It’s late when we get to their house, we’re all tired, and I’m asleep before I really can take in where I am. I wake up in the morning in a comfortable double bed in a light and airy room. I can hear some noise coming in through the window, the sound of a lawn mower running nearby.

I walk over to the window to check my surroundings and am surprised to see Jamie cruise past on a sit on lawn mower. He’s wearing sunglasses, headphones and his X Games gold medal. Just two days after standing on top of the podium, and after not nearly enough sleep the night before, Jamie is doing Bo Selector impressions to himself as he happily goes about his daily chores.

The airline has lost his bike so we spend the day lounging around the house. The Bestwick residence is comfortable to say the least. Situated on a leafy executive housing development on the outskirts of town the building is set-out over three floors and is modern and expensive looking. The neighbours are doctors one side and lawyers the other. The minimalist interior has been well considered with a close attention to detail. The walls are adorned with a combination of original artwork and title winning BMX bikes.

There are no medals, cups, plates or trophies on display anywhere.

“ I’LL BE

I compliment him on his beautiful home. We’re sat in the cavernous open-plan living/dining/ kitchen area and talk about how he came to inhabit such a lavish abode – the story of how he came to be the world’s greatest vert rider. “Back in England I worked for a company repairing compression engine blades for aircraft” he begins, “it was a really involved job and I loved it. I loved working there, had some cracking mates.” I can hear a genuine nostalgic tone in his voice and I’m immediately aware of just how much of a big decision it was to quit his job for the uncertain future of his BMX dream.

Jamie found that first year hard [1999], his wife-tobe was still in England holding down the fort of their modest council house, he was travelling back and forth to America for six week stints and the time apart was far from ideal. Back then Jamie was riding Derby Storm’s indoor vert ramp on a regular basis and was enjoying a good year on his bike. He flew out to compete in the ’99 X games and, with all the work he’d been putting in, was quietly confident of placing well.

His first run started off strong and things were looking good, but towards the end he lent too far in on a frame stand icepick grind and smacked his head on the flat bottom. He wasn’t badly injured but the crash left him dizzy enough to knock his focus and considerably blunt his second run. He was livid at himself for letting such a small laps of concentration ruin all the time and hard graft he’d put in. After the contest he gave all his stuff to the people from GT and asked them to take it back to the hotel, they obliged and asked where he was going.

“I’m going for a bike ride” he told them, and buggered off. He rode for miles all around San Francisco having a good think about quitting his job and about his future as a pro BMX rider.

“What am I doing?” he asked himself. “I’ve just given up a really good job and I keep screwing up at these big contests. What is it that’s the problem? Maybe I’m just not supposed to have given up work. Maybe the pro riding thing is a bit too much.”

That bike ride proved to be a significant turning point in his BMX career. The words he had with himself were enough to start a fire in his belly and after the event he went back to Woodward and started riding with a heightened intent.

“It wasn’t like Rocky 4” he remembers “I wasn’t out in the cold of winter lifting up logs and running in a sheepskin jacket” [laughs].

But from that moment on, whenever he went to ride he just had a bit more about him and his riding had a bit more of a purpose about it. He had more of a stride in his step: and that year he won the Gravity Games.

LUCKY TO GET TWO PARAGRAPHS NEXT TO THE TIT COUNT IN THE SUNDAY SPORT

”

“It wasn’t like an overnight decision, it wasn’t like “Yeah! Let’s go riding!”” he went on “I used to go to work every day and use my holidays to go to contests, then I started doing better and GT Bikes came in with an offer and said “Do you want to ride your bike for a living?” FUCKING HELL! THAT WAS A CRACKING GOAL!! [Jamie has one eye on the footie match on the 50” plasma tele] I went into work and said “in three months I’m leaving” Bang straight in there! [watching the replay].”

“Yeah keeper was well beat!” I add “Nowhere near it!”

The fact that Jamie gave his employer three months notice reinforces my point about him being a well mannered, conscientious, stand-up dude – it would be rare to find such integrity in say, a modern day street rider.

“It meant I could concentrate on contests more. It was a dream I’d always had. I’d always dreamed of being a pro rider. I wanted a piece of that and it finally came around and I left work.”

After receiving the gold medal and the giant cheque he phoned up his misses and was like “Right, quit your job, we’re moving to America” she was like “You what pet?!” he says “You ‘eard. Walk into the bank tomorrow, quit your job, I’ve just won the Gravity Games. I’ve made enough money here to last us for the next two years, so we’re moving out to the States”. So he moved his wife out to America and they bought a house near Woodward, in State College, PA. This may sound like an idyllic situation. Like a dream come true. It may sound like Jamie’s gamble paid off and he lived happily ever after – enjoying the life of Riley as a globe trotting BMX pro – but things are seldom that easy. And luckily for him, Bestwick has never been one to under estimate or take things for granted…

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“People look at it like ‘It’s cool, it’s a lifestyle! I like to ride because it’s cool, I like hanging out with my bros’ and all that bollocks, but when you have bills to pay. . . yeah, there are some fun times in BMX but there’s a time when you’ve got to get a little bit real because you know that the guy who collects your mortgage each month ain’t gonna accept you ‘having fun on your bike’ as a down-payment. So you have to start mapping it out and getting paid, and that’s what I had to do. That’s how I made money at my last job, I took my job serious and I got paid for it. When I wasn’t taking BMXing serious I wasn’t getting paid.”

At this point we’re sat talking over a cup of coffee at the breakfast bar in the kitchen and he’s speaking with a sense of conviction. It’s another reiteration that Jamie’s career has been no free ride. I ask what motivated him, what pushed him to knuckle down, train hard and make it happen. He warmed to the topic and a conversation ensured which revealed some deep seated emotional drives resulting from a typically British working class family up-bringing: Jamie: I didn’t want to go back to my old job. I didn’t want my old man to say “I told you so!” Like when we left, my old man said to me smugly “You’ll be back!” and I just went “I won’t!” Me and my old man have knocked heads over the years.

Albion: What, about whether riding BMX is a viable career move?

J: Just in general, me riding BMX has never really gone down too well with him.

A: What’s his background?

J: He was a miner. Just a hardworking guy.

A: Was he working down the pits?

J: Well he started down the pits but he worked up to a mining engineer. He comes from a family of hard workers and he couldn’t accept that riding a little BMX bike for a living was a career move. But for me I was like “I’m not going back” I would have hated to walk back in the 66

country and have to face him all like “I told you you’d be back” That was never gonna happen, so I knew I had to do something drastic to make it work.

A: Now that you’re the undisputed best vert rider in the world, what does your dad think about it now?

J: Probably the same. [laughs] A: What about when he comes out here and stays in your massive house and watches you on TV making bank and winning medals, does he ever say “Sorry son, I was wrong. Well done, you’ve done well” J: No. To my Dad it’s not a real job. To him, a real job is going to school, getting an education and putting some hard graft in, you come home, you have your tea, you watch the 9 o’clock news or the 6 o’clock news – or even both – and that’s what made him tick. That was his week, that’s what he enjoyed. He doesn’t understand that BMX is the hardest job I’ve ever had. Nothing’s guaranteed in BMX, it can be taken away from you so easily; it’s a hard job.

A: Would you say you’re one of the most professional bike riders out there today? In terms of being in control of all the variables that need to be in line to make it work.

J: Erm. . . well I’ve always had a strong work ethic, even from working back in England, I knew who my bosses were, and I knew that in order for me to keep my job I had to do good work and keep everybody happy. . .and I treat it no differently in BMX. I’ve always looked at it that I have a part to play in the relationship and I’m gonna uphold my part in the bargain.

I find the dialogue fascinating. The perplexing relationship between father and son: the need to impress, the need for approval, the need to save face. The nonacceptance of BMX as a legitimate career by his dad clearly outlines the passing of time, the shifts in thinking and the evolution of society across a single generation.

But although the power of the father/son bond is clearly

profound, I push a little further and ask what else there was inside that made winning so imperative. Already knowing the answer, I ask if he considered himself an overly competitive person: J: Yeah, I’m competitive. I’m hugely competitive. I like to compete. I’ve always been fascinated by the side of people that competition brings out, it intrigues me and it’s great to experience the ultimate high of winning, but it’s also humbling to experience what it’s like to come up short and you’ll only find that when you’re competing – whether that be with other people or with yourself.

The conversation moves round to how some people look up to superstars and think their position is unattainable, they put formidable talent down to some kind of gift from God or a genetic gift: A: Would you say you were lucky or necessarily gifted bloke?

J: Not at all. I’m just a regular dude who worked hard and gave it his all. Growing up, I wasn’t particularly talented at anything, in fact a lot of my friends were better BMXers than I was, but through my life if I’ve ever found something I’ve liked, then I’ve always stuck with it and made it work. What I’ve done is just a product of hard work. The times that I’ve been sat broken in two, in tears at the amount of pain that is going through my body. . . you only have to look at the individual and appreciate what he’s actually put in to himself and the people around him and you have a better appreciation for why good things come to good people.

The dialogue swings back round to competition and to what it takes to be the best: J: It’s a hard scenario to be in: To actually bring everything you’ve got to a situation. It’s physically impossible… If you were faced with certain death you would be amazed how much you’ve got in reserve, but you can’t tap into that whenever you like. It’s there but you’ll never

be able to get it all out. People say to me “Well, you just make it look effortless.” But it’s not really as simple as that. The finished product may look effortless, but the whole time I’m doing it I’m constantly trying to control my aggression. If I get too aggressive then the riding will look like shit, but if I can get to where I’m on the edge, just ‘alright’ and not quite turn into the Incredible Hulk just yet, then everything goes to plan, but it takes so many years to figure out how to do it, how to stop yourself from physically shaking and just throwing-up under the pressure of the competition.

A: So you feel like sometimes people don’t appreciate that that two minute run in a contest environment is the product of your life’s work. . .

J: Everybody always looks at me like I have to be this person that constantly progresses vert riding, but anytime you land one of your hardest tricks right at the top of the ramp – that’s a big step. Because one, you’re nervous as hell.

A: What, so you are still nervous as hell when you’re on the deck, even though you might have those nerves in check?

J: Yeah, if I don’t get nervous before a contest then I start panicking. . . If I don’t get nervous then I think I’m gonna get broke off. So I’m always nervous, but it’s healthy. It’s only when you get into your riding, and start hitting your tricks and lines, that your nerves get calmed and adrenaline takes over. But you can let that get you too much, or you’ll end up spannering yourself! You can’t let that “Let’s Go!!!” get in your head.

A: What, like the red mist?

J: Yeah, you’re like “Hang on a minute, where did that “Let’s Go!!!” come from?” And that “Let’s Go!!!” can easily find you on the flat bottom with some guy rubbing your sternum going “Wake up, are you all right?”

A: [laughs] It sounds like that’s happened a lot?

J: Yeah, it has.

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Sam, Jamie’s son, wants to play golf. He is a strong and healthy six year old lad. Energetic, clever and also well mannered, he often goes to ride his BMX at Woodward with his Dad. Sam stayed at home with his babysitter over the X Games weekend, so I leave Jamie and his son to catch up on some missed time together. Kerry, Jamie’s beautiful wife who he’s been with for 20 years, prepares a meal of organic noodles, salad, nuts and berries. I’ve been away from home for a month now and this is by far the healthiest, most nutritious and delicious meal I’ve eaten since I left. In fact, it’s the best damn meal I’ve eaten all year. Kerry has played an epic role in Jamie’s success. She is a life coach, people come to her with goals and, through a program of Yoga, nutrition and meditation, she helps them realise that goal. And Jamie is very much a client of hers.

Jamie’s bike shows up the next day in a taxi and we both set about unpacking and rebuilding our bikes in the garage. The plan is to head to Woodward, to ride for the afternoon. I’m excited as, after seeing the BMX Mecca in videos for half my life, I’ve never been before. As we reassemble our bikes I ask who he rides with usually and whether it’s weird to have a mellow session with someone he competes against. He asks for the Dictaphone to be switched off. I oblige but I’m unsure whether that means he doesn’t want me to mention it in this piece, or whether he doesn’t want there to be hard evidence of what he’s saying. . . either way, I can’t turn my brain off.

He talks about Stevie McCann and Chad Kagy and the whole ‘competitive vibe’ there is between riders at the top. He talks about the rivalry and how Kevin Robinson was crying under the vert ramp after Kagy and him learnt double flairs.

sincere “Good luck, hope it all goes well buddy” would have done the job, but such is the competitive nature of these guys at the top, all emotion and common courtesy goes out the window at the first sniff of gold.

He talks about Stevie McCann and about how they no longer ride together. Whenever Jamie rode at camp McCann would make his excuses, saying he was too tired or hurt and just watch from the deck, not dropping in himself but just sitting there taking mental notes and figuring out what he had to do to beat him. He’d hang around waiting for everyone to leave. Once the ramp was free, he’d sneak back in and set about learning what he’d just stored in his brain.

He talks about how it can be lonely at the top. There was a social scene amongst the other riders, united by their shared jealousy, thirst for recognition and their contempt for the one man standing in their way. They’d all go out on the weekends and Jamie wouldn’t get an invite, when he enquired as to why that was, he’d hear back “we thought you’d be out with your doctor mates.”

It’s salty at the top.

[The Drive] With our bikes now built up, we pack up Jamie’s brand new 5.7litre Toyota pick up – one of many perks that comes with sponsorship from a car company – and head to Woodward. On the drive we talk more about the importance of having decent facilities at your disposal and about the significance of Woodward to his career.

THERE AND SUCK YOUR THUMB, OR YOU STEP UP TO THE PLATE

Jamie first visited Camp for an ESPN contest in ’98.

He travelled with the rest of the GT crew, arriving two days before the contest started. On his first day there he was so excited he rode from 10 in the morning to 10 at night. With such a vast array of vert ramps, foam pits and resi ramps: he found it hard to comprehend what was going on. When he finally finished riding for the day all his team mates had gone and he was left there alone, in the middle of nowhere, 40 miles away from his hotel.

So he walked into the office and told them of his predicament. A friendly man with a moustache offered him a lift, which he gladly accepted. Getting left that night turned out to be a blessing in disguise, as the man with the moustache turned out to be Gary Ream, the owner of Woodward Camp. On the journey back to town they hit it off and it was the beginning of a strong relationship between Jamie and Camp – so much so that in 1999, Jamie and his wife Kerry bought a house nearby. “Maybe if I’d never have been left there and I’d never got a lift off of Gary, then maybe I’d not be where I am today” speculates Jamie.

He talks about the time he had to fly back to England to have his neck fused. Kagy and K-Rob were stoked as they thought, in his absence, they were going to frolic centre stage in the limelight for once. He bumped into K-Rob randomly at the airport when he was on his way home and the atmosphere was strange. Even though Jamie was hurt and having to fly back to get serious surgery on his neck, K-Rob couldn’t hide his elation at the fact Jamie would be out of action for a while. Even an in-

We’re getting closer and my excitement is growing. We talk more about the Camp regulars and who regularly riders the vert ramp there. The conversation swings back round to competition and Kagy. I ask whether, although they’re not really close friends, whether he had called him to see if he was OK after his rather savage leg snap three days previous.

Jamie: Nah, I saw from Twitter that he’s OK. Like I said before, it’s not natural to be friends with people you compete against. With anything competitive, the guys at the top will always knock heads, because everyone’s going for the same goal. When you’re out on course – it’s all business.

Albion: What about Dave Mirra, was there any animosity there when you two were competing?

“ YOU EITHER SIT ”

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J: Dave Mirra? That guy’s a champ. He’s the same again, he’s a competitor. At the end of the day you try to be civil with people, but he didn’t want to be knocked off his perch and he puts that above everything else.

Look what happens when he has a bad day! Christ!

You’d think the sky’s fallen in!

A: Do you think that Mirra moved away from riding because you knocked him off his perch and he couldn’t climb back on?

J: I think he lost his focus for riding vert a few years ago, when he started a few too many projects that he had going on. At the end of the day we both knew what we were doing and we were both heavy competitors and there were a fair amount of times that I had to endure when the decision went his way. But because I had a healthy respect for BMX – you can take those decisions on the chin. Being from another country it’s not like I can go barking at everybody to try to rally the troops to be on my side, once the scores have been put down you can’t change anything. So it went his way for a while and I upped my game a bit and things started swinging my way. At X games 2000, when you watch the TV footage, as I dropped that turndown flair for the first time, it looks like his jaw is smashing through the bottom of his helmet [laughs]. It was one of those moments that was a tough pill to swallow for him. But then I missed the next two X Games after that through injury and his riding was awesome.

A: In my eyes he was the first person who really made vert riding look amazing. It all just came together for him, he was flowing properly. The tricks and the style all came together, and he stuck out because at the time it was all up and down and a bit ragged and awkward.

J: Yeah I know. Everybody kind of looks at Mat as this pioneer of vert riding, and I mean, he did some amazing things but look at Dave, he was the first one that made it look really good. Mat was going up and down and Dave just did so many big tricks that were so cool and went together real nice, so everybody wanted to ride like him.

And that style transitioned into his Park riding as well, that’s why he was the most eminent athlete at X Games for so many years.

A: Yeah, I’ve heard he’s super competitive, him and Jay Miron. Ruben told me the other day about how at old BS Contests Mirra and Miron used to be stood under the judging tower just shouting up at them. That’s what I wanna see, I wanna see people shouting swear words with bright red heads with veins bulging out!

J: Everybody was, and still to this day, everybody is trying to establish themselves and people take things very seriously. I would not like to be a judge, they’re not biased or anything like that, but I just think it’s a very very hard job to do.

We’re still driving at this point – through the rolling hills of Pennsylvania – deep in Amish country. We talk some more about the old days, when he was making a name for himself, when the competition was fierce and fiery.

We end up talking about Hoffman again. I’ve slowly been getting the impression that Jamie has a bit of a bee in his bonnet about him.

A: You were talking off record the other day about how Hoffman has always been regarded as the Grand Father of BMX. . . .?

J: Yeah, what’s that about? He’s a year younger than me! Here I am, just won X Games 17, just won five in a row at 40 years old. And then there’s Mat behind the scenes running the event and I’d bet he’d cut his right testicle off to be where I am. He’d give anything to be riding at the level that I am, and the level that he was. I

read the interview in the first Albion and after that and his documentary, I got the impression that he had a very rough up bringing and he had to fight hard for things he had, but I know I sure-as-shit didn’t grow up with a vert ramp in my back garden, and my Dad didn’t give me my own private building to stick a vert ramp inside.

Yeah, he made money through his sponsors and his bike company, but his foundations are all built on his own private vert ramp. The only other person I knew who had their own vert ramp was Carlo Griggs, and his has still got a dodgy height pole on it where there’s eight inches for every one foot on the stick [laughs] Mark Atkins was nine and a half feet tall last time we measured him on Carlo’s height pole. . . That’s why Carlo could 540 at 18 feet.

A: Do you ever feel like you get over shadowed in the American BMX media by people like Mirra and Hoffman?

J: Oh yeah. I’ve always felt like I’ve been stuck between a rock and a hard place: I’m never gonna be the American hero because I’m from England and I’m never going to become the English hero because they don’t give a shit about action sports. I get a ton of messages saying how I should be in for a shot for BBC Sports Personality of The Year, but in reality I’ll be lucky to get two paragraphs next to the Tit Count in the Sunday Sport [laughs]. It’s just the way the English media are: they like sportsmen who rack up a tab, frequent their local cocaine dealer and are banging every ropey chick who walks the earth, to them, that’s a sportsman. But to me, that’s the complete opposite: I don’t get inspired by people who do that, I get inspired by people who do amazing things in their field of choice. But I’ve never minded, I feel like I’ve succeeded in my goal, and that was to quit my job and earn a living riding my bike, it never mattered that I’ve never been considered in the same light as those big dudes. They’ve gone on to other things, one’s gone on to rally car and one collects metal objects to insert into his body. To me, all I wanted to do is ride my bike. I’m never going to be England’s Sweetheart because some chick from Crewe crashed and got dead last in the Olympics – they make more of a deal about that than they do about a guy who goes out there and destroys everybody on a weekly basis.

A: That must be hard to swallow?

J: Yeah, it’s tough. I’ve seen the English media build people up, people who don’t deserve it, but I’ve also seen them just cut people down, people who do deserve to be where they are. I’m just glad they’ve never come knocking on my door because you have to accept that, while they might do great things for you initially, even the people they love the most, they will eventually just burn at the stake. And I’d hate it for them to drag up any old images of me out on the razz in Ripley out of my brain on snakebite! [Laughs].

[Woodward] He flicks the indicator on to turn right and the truck starts to slow. I look out the window at a sight that feels familiar, even though my eyes have never seen it first hand. We pull into Woodward and park up. All around are cute gymnast girls and kids on bikes and world-class ramp facilities – I feel like I’m trapped in an adolescent BMXer’s wet dream. My eyes are torn between the gymnast instructors and the ramps. I probably shouldn’t be looking at the girls but, you know, ‘you can’t help what your eyes like’. The building of most interest to us is fittingly titled ‘Cloud Nine’ – the home of Woodward’s gnarliest indoor vert ramp. It takes us an age to get there 69

Nac Nac, Cloud Nine, Woodward, PA. 70

as everyone and their dog wants to shake Bestwick’s hand and congratulate him on his performance at the X Games – the 5-peat. Being the friendly professional he is he takes the time to speak to everyone and it’s not until an hour later that we’re sat 13 feet off the ground on the deck in Cloud Nine. The ramp is big and perfect.

The ramp has a foam pit section at one end and a resi section at the other. When combined with a burning desire to be the best, a boat load of creativity and 10 years of your life – the ramp is all you need to win gold at the X Games.

I’m still intrigued about the competitive environment and about what it takes to be at the top for as long as Bestwick. I think back to something Nyquist told me a week before. He said “Jamie has Insurance” After probing him for what he meant by the statement, it turns out he was referring to tricks. He was using ‘insurance’ as an allegory to highlight that fact that if a rider were to up his game and learn a whole load of heavy hitting tricks, then Bestwick has an answer for it. If he were to ever find himself in a silver medal position during a final, then he has an unseen repertoire of tricks to see off any challenge. The only reason he doesn’t use them, is because he doesn’t have to. He has secret weapons. Weapons of mass destruction that actually exist. I swing the conversation round by once again asking about judging.

Albion: At the X Games the other day I heard a couple of people say they thought McCann should have won, he did some big tricks and really pushed himself. He really laid it on the line, where as you took it steady. What do you think about that?

Jamie: Well in his first run he did do better than me.

Steve McCann scored better than me, and if it was ‘one run counts’ then he would have won the contest, but unfortunately for him it’s four runs where the top two count. The kid went out and did the same run three times! And I switched it up three times.

A: And then he gave up?

J: Yeah, he tapped out after two runs as he didn’t have anything left to do. I saw that he didn’t have anything left to throw. It’s not like he was going to do that same run again, for the third time, because he knew he would get scored less, and the likelihood of him pulling that no-handed 900 again was very slim [laughter]. So it’s like, to me, my deal has always been: I go in and if I can get it done in two runs then that’s what I’ll do. I’ll post some good scores early on and then I’ve got one last run. And if I’ve won before that last run, then guess what? I’m taking a victory lap because I’ve got another contest next month. I mean, what’s the point? They’re not going to plaster me all over the X Games because I went nuts in my last run. If I have to, then great, I’m more than prepared to do that. But I’m not going to get anything extra from the contest, and I’m not going to risk being sat there in a cast, eating hospital cheeseburgers and watching the shittyist cable TV on a cheap television set. Or I can enjoy winning and move on to the next contest. I saw McCann do the same run three times, and I saw him do that no-handed 900 and I knew that it was over. Where as he knew damn well that I still had plenty in the tank [laughs].

A: Can we talk about that a bit. Hypothetically speaking, say he dropped in on his fourth run and dropped a double flair, what would you have done then?

J: I would have dropped in and done a double flair.

A: [Laughs] I’m not sure if you’re being serious or not.

But if he’s dropped the no-handed 9 and a double flair then he would be in front. Would you have anything to trump his no handed 9?

J: You know what’s funny? I had no-handed 9’s dialed for the 2002 X Games [laughs] and when I broke my ankle and had to sit that one out, low and behold, Mat Hoffman went and did one. I’ve been doing no-handed 900s for 10 years.

A: But what about now. Just say he had pulled a double flair and no-handed 9 in the same run. What would you do then?

J: Well then it would be on then wouldn’t it!

A: You’d have to wheel out the big guns then wouldn’t you?

J: You either sit there and suck your thumb, or you step up to the plate. You never know what people are going to do, while Stevie McCann was still jumping up and down celebrating his third run I’d gone. I was in the ramp. I’ve been against Mirra in these situations and I know to just get in the ramp, shut him up and get the eyes on you [laughs]. And all I thought about was putting a score up by his to shut him up. Because I knew that when we go to that 4th and final round, I’ve got way more experience than anyone else on that ramp in being under that sort of pressure. And you just make it happen.

A: But what are your big guns? What are you packing in your arsenal? I want trick names [laughs].

J: Ok, so hypothetically, if he does pull a run out of his ass that is incredible, then I’d have to stick on my Paul Daniels hat, cape and wand and make it happen.

A: But you would have done it though yeah? If you had to.

J: I would have done it. My misses is there, she would have taken care of things if things would have gone tits up. And you just do it don’t you?

A: So you would have stepped up?

“ WHEN I LEFT, MY

OLD MAN SAID TO ME SMUGLY “YOU’LL BE BACK!” AND I JUST WENT “I WON’T!”

”

J: You have to. Because if you don’t then you make yourself look like a bit of a tit. And you never know, it could be a turning point. I even thought about it when I was riding in. If you ever get put in the position where someone beats your run, then it’s the same in every competition: you’re going to stand your ground. I’m always really proud that English BMX is still number one when it comes to vert riding. And for me, I’m not ready to pass the torch on to the Australians yet [laughs]. I saw him [McCann] win in mega-ramp last night and I was like “There’s no way I’m letting you walk in here and trousing me!” But if somebody does put a golden run together then you make it happen.

71

Invert, X Games 17, Nokia Arena, Los Angeles, CA.

A: And you’ve prepared for that scenario though yeah?

You have tricks in your bag that you don’t do but you could do if you needed to?

J: Yeah. I was at Woodward for one day in between Dew Tour and X Games and all I worked on were the banger tricks.

A: Into the foam?

J: Into the foam, then on to the Resi.

A: Is it like just flipping a switch? Do you have those big tricks hard wired into you?

J: Yeah. You basically shut off when you take off. And you don’t say too much shit, it’s not like Brave Heart where you go ”AAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!” and you’re in the air all like “THIS IS IT!!! DO OR DIE!!”

[Laughs] You just take off and everything is real fucking quiet, you could hear a pin drop, even though there’s thousands of people there and the music’s up full blast.

But when you take off it goes dead quiet and you either hear an almighty bang, or you find your pedals and you ride off and think “That was amazing!”

A: I guess it’s only through practise and experience that you can do that?

J: Yeah, if you talk to anybody that has ever done anything where it’s all about 100% focus and making sure that all the practise you put in goes perfect, there is this kind of quiet… kind of quietness… and you can’t hear 72

anything and you’re not really thinking like “Shit! OK! I’ve gotta do this!!” It just happens. And then you land.

And you’re like “That was amazing” After I dropped the double downside whip flair I popped out on the top of the ramp and people were freaking out and I was just like “Well I guess that worked out”.

Jamie Bestwick is a professional. If BMX were ever to be accepted by the mainstream media then as far as skill, professionalism and dominance are concerned, he’d be up there with the likes of David Beckham, Valentino Rossi and Kelly Slater. He’s an extremly competitive professional who holds his cards close to his chest. After we are done shooting, in one last ditch effort, I asked if I could have a quick look at one of his big guns. He smiled, dropped in, hit two set up airs before floating a perfect double flair – he made it look like child’s play.

I laughed out loud. Witnessing the ease with which he spun and how perfectly he landed, it dawned on me that – much to the frustration of a lot of vert riders and even though he’s in his 40’s – Jamie Bestwick and the English flag are set to be on the top step of the X Games podium for a good few years to come. And to anyone brave enough to challenge him – I bid you good luck – for you’ve got one hell of a fight on your hands.

75

EDWIN De LA Rosa On my first night back in New Jersey, I sit on the same stoop as I did last time, with Bob Scerbo and Vinnie Sammon, across from the bar they were both once barred from, but now refuse to go in out of principle. It’s warm, shorts and tshirt weather, and Bob’s dog Harley gets up every now and then to bark at people going to and from the bar. I avoid the obvious questions, like ‘how you been?’ and ‘what you been up to?’ As it’s obvious, sitting on this step, that so very little has changed, it makes any inquiry along those lines a moot point. Besides the lethargy from lack of sleep, I’m happy to be back on the East Coast, sitting on a step, drinking beer and talking bullshit with Bob and Vinnie. I’m happy that I’m back here to interview somebody who first blew my mind back in the early 2000s.

Edwin quickly earned a reputation for himself on the already established and respected New York scene, before the rest of the world became aware of his talents. Bob remembers that people were talking about ‘the 15 year old kid from Brooklyn with amazing bike control’ long before anyone outside the scene had the opportunity to notice. It wasn’t until 2002, with the release of the first Animal video and also a small but insightful feature in Dig magazine, that the rest of BMX started to take notice of the 15 year old Panamanian.

Around the same time, his Etnies Forward section presented him as an innovator, with follow up sections on Can I Eat, All Day and Cuts cementing Edwin as a truly influential figure within riding.

Words and Photography by DANIEL BENSON

76

T

he following morning Ed rolls up to Bob’s place around midday. He’s laughing, grinning and going round greeting everyone. I’m reminded why I got on with him so well before, Ed’s instantly likable. His manner is friendly and relaxed. I remember how polite he is with strangers, security guards, shopkeepers and people he passes in the street. It made me laugh a little the last time I was here, and for some reason I remember it now. It’s not what I originally expected this keystone of the New York scene to be like. But then again, I didn’t really go to New York with expectations about anyone. The Iconic Keith Haring tattoo on his right ankle hints at someone whose interests run a little deeper than just BMX. It symbolizes a lot of things that are intrinsically associated with New York – graffiti and street art.

We head out, Ed up front, feet up on the dash, working through a cardboard box full of Hip Hop from various eras and, strangely, Oasis, (What’s the story) Morning Glory. We head away from New York as the atmosphere is tense in the days running up to the tenth anniversary of 9/11.

“I can’t imagine what it was like growing up in New York,” I comment, aimlessly, but thinking about two planes flying into two of the world’s tallest and most iconic buildings.

“Shit was crazy, man’ Ed comments.

“Did security get a lot worse after 9/11?”

“Yeah, for a couple of years after that, but now I feel like its back to normal, for the most part anyway.”

“You shot a picture of Vic [Ayala] with the towers in the background. Did you actually see them go down?”

“Yeah… I was like ‘Holy fucking shit! This is insane.”

“Did you know what was happening?”

“Nah, but I knew what I was seeing. That shit was burning up” The conversation goes quiet for a moment, Bob responds.

“The night before, me, him, Vic, Ralph [Sinisi] and Jeff [Zielinski] were coming back from Philly and once I spotted the towers, I knew I was close to home. Once you saw them you knew it was close. So the next morning, my mom runs into my room, rips the covers off me and starts saying ‘They’re dropping bombs everywhere.’

She was so frantic. ‘Every major city is getting bombed.’

My brother comes running home from Newark and people actually thought people were going to start taking over the streets. My brother goes to my neighbours and he gets given a gun. My neighbour was like ‘Get ready when these fuckers come.’ Nobody knew what was going on… After a while, I just went and rode my friend’s mini ramp. What else are you gonna do? My brother was stuck in the city for a couple of days.”

“Yeah, I was stuck in the city for three days. There were no trains. Vic, me and this chick Rachel I was dating went out and bought a six-pack of beers and just drank in the street dude. No cops around, everyone was downtown. For a while after that, there were so many vigils at Union Square that the floor was slick with wax from all the candles that had been lit... I still can’t believe that happened…. Ten years dude…”

Again, I try to understand the gravity of that situation.

Actually seeing them collapse, in the place you live and ride. I find it difficult to separate it from the cinematicly catastrophic aspect it has, how if you saw an event like that happening in a movie 11 years ago would seem faniciful, now it seems almost prophetic. As usual, I leave the subject unconcluded and turn my attention back to the Jersey turnpike.

I think it’s Monday before I finally end up heading into the city. Ed and me get the PATH train from Jersey City into downtown Manhattan to meet Hoder at a bar called Iggy’s in the Lower East Side. We sit and drink a beer on the street across from a place we went to a party the

last time I was here, where Hoder showered the whole room in champagne, Formula One style. Ed shows me his phone, there’s a photo of a woman on there, walking down the street, smiling, wearing a yellow dress with matching yellow get up.

“Who’s that?’ I ask, “That’s my mom Benson, in Brooklyn somewhere I think.”

“Didn’t you mention last time I was here that your mum got shot when you were younger?”

“Yeah man, she got shot right in the chest. From a ricocheted bullet at a party she was at. It was nothing to do with her. I remember being seven at the time and I was almost too young to really comprehend what had happened, so at the time it didn’t really bother me too much. I think if it had happened when I was older it would’ve had a much greater impact on me.”

I don’t really know what to say, after someone tells you that their mom was once shot in the chest, so I don’t say anything and wait for Edwin to.

“You wanna know a funny thing about my mom, Benson?

I like how he always refers to me by my name, like there’s somebody else present.

“Yeah, go on.”

“When she spots some BMXers riding, she’ll go and sit opposite them for a while and watch them ride, then go up to them and tell them she’s Edwin De La Rosa’s mom.”

I laugh, imagining this woman in a bright yellow dress going up to announce something like that to a group of young, impressionable BMXers. I look to my left and spot a woman with two pugs coming towards us.

“Ey Ed, look at these guys…”

“Oh shit!”

Ed jumps up, leaving the woman looking a little bemused at this guy who was only a moment ago street drinking on some steps, now have such enthusiasm for these two little dogs.

“What are their names?”

The owner responds, like she has a thousand times. It isn’t until Edwin reveals the ‘I Love Pugs’ fridge magnet he bought earlier that the woman warms to him and starts talking. Ed’s his polite and amicable self.

“I’ve got one too, his name’s Jerry.”

She allows the dogs to sit for a quick photo. We watch the dogs walk down the street, finish our beers and head to the bar.

I feel like I need to backtrack a little here. I’m not sure if I’m giving an entirely clear picture of Edwin. I think I’m making him out as being too clean, angelic almost.

Like some poster boy for the New York scene and street riding in general. Edwin isn’t that person, I don’t think anyone on the east coast is for that matter. He’s had his run-ins with the law, much like everyone I seem to interview has. ‘I need to interview some good intentioned Christian next time,’ I tell myself. But he isn’t a bad person, don’t get me wrong. Growing up in New York teaches you how to look after yourself. During one car

Crook to pop over, New York.

77

360, Manhattan.

78

journey, Ed finds out that some guy threw a drink in his girlfriend’s, or ex girlfriend’s (I still don’t know how that situation panned out) face, because of some problem that had occurred between his girlfriend and Ed’s. He calls this guy up to talk it out. I’m impressed by just how diplomatic Ed is being, he argues a good point, keeps calm but makes sure this guy knows what’s up. “He could be a fucking politician with a speech like that.” I think, to myself. Ed finishes the call.

“What did he say?” Bob asks, without taking his eyes off the traffic in front.

“You heard man, I told him. Y’know, I told that fool what’s up. But he said he fucking hates her and some shit like that so…”

“So what you gonna do about it.”

“When I see that nigga out, I’m gonna fuck him up.

What else can I do man, I told him nicely, dude.”

We spend a lot of time driving around New York and Jersey. We dip in and out of countless projects, into industrial estates and around satellite towns that surround the New York metropolis. The banter in the car comes and goes, but it’s usually something stupid that starts it up. I’m looking out of the window as we drive back into Jersey City when I catch wind of Corey Bohan’s name up front.

“So one time, I get a call from Bohan saying ‘Yo Ed, I’m in New York, you wanna come hang out?’

He’s there with his famous girlfriend, Audrina, but they’re in this expensive part of town. So I’m thinking I can’t afford $20 drinks, I don’t fuck with shit like that. So me and my girl jumped on the train and I’m drinking liquor on there and by the time I get into town I’m already drunk.

We meet Bohan and his girl and it’s cool for a bit, they invite me down to Atlantic City for some MTV party and I’m saying I can’t afford it and they tell me they’ll get me and my girl a hotel. But Bohan keeps buying me drinks, man! I’m drunk as fuck now, Bohan brings a round full of drinks and I spill them all, I fall down a load of stairs then I tag the couch and get caught for it, so the police get called. I sober up when they put that jewelry on me, you know what I mean, they keep me waiting for ages and I’m dying for a shit.

Somehow I convince them it wasn’t me and I was so excited that I didn’t get arrested, so I run off down the road and take a dump between two cars.”

Bob, Vinnie and me crease up laughing.

“I had to hit ‘em wid it! I don’t remember getting home, but my girl got back and I’m there, asleep on the couch, face down, butt naked, with my dog Jerry asleep on my ass. I never got that call in morning for that trip to Atlanic City.”

to Edwin. I’m at a loss as to what to say. Ask me anything else and I’ll hazard a guess, ask me what Istanbul used to be known as and I can tell you it was Constantinople.Ask me how deep the ocean is and I’ll tell you it averages around 4000ft. I’m useless with relationship advice. I offer Ed boilerplate answers that I think sound right, but more than anything I think he just wants to talk it out, and I’m more than happy just to listen. On the last few nights Bob’s girlfriend gets ill, so we move out to a motel in Jersey City. The following evening Ed does the loading dock feeble to hop into the access ramp. It’s a big move and once it’s done I know that Edwin’s finished for the interview. Bob would say later that I’ve been lucky to get him this focused. It hasn’t gone unnoticed and I appreciate the time from the pair of them. We drive into Williamsburg to get some food and have a few drinks. Ed’s girlfriend, or ex, Melissa turns up and brings their dog Jerry. It’s a comical looking thing, like most small dogs. We all have a few drinks and all seems to be well. I still need to sit down with Ed to have an official, sit down interview, but right now I’m happy to be having some beers to sign off the photo side of things.

We drive back to Jersey late, the hotel we were in the previous night is full up so Bob drives out towards the pay-per-hour motels by the freeway. Right away I notice some young girl being led off by some old dude. It’s seedy to the point of being almost morbidly entertaining. All night cars and taxis come and go, moving around the carpark like pieces on a chessboard. When we get in the room Ed turns the TV on. “Hit ‘em wid it!’ I turn to look at the screen. There’s porn on, presumably the last person who stayed in the rooms channel of choice. For more than a moment, I actually think it’s being streamed from a neighbouring room. It’s so badly amateurish that it almost looks live. Ed passes out and I stay outside and watch people come and go in and out of rooms, into cabs and back out onto the freeway. I notice a room two doors down with children’s toys outside and an air conditioner unit jammed hastily in the front window. I try to think of excuses why they would be there, but it’s clear a family live amongst this nightly mix of prostitution and adultery.

We get kicked out of the room at 11 and go and sit beside the office and wait for Bob. The carpark is empty and the only person I can see is the guy who kicked us out, moving between rooms, changing sheets. It seems as good a place as any to start the interview, so I begin, remembering something we talked about on a previous night.

“ I FEEL LIKE,

IF YOU GET TO A CERTAIN LEVEL AT RIDING, YOU’VE SHOWN YOURSELF THAT YOU CAN BE GOOD AT ANYTHING

”

Ed’s been staying at Bob’s on the sofa in the living room, beside the two seater version I’ve squashed myself onto.

He’s having a rough patch with his girl and he’s been kicked out. “You’ve caught me at a bad time, Benson.

But I’m good man, I’ll bounce back.” It’s worse earlier in the week and gets better as the days pass, but on occasions I find myself having to give relationship advice

We spoke briefly the other day about being a role model and you said “hell no!”

“I would never think I was one, but I get kids coming up to me and say ‘I started riding because of you’ and blah blah blah…”

“I don’t think you’re a bad role model?”

“I don’t know man, I…” Ed pauses, struggling with the question. He doesn’t seem comfortable taking about his influence, I press a bit further.

“Do you think if you had an agent you could almost 79

Feeble to Barspin, New York.

take your BMX career to that next level, financially? You got where you are off your own back, sponsor wise.”

“I actually looked into getting an agent a year or so ago and he was like ‘there’s nothing I can do for you man, you’ve got all your sponsors already, you’ve got it all lined up with Red Bull and DC, and of course Animal….When you look at Nigel [Sylvester], he has to work for those sponsors a lot. It’s not just an easy ride.

It’s if you want to take it to that level. I watched him progress over the years and he’s a hard working dude, straight up. I’ll call him up and I’ll ask him what he’s doing and he’ll be like ‘I’ve gotta photoshoot for this magazine’ or whatever. He works for it.”

“Do you reckon you could do that stuff?”

Ed smokes, then laughs. I’m not sure if he’s serious.

“Hell yeah! I think so. I’ve never had an agent, so I can’t really say. But if I did have one, I wouldn’t have to speak to any of my sponsors. Obviously with Animal it’s different… To be honest I never think I got to that level, but if I had, I’m sure things would’ve been a lot different.

But I’m real happy with how stuff worked out, I’m sure with an agent I could’ve gotten better deals, as that’s what it’s all about, but I’m happy with all the guys who hooked me up and how I got them. I’m grateful for what I have, like I’m happy with where I am. I never thought I’d end up getting paid for riding. I never thought it was possible, which is maybe why I find it difficult when kids come up to me and say shit like ‘you’re the reason I got into riding.”

“So you do you find that difficult?”

“Yeah, I do find that difficult. But at the same time I have to remind myself that I was the same way. Like when The Gonz came to town when I was young, I was exactly the same way, so remembering that gives me a 80

better understanding of it.”

Bob pulls the van into the car park and jumps out with a grin on his face.

“You guys survived then? See any shady shit?”

“You come back and I’ve got a syringe in my arm,” replies Ed. “And I’m like, Ed, what the fucks up?! I only left you twelve hours ago!”

I look up and down the rows of rooms, which form a single storey square around a parking lot.

“I can’t believe places like this exist.”

“There’s so many of them. People live here when they can’t get a downpayment for a house,’ remarks Bob. “You guys eaten yet?”

Ed and me both shake our heads. Earlier I looked inside the office and all that was in there, apart from a half empty vending machine, was a microwave in the corner, surrounded by nothing, beneath a picture of the New York skyline.

“White Mana?” Bob asks.

“Fuck yeah, man.”

“Wait until you see this place Benson. It’s legendary.”

We drive over to the diner, which is an earshot from the motel. The place is old, with that shiny metal trim on the façade, there are seats around a kitchen area and few booth seats out the back. The guys working there seem like proud men, the sort of outspoken characters that turn up on shows like The Sopranos.

“Would ya look at that? That’s an old camera. Is it film?”

I’ve just walked in the door and I hand the camera over to the chef.

“Yeah, it’s a film camera, it’s not too old though.”

Another chef walks over.

Rock Barspin, Long Island.

“Look at that old camera! It’s like a Fred Flintstone camera!”

Everyone laughs and the guy who first spoke gives us menus. We sit for a moment on the stools, then decide to take one of the booths out the back. I’m looking around, taking a few photos. I notice a shot of Sylvester Stallone on the wall, stood with some guys who look like the owners.

“This place is amazing.” I say to nobody.

“You get places like this in England?” Bob asks.

“Erm… Sort of. We get old cafes. There’s some Italian ones around the East End that remind me of this place, but they’re a dying breed.”

“Same here, man.”

Ed comes and sits down on the table. “This is my first time getting breakfast here. When Animal used to be down the road, we used to stop at White Mana… If I moved to London I’d open something up like this, or that sandwich shop we went to last night. Have you got stuff like that in London?”

“Well, we’ve got Greggs.”

“Is that a bakery?”

“Yeah.”

“For no reason one year, I had Red Bull buy me a ticket to England and I split the cost of the other one with Tyrone. We stayed in London for a week…”

“When was that?”

“2004 I think. We just went for no reason man, we just went ‘fuck it, let’s go to London.’ We stayed at this girls house I’d met at the Backyard Jam a few years ago. She was half Turkish and half Greek. She was nice, man. It just so happened to be at the same time Sprite had some contest on…”

“The Urban Games? On Clapham Common?”

“Yeah, the Urban Games…”

Breakfast arrives. I get a western omlette, which continues the trend I’ve been following of just ordering the same as one of the people you’re eating with.

“One night, me and Tyrone went to some sort of rave.

It was sketchy as fuck man! We went through this little alley and the lights were flickering on and off. Some guy went ‘Buy the tickets over there mate.”

Ed puts on his best Mockney accent. “So we got in there and we’re chilling all night, and I’m not joking, but about 30 people came up and asked Tyrone for drugs. I was like, ‘Yo Tyrone, you got the look, man. You’ve got the UK drug dealer look.”

The chef shouts over to us, “Anybody wanna read the paper?”

“Yeah, I’ll take it.” replies Bob. “I want it back though buddy. Look at the headline, ‘KUNG FOOD” jokes the waiter.

The table goes quiet as we eat. Bob scans over the cover story.

“It was Jeff Zielinski who shot the first photos of you, right? The thing in Dig?” “Yeah, he shot that. I was with Z all the time. He’d come out to the city, or me and Vinnie would go out to Jersey for the weekend. We’d watch footage all the time, then he’d take me to spots I’d seen in Don’t Your Quit Your Day Job. When I first saw that video it blew my mind.

They were doing the same sort of shit I wanted to do.”

“Did it change after that thing in Dig came out?”

Bob interjects before Edwin answers. The dictaphone has been out a while now and the whole talk is slipping into that conversational tone I was hoping for “I feel like he was big out here way before that came out. Or any footage or anything. Everyone knew about 81

this 16 year old kid from Brooklyn that had amazing bike control. That’s all you heard! I remember knowing Vic before I knew Ed and having Vic tell me that this 16 year old kid was the best bike rider in the world.” Bob and I laugh, whilst Ed sort of chuckles whilst keeping his eyes down on his breakfast. “I remember telling him that he can’t be, there’s no way he can be as good as Joe Rich!

‘I was like, Vic, I know what your saying, but… He can’t be as good as Taj!’ There’s no way a 16 year old kid from Brooklyn is as good as those guys. The one thing you kept on hearing was that this kid had the most precise bike control.”

“It must have hit everyone else when the first Animal video came out?”

“Oh, it was crazy, man. The first time I was in England, all these kids were so psyched on that video,” replies Ed. “I think the videos still have that impact. Like I was saying about when George [Marshall] went to Kiev and all those kids were covered in Animal stuff. It kinda goes back to what we were talking about earlier, like how do you deal with that, being an influence, whether you like it or not?”

“I feel real awkward dude.”

“I guessing there’s the flipside to that with people hating on you?”

“Oh yeah dude! I’ve had people tell me some crazy shit man!”

“You’re always going to get people who aren’t into what you’re doing. I just learnt to deal with it.”

Bob finishes up Ed’s point, “When something different comes along that didn’t obey the order of things, that didn’t work their way up the ranks, people don’t take that well.”

Ed’s attention turns to the newspaper, which he’s started leafing through. He spots a photo of a man skipping down the steps of a courthouse in a brown suit, clutching some kind of papers. The poor bastard had spent 13 years in prison for no reason.

“You gotta celebrate, man. Imagine that, 13 years. . .”

Ed’s still laughing at the photo when I ask him who he started riding with.

“With Tyrone [Williams] and Wormz [Ruel Smith].

I grew up in Brooklyn, but we moved around a lot, so 82

when I moved to another part of the neighbourhood at 13, that’s when I met Tyrone. I used to hate him dude. . .”

“Really?! Why?” “He was just a wise ass, y’know what I mean? I love the guy, but I didn’t like him at first, like he had blonde hair!

But I rode with him a couple of times and realised he was cool. I kept hearing these myths about Wormz. In my head I thought he was gonna be this big dude, but when I finally met him – Tyrone took me to his house in a bad part of town – he was just this skinny kid with braids!

That’s why he was called Wormz. That’s who I rode with for… well I still ride with them to this day. They were good at riding too. Jeff Z came to shoot Wormz, and that’s how I eventually met all the Jersey crew.”

“Has the scene in New York always been this big?”

“It’s gotten huge now dude. Back in the day you’d kinda know everyone…”

“Do you think people like you and Nigel have anything to do with that, with the scene growing?”

“I don’t know dude!… I don’t know…”

“What do you reckon Bob?” “I feel the scene was always big. There were always people, together, from all parts of the city. Like when people met up, there were always guys from Brooklyn, always guys from The Bronx, meeting up and riding everywhere. Whereas rollerblading, for example, was always big in Harlem, always big in Queens. Riding wasn’t neighbourhood specific. If you watch the first Base video, New York Hardcore, you can see how crazy the scene is. I think Will [Taubin] had a lot to do with riding getting big in New York, I feel like he’s left out of it…”

Every time Bob talks I’m impressed with his answers, he’s like an oracle of New York knowledge.

“Yeah dude, everyone knew Will.”

Bob and Ed start talking to one another, almost reminiscing.

“When I first met Will, I didn’t know what the hell he was.

He had the sickest style, he looked like a maniac,” Bob recalls.

“He’d be spitting all over the floor,” adds Edwin.

“Yeah, he had the worst attitude I’d ever seen. I was like ‘who the hell is this kid!?’ Where I’m from, people didn’t act like that.”

“He was outta control dude, he’d say the wildest shit, like flip on the drop of a dime, start throwing shit around…”

‘I think that’s why Jeff liked filming you so much, you were a lot more mild mannered than Will.’

‘He’d have a meltdown every time he rode. People would stop and watch him in the street…. It was funny to watch him have a meltdown. Will was quick, but Vic [Ayala] on the other hand, he couldn’t try a trick too many times.

With Vic, you could see him progress with each try. Say if it took him ten goes, each time he’d get closer, just working it out. But by the eighth go, he’d flip the fuck out, dude!”

The conversation quickly and seamlessly shifts to another legendary New York figure – Vic Ayala.

Bob starts talking about Vic with a grin on his face, looking at me. “His thing was talking to God, like on his knees, looking up to the Heavens. In the FBM video, there’s one version of it, but that was happening all the time. But you knew he was doing it to be funny! His priority was being a funny guy.”

“Yeah dude, He was always being funny. He knew he was funny too! He was always on a roll. Yo, he told me he learnt tailwhips third go!” We all crack up laughing. A few people sat around the kitchen look over, wondering what we’re laughing at. “It was just a pleasure to hang out with that dude, he was a clown.”

“When did you get hooked up with FIT?” “Robbie came through to New York as Jeff wanted to film a few things with him. At the time I was hanging out with Z loads, filming and shit. Z was like ‘come out dude.’ A couple of months later, I went on this crazy roadtrip with Z, that one across country on the Greyhound buses and I saw Robbie at the Vans skatepark in California and he hooked it up dude, straight up. I went to Cali with a shitty bike and I came back like the fuckin’ man! I was like, ‘I’m fuckin’ made nigga!”

Bob and Ed start laughing again and the same heads turn around, not angrily, just out of curiosity. We’ve been here a while now, I’m still pushing the leftover food around my plate and Bob is intermittently reading something in the paper. Bob and Ed are a pair together, I can’t fathom

their shared knowledge of the streets in and around New York and Jersey.

“So when did you two meet?”

Ed gets in first “The first time I went to Jersey I was real nervous, as I’d never really left Brooklyn. But when I got there, all the crew was there, all the guys from Don’t Quit, I couldn’t believe it.”

“We were riding Newark and Ralph was trying this crazy gap to pegs from a hip and he crashed real hard on it, with his legs between the rail and starts making all these crazy noises. I remember me and Ed kinda hiding our faces and laughing, as we didn’t want Ralph to see us.

That’s how we became friends.”

“Ralph was so fucking nuts dude! A little while after that we took a roadtrip down to Miami to film for his Props bio…”

“Is that the one where he starts beating up his bike up against a tree?” I ask.

Bob cuts in, “no, but I filmed that. You see on the video, after he’s beaten his bike up for ages it’s in the road, so I say ‘Ralph, get your bike out the road!’ So he turns and comes towards me and throws something at me.”

We laugh again. Ed moves back to the subject of Miami.

“He’d be driving, rolling a blunt, drinking a beer and driving at night! I was like ‘this dude is crazy!”

“Yeah, he’d be doing all that, then a new song would come on and he’d start adjusting the bass levels!”

The pair of them are such an inseparable part of Animal that you can’t really imagine it without them. Bob’s a little more behind the scenes, but I know for a fact we wouldn’t have got this interview done without him. I move the subject back to Edwin.

“Out of all the sections you put out, which one were you most happy with?”

“My favourite one is Can I Eat. But it’s weird, like when a video comes out, I’ll watch it, and then I won’t watch it again for years.”

“I watched your Etnies section again the other day.”

“I like that one too, man. I like that one. I was just so fucking happy to be in that video. When they asked me to have a part, that was official. I went to Cali, then [Dave] 83

Feeble to rail hop, New York.

84

85

Parrick and [Josh] Stricker came out here and stayed for about a week. We filmed non-stop. One period I filmed for 48 hours straight. I was filming the whole time. We rode the city all night, trying to get tricks that took hours, rode a bit more, then went home to take a shower, then went straight back out to get the stuff in New Jersey, up that black rail. I remember showing Bob that video and he was like ‘That was fucking sick!”

Bob comes back to the table after clearing up the bill with the waiter. As usual, Animal got the tab. At Bob’s local diner, the waitress asked “Why do you always get the bill?! When’s one of these people you always bring in gonna get it? Why’s it always your turn?” Bob laughed, handing over the Amex card, “I just do what I gotta do.”

Back sitting down, Bob asks “What was it, what video?”

“Etines.”

“Ahh, that’s the best part, dude. It was funny for me, because I’d always filmed him, or if Z had filmed anything, I’d be round his house that evening looking at the clips.

But a lot of that Etnies stuff was new to me.”

“Those two sections are my favourite. They were kinda filmed around the same time too.”

“Were you getting paid then?”

“Nah, not really I don’t think.

Maybe a little bit off Etines and FIT, but I was living at home so it didn’t really matter.”

“It’s funny looking back through your photos, there’s a huge timescale in there. Of all these places you went and all these crazy characters you met. Why did you take all these photos, I’m guessing back then there was never any ulterior motive?”

“I don’t know dude. I just couldn’t believe I was going on these trips with these people. I’d buy a disposable and just take photos of whatever. Looking back now, I’m so happy I did, as I could’ve quite easily forgotten what was going on. I’d get duplicates done, so I could pass the other set onto Bob or whoever.”

“I was surprised when I was in New York last time at all the photography books you have. All with a similar style in mind.

I recall that you’d just gotten that Ari Marcopoulos book, and I asked what you thought of it and you said that although it was a great gift, you thought the subject of the book was so broad it lost its impact. I was surprised to see you had this educated opinion on it. I mean, don’t take that the wrong way, but…. I want to say, when did you start taking photography that bit more seriously?”

“I wouldn’t say I take it more seriously, but I just got way more into it in the past couple of years. I bought a good camera and I’ve been collecting books for years, so I just started shooting stuff. I always doubt myself, like I can’t take photos, but I’ve got cool friends, y’know. I live in a crazy place, go on these wild trips all the time.”

“And those Ari Marcopoulos photos are insanely easy to take,’ Bob points out. ‘like that shot of Ryan Hicky, all it is, is him drinking a 40. But it’s Ryan Hicky, that’s what makes the shot.”

“Yeah, and that’s what I mean about my friends, like they ain’t famous, but we end up in some crazy situations, or go on some wild trip. I find it interesting.”

“Is it something you plan to pursue?”

“We’ll see, man. Like this winter, I wanted to maybe do

some assisting, so I can see a few different styles. Just to be around some different shit for a little while… I feel like, if you get to a certain level at riding, you’ve shown yourself that you can be good at anything, Especially if it’s not physical, like you’re not gonna crash shooting a photo.”

I couldn’t have put it better myself, I move the conversation on.

“I’ve always thought you brought a lot of style to street riding, like with certain lines you’ve done. Was that an influence from other riders, like maybe people like Castillo?”

“Sometimes I’ll do lines as it helps me focus on the main trick. If I get a good whip, for example, I know I’m going for the main part.”

“I think with the lines stuff and your style in general, the stuff flowed good, by the time you were getting full sections, from that raw footage of Z’s lost footage, to say, the first Animal video and Etnies, your stuff really started to flow. A lot of street riding, I felt, could be clunky, if you know what I mean.”

Bob answers whilst Ed still thinks about the question.

He never seems too interested in talking about his own riding, I notice. “I think guys like Parrick and even Vic Murphy to an extent were doing lines even before Castillo. Maybe Vic Murphy was a bit aggressive…”

Bob and I continue. “I think Castillo managed to stay a bit more relevant, or fresh than those guys, so it almost linked up with Ed, then he brought it to another completely new audience…”

Ed cuts in, whilst we discuss the influences of Ed’s riding, right in front of him. “I still don’t understand it, all these years later. Like, I wasn’t trying to ride like anyone or act like anyone. Just the people who were around me, guys from New York.

I still think it’s kinda stupid when people try and pin stuff on me. It makes me kinda awkward too. The only way I could see it is from skate videos. Me and Vic would watch a lot of skate videos. I didn’t think it was a big deal. I still don’t.”

I move the conversation on. “I’m backtracking a bit here, but it seems like with Animal, it’s a family. Like once you’re on, it’s a sponsor for as long as you’re riding. And they’ll support you too…”

“Dude, it is a family. Straight up. Like with FIT and DC, I’ll go on trips with them and hang around with the team for a week or so, but that’s it. With Animal it’s different, it is a family.”

“Hypothetically, if Animal hadn’t have happened, where do you think you’d be?”

“Riding for some wack-ass company. I’d have ridden for Primo or Snafu, not to talk shit, but you know what I mean. I just can’t imagine Animal not happening. Ralph and Animal have been so good to me.”

Everyone has finished and all the plates have been taken away. I turn my attention back to the diner. A hooker is now sat on one of the stools, by the door, eating some food. We all turn to look at her, like she’s something to be examined.

‘Man, I love hookers,’ exclaims Ed, out of the blue. Bob and I turn to him, pause, then burst out laughing. Ed joins in, realising just how ridiculous what he just said was.We get up to leave, but Ed insists on getting two of the famous burgers they serve. One for me, one for him. As usual, never one to shy away from generosity.

“ I WASN’T TRY-

ING TO RIDE LIKE ANYONE OR ACT LIKE ANYONE. JUST THE PEOPLE WHO WERE AROUND ME, GUYS FROM NEW YORK

”

86

Tailwhip drop in, New Jersey.

87

Victory

week

7 DAYS WITH JAMBUL Words and Photography by GEORGE MARSHALL

L

ane discipline was never my strong point I recall my driving teacher telling me as I cut up the car behind. The cut up driver angrily overtakes looking back in attempt to make eye contact and size us up. Before his eyes meet my own he takes a glance at my passenger and looks back to the road, defeated.

Jambul sits there, oblivious to my bad driving. “What’s his problem like?” he mutters in a Yorkshire accent as thick and knotted as his black curly hair. A sentence from him rarely fails to start with an ‘am’ and more often than not ends in a ‘me.’ Even to my Midlands born and bred ears his accent can be difficult to understand. I think about the driver’s scared response to seeing Jambul sat in my passenger seat.

I hadn’t noticed it before but witnessing the driver’s reaction I can now see Jambul has the hardened look of a man who is no stranger to trouble, and possesses a fearless stare. I imagine if my middle class Mum were to see Jambul – in his vest, 3 stripe joggers and big puffer hooded coat – crossing the street from the safety of her family car, the central locking would slam down instantly with a four-way synchronized thump. And if you were to ask her for an explanation she would whisper two fearful words - ‘drug dealer.’ Only the words ‘peadophile’ and ‘menopause’ are more feared by her. But here Jambul sits in my van, comfortable with the seat almost flat down, nodding his head in time to dancehall reggae and smoking out of the open window. “Ey Josh, do you want to goes twos on this lad?” Jambul says to Josh Roberts who is sat in the darkness of the back of my van. Jambul looks out the window. “Am in need of a Tescos I am me” he announces and it begins to rain.

We turn off the M62 that slices through the misty Yorkshire moorland and we enter the outskirts of the town below. As we drive down from the moors, the town appears as rolling fields of Victorian terrace houses in long straight rows, their stonework blackened by industrial revolution era soot. The long narrow streets are interspersed by frequent golden domes and calls for Muslim prayer ring out from speakers into the streets. “White folk round here think that it’s saying ‘kill the white infidel’ or some shit, but it’s just saying ‘Allah is calling you to prayer’. Welcome to Bradford, or ‘Bradistan’ as people call it round here. It’s called that because it’s the densest population of Asians in Europe, it’s also the heroin capital of Britain.” Jambul says proudly.

92

We drive through what looks to be a purely Asian community. We pass a shop, the sign for which is in Arabic, only a newspaper stand outside is in English and reads ‘Burka Wearing Raiders Target Jewelers.’ My mind tracks back to stories of no-go areas for white people in Bradford and fierce race riots. I ask Jambul what happened. “Yeah the race riots were about ten years ago. I was only 12 or 13, too young to really remember.

Older lads from my school were going out on mopeds petty bombing and that. It was Asians on whites. It has calmed down nowadays though. But even today groups of Asian lads and white lads can’t walk past each without there being some shit… it’s proper dodge innit. There’s still the Bradford Ointment, have you heard of them?”

I shake my head. “They’re a gang of white hooligans that terrorize Asians.

All the younger kids whose dads are in the Ointment have started the Bradford Youth Ointment, those kids grow up being racist, they’re little bastards.

The E.D.L. [English Defense League] is here too, stirring up trouble between the two communities. Both groups are at fault, it’s the Asians and white lads my age who start all the trouble. The town is divided by estates, and there’s not much mixing, they’re either white or Asian. If an Asian family move to a white estate they move on quick because people give them hell, and it’s the same the other way round. It’s more bother than it’s worth. I don’t associate with any of them. I’ve got white mates and I’ve Asian mates me.”

“There’s a lot of gypsies round here too. Castleford is only the other side of Leeds, that place is like their spiritual home. Round my Mum’s estate you’ll see gypsies tank on the road on horse and carts. There’s a massive gypsy site there near her house.

A couple of months ago my Mum’s mate was taking her dog for a walk, a proper nice Japanese Akita, and gypsies came over and were like ‘sell us your dog, sell us your dog’ and she said ‘no, no’. A day later and the dog’s been tied up in the garden and its gone missing. It was in the paper and everything – gypsies took it for fighting didn’t they. They take dogs and lead. All new build houses get shredded for lead round here – gypsies will rob anything. Gypsies are up to no good. Probably the only people I’m scared of are gypsies. If a gypsy starts on me I’m off me. Not a chance I’m I fighting a gypsy. Even if you got the better of them, you’ll have the whole family looking for you for months. I keep my head down, I can’t be doing with bother.”

Smith grind, Liverpool.

93

Tyres to opposite feeble, to 180, Liverpool.

“Walking into a shop with skateboard and you’re 22…doesn’t look right does it? It was always easier to sell bud on a BMX than on skateboards.

That’s how I started riding. My first bike was the deal mobile. Skating has influenced me heavily but outside of skating I look up to Butcher, Edwin, but British guys as well, Benny L, he’s a true legend and Ditchburn is savage. When the Dub video drops the Americans will be scared of us British. Fuck all the Woodward training camps, us lads have learnt shit in Britain where it’s twice as hard. Britain’s gritty, if you take a slam to the floor it’s flag stone or gravel, it’s rare you find a spot in Britain that has a nice run in and run out, or you have to scrape the ground with your foot for 20 minutes getting rid of all the “I’ve been to more places on my glass. It’s down to the weather, the skateboard than my bike. I used to weather makes it tougher, it makes proper love skating,’ he says, a state- the riders here harder.” ment confirmed by the board attached to his bag in the back of the On my first meeting with Jambul in van. Seeing Jambul on that board, London a few weeks before I thought the origin of his riding style is clear. I had him figured out as a carefree, “I think on my bike as a skater. laid back guy who liked to smoke, ride Four pegs, no brakes, both two feet his bike and listen to reggae. Little forward…I just think as a skater me. did I realise that Jambul has seen and Skating is sick but you just look like a done things that I, or anybody else I chi-chi man with a skateboard under know, have no understanding of. As Jambul raises the back of his t-shirt I your arm.”

“What’s a chi-chi man?” I ask him. learnt he is from a world I don’t know “A batty man.” He replies laughing. or understand, a world I fear.

It’s here in Bradford, between racial tension and gypsies, Jambul grew up with his Mum. “Where I live on my Mum’s estate, it’s a pure white bred scally estate. People are born on the estate and die on the estate. People think going to Leeds is a big day out. It’s a rare occasion people leave Bradford, maybe Tenerife for holiday once a year but that’s it. I’ve lived in Leeds for a year, Poole for a year but Bradford for most of my life. I ain’t been many places me. I’ve been to London for two days, Sheffield twice, Birmingham once, Wolverhampton once, that’s it man. I haven’t been that far. I’ve been to Doncaster too.” He says looking unconcerned, still smoking out of the window of my van as we drive around his hometown trying to find a dry spot.

94

“There she is, that’s where I got stabbed, it’s healed pretty good for only six weeks… talk to me, what do you think?” I look at the wound, bright pink, clean and straight, like the mark of a surgical operation. I ask him what happened. “I’ve got to careful what I say. I’ve got the court coming up me. I can say I got stabbed up. I doubt the bizzys [police] are going see this magazine. The police watched it all happen from the top of the road. But because of Health and Safety regulations they couldn’t come down to help me, because they were swinging blades and that. The bizzys stood at the top and bottom of the road, and watched us getting shanked up… mad that.” Jambul says calmly reliving the moments where he very nearly got murdered on the streets of his hometown.

“I was having a night out. I got wasted in some mosher bar. After I went to a take away across the road, I asked for some Bhajis and this girl [who worked there] started mouthing off to me and I mouthed off a bit back. Just mouthing off though, nothing bad like. I got my food, walked out, next thing I know the owners come out after me and were kicking off. There was six of them altogether, and just me and my mate. We tried to get out of there, then my mate was like ‘check

Tyres, London.

yourself, check yourself’. I tapped my head and it was like paint, red paint all over my hand. Blood was pouring from my head. I had been hit with a big kebab blade.

The girl swung that at me…I don’t know…’Machete to the head – still ain’t dead.’ While I was checking my head another one ran in and stabbed me in the back, right next to my kidneys. It was more like a slash than a stab, so my kidneys were sound. I also got a slash on my bum as well.

I was in hospital for just two days. The morning after the attack I had to go to the bizzy station in the morning to do a statement and then back to hospital. It’s going to court in October. The girls up for attempted murder. I just want to put it all behind me.”

“Just one week later, when I still had stitches in and the attack was still fresh on my mind I was riding my bike to my mate’s house. I wasn’t meant to be riding my bike yet, I turned down a road and got hit by a car me, side on. My pegs went straight into the bumper. If I hadn’t had pegs on it would of smashed my legs in. I bounced straight into the windscreen, slid off and lads got out and they were like ‘what are you going to do about that?’ and

they walked round the corner and said ‘come with me, come with me,’ I tanked it off. I can’t be fighting. If I got put in a headlock my head would just split open. I’d split up with my bird, got stabbed and then hit by a car, then the day I got my stitches out I went to the Prow Jam and I got signed to ride for The Make. I thought three bad things, one good thing.”

After my first meeting with Jambul I began to spend a fare amount of time with him, going out riding and sleeping side by side on the Dub House floor in Liverpool. My initial opinion of him as trustworthy and good character only grew, but I also began to hear more dark stories from his past that contrasted with the man I was getting to know. I’d been told he had a history of stealing cars, and had been in trouble with the law. One evening, again in the van, returning from a days riding I ask him what happened. “Years ago I used to go grafting [burgling] with my mates. We used to go car key burgling houses. I was a little bastard wasn’t I? Just taking cars to get money. If you are from round my end you can either sell drugs or you end up going grafting. That’s what everyone does. It’s just 95

Narrow over pegs, Liverpool.

“ FAST MONEY

COMES WITH CONSEQUENCES

” 96

Ice to over, Bradford.

quick money. I was 19 and stupid. I only did it for a short time. I was lazy me. At that time I just wanted to ride my bike, get baked and skate. I could go out and earn good money in a short shift and chill for a few weeks.” Every word Jambul speaks is spoken with genuine remorse and a shake of the head facing downwards, he doesn’t seem proud but is eager to tell me more. Intrigued, I begin to bombard him with questions. How did he get started?

Why didn’t he just get a job? How much money did he make? How does he shift the stolen goods?

“For shifting stuff we had different guys for different stuff. We had a chop shop for the motors. We’d sell cars to them. We’d just get German cars, Audis, BMs, anything German because they’re easy to take apart. Then we had a guy for TVs, laptops, PS3s and any electronic gizmos.

We had a taxi rank who would be our transport. If we didn’t get a car, we used to fill taxis up with TVs and give the driver £20 and some phones, then we’d all get in separate taxis home so we were never together. We’d meet at a house later and work out selling everything. It was bad.”

Hearing the finer points of the surprising level of planning and organization, I’m gripped in fascination by the details and his openness. “So the taxi drivers were all in on it?” I ask him. “Yeah they loved a bit of dodgyness. We just used this one taxi firm, they all knew what we were doing. At one time we didn’t have to pay for taxis, I could just get everywhere in Bradford. We kept the taxi drivers sweet then if we ever got stuck in an area with loads of bizzys about we’d just phone up a taxi and lay down in the back so it didn’t look like anyone was in the taxi.”

“How did you get in the houses?”

“Mole grips”. He answers instantly. “Yeah mole grips on PVC doors. One of my mates showed me how to do it silently and in a matter of minutes. Everyone gets shown how to do it when you go grafting. Three is the magic number. One for lookout, one to do the door and one to go in – it’s even split then.

“Did you get hand picked to do it by some mates?” I ask him.

“A couple of my mates used to do it and I used to say ‘one day you’ll graft the wrong person’s house and they’ll have you.’ I never thought I’d do it. Then I was skint as fuck when I lived in Leeds, and they said ‘do you want to make

a bit of money?’ On my first job I was shitting myself me.

I had a hat on, gloves on, rucksack on my back. I had spare clothes ready at my mates. We used to chuck our clothes away after grafting so there were no fibre traces or trainer footprints. I did the first one and it was the shittest one. We got two plasma TVs and a Nissan Micra. We got £90 each, between four of us. It wasn’t worth it.”

“What about the people in the houses, did you ever get confronted?” I ask him, slightly worried what his answer could be.

“They’re asleep. Most of the houses are big million pound houses. My mates were on it though. They used to drive round taking pictures of people’s houses, taking pictures of people’s curtains, and washing that was on lines – they’re on it. If you go back two days later and the washing is still out, obviously no one is in. You know like what we do for spot hunting, that’s what those guys are like for grafts. They’re constantly looking for the fattest graft, and working out a way to pull it off. I never used to do that stuff. They used to tell me when to graft. I’ve heard a lot of grafters now have been hitting the Asian houses, because the price of Asian gold has gone up. It’s bad that.” He says, again with a shake of the head.

“How did it all come to end then?” I ask him.

“One night me and two mates were out grafting and we saw another group of grafters we knew. We said ‘alright’ and they said ‘we’ll get the top end of the estate, you get the bottom end’. Next thing I know the bizzys were flying round in unmarked cars with the lights off. Everyone jetted off. I was the last one caught me. I was running nonstop, bizzys were throwing truncheons at me, five of them were behind shouting ‘you’re fucked.’ I ended up getting wacked in the leg with a Mag Lite, I couldn’t run away.”

“My mate who got caught first spilled to them and dropped us all in it. The police thought I was the ringleader because I was a bit older, but I was the one who’d only just started doing it. So I admitted it all me. I came clean. I told the police the truth that I just got asked to come out to earn £200. In the week before court the bizzys used to come to my house to take my trainers, the police still have four pairs of my trainers and some tracksuits. They think you’re still on it. Right up until the court date they came round every night to check I was in and not having a victory week.”

“Victory week? What’s that?” I ask.

97

“It’s the week before you go to court, lads would go out and kill it grafting every night getting as much money as possible. Especially if they knew they were going down, they’d just smash it every night. They just stash the cash so when they came out of jail they’ve got money waiting…victory week.”

“So you have a criminal record now?”

“Yeah. I’ve tarnished my record. I used to do little cleaning jobs me, in schools and that, just part-time, working from 3:30 to 5:30, Monday to Friday for £100 a week, but I can’t do jobs like that anymore. Because of my criminal record, I can’t work in schools, I can’t handle money. As soon as you say you have a burglary conviction employers don’t want to know, and I can’t blame them.”

“So you didn’t go to prison then?” I ask, feeling sorry for him. “One of the lads went to prison. I got a suspended sentence for a year, three months on a tag and 200 hours community service steaming clothes for Help The Aged, on seven hour shifts. While I was on tag I was only allowed out between eight in the morning and eight at night. I started community service at nine in the morning and had to head straight home in the evening. I got cabin fever. I was put on tag 15th December to March 15th. I had to stay in for New Years Eve and Christmas, I couldn’t go to my Mum’s even. I spent the whole time alone in the house. If I’d have stepped out the bizzys would have come round and bang I’d be in prison for 51 weeks. I used to get phone calls in the middle of the night from the police checking I was there. These dodgy guys from my community service told me to get a hair dryer on the tag to stretch it or try having a hot bath. So I spent New Years in the hottest bath of my life, with boiling water from the kettle, with olive oil, butter, soap – anything to get it off.

I could get it to my heel but any further and it would of snapped. If you get caught trying to take it off you go to prison. So that was my New Years, alone, burning hot bath covered in olive oil and fairy liquid.”

Hearing Jambul’s story I remember the feeling of physical sickness at the sensation of waking up to find laptops and camera gear stolen. It was a reminder of the anger I felt. As I sat there listening it felt strange sitting beside both a mate but also a convicted burglar, no different to the people who caused myself and countless others so much loss in the past. Believing Jambul to be quite a morally-led person, I ask him if he ever considered the people he stole from. “Of course. I know people worked hard for the stuff I took. I think about karma me. It will come back to me. One day I’ll settle down with a good 98

wife, good house and I’ll wake up and some little bastards will have robbed me. I’ll take it when it comes me.”

Usually up beat and smiling, it’s obvious from the tone of his voice and body language, that Jambul regrets his actions as an impressionable teenager. I ask him how he reflects on those memories and if he understands why he did it. “My Mum finding out I’d been out grafting hit me hard. It was a big enough scare so I’ll never do anything like that again. It’s bad stuff. I don’t want to be 30 and have bare convictions. I wish now I never did what I did.

It was just fast money. Fast money comes with consequences. Afterwards a lass sorted me out, Natalie. She straightened me out... I’m a reformed character. I went from being on house arrest to being locked down with a bird. I’m going to college soon, to sort myself out for the long term. I’m going to do an electrician course. I’ve got A-levels in business studies, so figured I’d do the sparky course and then do alarm fitting or something and go self-employed. I want my Mum to have an easy life and be proud of me. I realised I was little bastard the other year, that’s just growing up I suppose.”

In the days after Jambul told me his stories of taxi getaway cars, olive oil drenched electronic tags and attempted murder, I struggled to fit these stories with the man I’d come to know, like and trust. The two characters seemed incompatible. On our last day shooting photos, Jambul got a puncture on the streets of Bradford. He plucked a staple from his tyre and I handed him a five pound note with which to buy a puncture repair kit. He returned minutes later with the same five pound note and a Halfords repair kit. “I got it on the sly me. I would never do that to a small independent shop but I’m not letting you pay three pounds for a tiny bit of rubber, that’s wrong charging that much, that’s real stealing.”

I then understood Jambul, and how my mate and the convicted criminal co-exist. Outside of being a ground breaking English street rider, he’s a rogue with a sound moral compass and a personal code that transcends the law. To his mates he’s a generous, kind person who also happens to enjoy a bit of five finger discount. He is the kind of guy that if a ten pound note fell from your back pocket he’d return it without hesitation. I ask him if he’s scared about making the same mistakes again in the future. “There’s no way I could return to that life, my Mum would disown me. I have no more chances left, I’ve fucked up too many times. Now I’m hooked up for riding I’m looking forward doing some trips and getting out of Bradford. I just don’t want bother anymore. I’m a chiller me.”

2012 Novus

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Hell On Wheels Book 2: A Chronology for Survival (And An Interview With Angel Nastazio) Heading toward Long Beach Dave’s. It’s a six hour drive. Bancroft is absorbing Pacheco Pass, Route 152 that cuts across the valley through the San Luis reservoir and spits us out on Interstate 5. I take a hit from my coffee. Bancroft looks at me, “Mind if I put my feet up on your dash?”

“I don’t give a fuck, Steve.”

“Alright, just proper manners to ask.”

“Live it up.”

He watches the vast spread of brown mountains, punctuated by a large body of water off to the right of the van, “Who’s this guy we’re staying with in Long Beach?”

“Dave. Imagine the guy from Midnight Oil fucked a really big ogre and they had a kid who chain-smokes and drinks 8 pots of coffee a day.”

“Good.”

“He’s a writer. Except he’s tolerable.”

We’ve had a good time in Santa Cruz, where I’ve interviewed Windy Osborn, and he’s finished shooting Wilkerson for issue three. I’m thinking about Long Beach, but also about nothing, which is tough for me, personally. But I watch the road the mountains and Bancroft jumps in the backseat and shoots some shots of my dog in the front seat while we drive. It’s roughly a 45 minute

drive across the pass, and we’re on the 5. The plan is to head to Long Beach, get settled, then drive across the Mojave desert to meet up with Nastazio, which should be a great feature, but I have my mind on Long Beach and flatland, then onto the road east across the states after summer. There’s a road here, there’s a road across America that is lined with addiction, not Kerouac’s road, which is utter bullshit, but a road beautifully wrought with uncertainty, where the not knowing becomes common-thought, and anything else involving regiment feels like cheating. I have been bound to this for decades, like a non-morphing thing, a subject of sky and asphalt. Nothing fulfilling about it, no redemption, nothing greatly spiritual. There’s a sense of peace on the road, one of the only senses of peace that I find available aside from flatland and writing, particularly on a long drive, say coast to coast. There’s a point found there, where there’s a line tapped, a direct line to the muse, if you will, to the strange source. It’s a blend of fatigue and constant wonderment brought on by the miles and landscapes. It leverages the bullshit. But more than that it, opens doors that will never again shut the same way. It transcends everything. On a constant basis this is destructive. But without a long trip at least twice a year, there is a flattening feeling. It’s the condition

Words by JEFF STEWART Photography by STEVE BANCROFT

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the physicality of BMX has imposed upon a lot of us who want that motion, that freedom. There is no doubt in my mind that had I not been into riding at an early age, I would not know the restlessness due to routine, to climate, to the same grip of faces. It’s timeless and without faltering, that rush of road, the states gutted by the dashboard, the 360 degree view of no intent. The deaths fall to grace, the static burns off and there is a clear, unfiltered view. The same view provided by a pair of handlebars and a front tyre.

just after midnight. I go to knock but the house is dark.

Through the front porch light there is a spider web from the edge of the roof to the ground. It’s giant, human size.

I call his phone. No answer. Bancroft and I unload the gear on in the driveway and drink from the case. I pop open another can and watch the door. Bancroft nods, “See that fucking spider web, mate?”

“Yeah. He’s not answering. Hope he walks out and steps right into it.” Bancroft looks at the house.

I dial the number again, “I don’t want to ring his phone too long.

His girlfriend works early.”

“Does he work?”

“Fuck no. Wait, sometimes he washes windows.”

“Nice.”

I see his big, bald ass moving toward the front door. He opens it, then the screen and walks into the web. He flaps his arms and screams, “GODDAMN IT JESUS SONOFABITCH MOTHERFUCKER!” Bancroft cracks up. He gets to the bottom step then to the sidewalk, “Why didn’t you tell me there was a big fuckin’ web there?”

“Didn’t see it.”

Each of us have a room. Dave went as far to put bottles of water by our beds. He’s back in their lair passed out,

“ WHERE ARE

THE OTHER PERSONALITIES TODAY? HE’S THE LAST ONE.

It’s dark by the time we reach the outskirts of Los Angeles. Bancroft runs across the street and buys a case of beer while I refuel.

I drive over to the mini-mart and we sit outside while he smokes and I sip some really fucking bad coffee. I poke my head in and nod to the guy behind the counter, “When the fuck was this coffee made?” He starts to go into it with details, so I close the door and sit back down with Bancroft. He takes one last hit and flicks the smoke onto the curb, “Fucking XGames, man. I will be in the thick of it.”

“Take it for the team.”

“No shit.”

I let Chico out to piss, then we’re back on the 5, then the 405, then in the driveway of Long Beach Dave’s. It’s

”

Bancroft is in his room and I’m on my back in the dark, watching the ceiling fan. Chico’s snoring next to me. I think about a girl I saw in Wilkerson’s café as I was leaving. She was tall and dirty blonde, in a bikini. I finish and drink the water, and my mind switches subjects to the articles. I am interviewing Andy Jenkins to go with the Windy Osborn interview, like a BMX magazine heritage piece, then I am interviewing Bob Haro, which is an assignment nothing short of beautiful for me. But my mind drifts off to a parking lot in Arizona, 1988, where I first met Chad Johnston. He was in town from Bakersfield, California, on his way to the Tucson AFA contest. A few of us were carpooling. I remember that time frame, then to a contest in 1990, a flatland contest, where Johnston debuted the backward deathtruck, which was basically impossible then. Now, being S&M’s pro flatlander, his brakeless and pegless riding has gone from inimitable to formidable. I see the sentences for the intro to his interview run across the ceiling.

I’m slightly buzzed from the beer and the drive, and I pass out thinking about pegless combos, then to the ocean, then to the shores of Europe. I’ve never been across the pond. I’m thinking about writing a book in London, in Spain, in Switzerland. Anywhere else for once.

Early. Dave’s on his second pot of coffee. I see the old full filter on the counter. He’s on the back porch smoking a cigarette. I hear Bancroft out there with him. I pour a cup and walk out back. We talk a while, and I walk to the plum tree and pluck a juicy one.

It’s hot and bright outside, and we’re headed up to Tehachapi today, to interview Nastazio at his compound. I’m eating plums and watching Chico run the yard with their Dog, Grace. An hour later we’re back up the 5, past the Mulholland exit, and I get a text from Nastazio saying he’s been called away to Los Angeles and he has to put it off for a week. I look at Bancroft, “Fuck.”

“Well, it happens. Would have been nice to know sooner.”

“And another thing, why does he wait exactly 24 hours to text back? It’s a pattern I’ve noticed, is that something they fucking teach you in rock star school? Don’t text media back for one day after they contact you… Not like we’re the fucking paparazzi. I mean, I get it. Not his fault. Shit comes up, man. But come on.”

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I look ahead to the freeway. I need to lighten up on the caffeine. I call Dave, “Tell Denise we’re back on for dinner. Gig got postponed.”

Chico’s on the bed back at Dave’s, and Bancroft and I are pedaling the streets of Venice up to the promenade.

We’d just helped a girl push her empty truck to a spot, found a gas station, filled the small red can and got her back on the road. Some of the gas spilled into the back carpet fibers, and I smell gasoline all the way to the beach, until the odor leaves my face. Bancroft’s never been to Venice. The faces, the bikinis, the canals and the sidewalk from the Venice pier to the Santa Monica pier is flush with fame and freaks, with drum circles on the sand and a skatepark just off the ocean. We carry our bikes to the edge of the beach where two gulls catch my eye over the surface. One chases the other then backs off after a while. The other one becomes a dot then disappears. Words rise from the horizon, a sheet of paper rising from the platen: All the beauty the sea holds hidden, the oldest of things beneath the fear of its depth, the mystery of all life tucked away in the catacombs of her body, in the hearts and thoughts of whales. The sea floor more naked than the moon or Mars, more untouched by mankind’s infant comprehension than either of them. The answer to everything waits in the recesses of her trenches, in the paradise of her undiscovered countries, a land beyond the throws of Shakespeare’s capture of death, beyond theory and faith.

Vonnegut’s quiet, patient sort of fire – the burning of punk.

A mother chasing her kid beaks my thought and we’re back on the promenade. The vendors are ever there, selling jewelry, selling shit that you might buy and use once.

Street performers, hustlers, burned out homeless addicts and hippies, people of from all walks of life. We are pedaling toward the Santa Monica pier. I look back at Bancroft. He’s blown away by all of it. I point to the shore; “This is how I’d like people to think of America when they think of it. This stretch of sidewalk and these two places.”

Dinner at Dave’s and a few beers, and we’re parked in downtown Long Beach behind Chad and his wife, Amy. I haven’t seen him for decades, literally. We follow them to a night spot then over to the downtown fountains,

where Bancroft shoots Johnston, and I sit with Amy and watch him float through combinations that have to be seen to be grasped. At one point I start laughing. It’s literally unreal. We wrap up, I lock down a time to sit with Chad for an interview and we take off back to the house.

Dave crashes early every night. The key article there being crash. I’m in bed with Chico, thinking about Johnston, the fucking levels of what he does and the work it takes him. I realize I’m not riding nearly enough.

The next few days roll on. Bancroft goes his way for a day to meet and interview Castillo, I knock out the Andy Jenkins interview over some beers in San Pedro, and we’ve gone and returned from Cardiff by the Sea, where I’ve interviewed Bob Haro in what was a few hours that I can only describe as holy, because of the history and heritage, but also because he asked me to write the words for his coffee table book about his life and BMX. I get a text from Wilkerson while I’m driving asking me if I’m going to make the XGames that weekend. I text back negative, then I call him, “Wilkerson.

Driving, better to talk than text. Hands free, baby.” “No X Games?

Come on, man. It’s like watching your mom walk around in lingerie.” “Makes it harder to say no, but I am meeting up with Johnston to interview him, then I am doing anything else.”

We hang up. Bancroft takes off for the beach and I ride in the parking lot by Dave’s.

One in the afternoon.

We’ve confirmed it with him. Nastazio’s house for the interview. We drive the 5 north and cross the Mojave Desert. It’s breathtaking, the stretch from the interstate across the landscape. Disfigured things and shades of brown are bent beneath the sun.

We pass the sharpened things and small corpses. At the truckstop a mile from Nastazio’s house I get a text, 24 hours since his last one confirming the interview, saying that he’s been held up in Los Angeles, and can’t make it until Sunday night, which is out for us, because Bancroft has plans with Bestwick. I’m thinking we should show up and shoot photos of the backyard, just for posterity.

I’m holding my coffee and walking to the van. Two and a half hours into a brick wall. I am seeing red. Bancroft sits on the curb and smokes a cigarette next to the air machine, “Jeff.”

“What?”

“Let’s go see his mom.”

The door opens after a few minutes of knocking. We’ve heard a bass guitar in there. His little brother. Nastazio’s mom is showing us the kitchen, the house. She’s full of energy. I like her right off.

“You guys have never seen me on The XLife?”

“Never seen it,” I say. Bancroft holds his can of soda she’s handed to him, “We’re actually interested in Cory’s riding.” “Oh!” Bancroft walks out back and starts shooting things at will. Shots of Nastazio posters, the weight room, the jumps. It’s a good time, actually. I am talking with Angel after she’s posed for some shots out back.

We talk about the evolution of the famed BMXers, and about the numbers of them today, the hugeness of what has become an international million-dollar sports industry. We talk about Cory, about his time at the track as a kid and what he’s become. She nods, “I call him The Last Mohican. Where are the other personalities today?

He’s the last one.”

I am actually hardpressed to disagree with her. There is a play-it-safe mentality that in existence now; which wasn’t present at the beginning, or even welcomed. We talk awhile, she goes into stories about her son, about her family. It’s good sitting there with her. The feel of the place is warm and familiar. The entire time for this Bancroft trip has been like that for me, though, some weird sense of familiarity.

Angel is a good one, vibrant and quick, headstrong and admirably proud of her son. We’re pulling away from the address and the wind is dying down.

Nastazio had mentioned that he had to ride around the wind there, like early in the morning then again toward dusk, but it isn’t terrible today.

The drive back is good again; the Joshua trees and the buzzards pull the scene together nicely. The disfigured fingers of cacti reach out to the end of the thorn vistas, the depth of the Mojave. The mirages linger, the birds circle, and back in Long Beach there is cold beer waiting in the fridge. We miss traffic all the way back. I look at my phone as we pull in the driveway. The whole trip has been seven hours.

Dave’s the next morning. I drop Bancroft off in Los Angeles, see the mega-plex of the XGames, the crowd, the business of it. I head back and ride in the parking lot by Dave’s. That night I interview Chad in a bar in Long Beach. Amy sits in and I get a perfect interview flowing, 103

flawless. The Jack & Cokes arrive without mercy. I’m listening to history, witnessing in verse the roots of what will become the next generation of flatland, if not the most prominent. Theories on the geometry of BMX, stories of Virginia cops and unfair incarceration. The story of the two of them hovers the table in long waves of solid blood. The arterial layout of two decades rolls across the table. I am buzzed here at the table, among the words and energy of these two, and the buzz gives shapes and animism to things otherwise left unnoticed; a lone ice cube, a blade on a ceiling fan slightly bent, a lyric to a song that reveals itself after years of a different meaning through mishearing. The bar is loud and in full-swing, and outside the ocean waits there for no man. It waits there watching like it has for billions of years before tonight, it waits there and laughs. I drain my drink and three more arrive. Then it’s 2 in the morning, we’re at the cars across the street and some old guy pedals his ten-speed past the parking lot with his stereo blasting something hidden under the noise of traffic and two cop cars cruising the street slowly. Amy hands me a stick of gum.

Our time is winding down for this project. In two days from Mother’s, I am dropping Bancroft off at the small Long Beach Airport, getting the loose ends of Long Beach tied up, and heading back north for the bay. But the night after Mother’s, I’m sitting in a different bar and recording McKinney in what is an almost holy interview, so much on the inside of this bizarre industry that appears in form like any other. He spits gold and we drink. It’s good to see him again. He’s doing well for himself. We shoot pool and drink and record. It’s a sports bar, but the atmosphere is tolerable. The bartender knows her job and how to dress. I watch the velvet of the table and I see a parking lot, I see a keyboard full with letters, a steering wheel, but mostly there’s a feeling there, a feeling that I am going to be moving toward somewhere else too soon, a place colder in climate, and a place without the life of southern California. Nothing need ever be given to age and the years that wasn’t worth keeping anyway, but I would like to move here, that was decided the night I got obliterated with Chad and Amy.

“ THE DEATHS

FALL TO GRACE, THE STATIC BURNS OFF AND THERE IS A CLEAR, UNFILTERED VIEW. THE SAME VIEW PROVIDED BY A PAIR OF HANDLEBARS AND A FRONT TYRE.

The next morning Bancroft is back at the games and I’m at S&M with Chad, and we’re bullshitting with Sean McKinney. I set up an interview with him for the next night, and we talk a bit with Moeller, head out to Mother’s in Sunset Beach where Bancroft later appears via train and bus, and we drink there beside the ocean and the Pacific Coast Highway. Bancroft tells me he has his own personal X Games bum, a homeless guy whom he’s fed and tried to sneak in. He shows me the bum’s picture. I smile at the picture. It’s a bum alright, hardcore as one gets. The idea is great, sneak his ass in and let him harangue the patrons for change and food.

Bancroft drinks his beer and shakes his head at the camera’s screen, “Almost got him in, too, mate. This close.”

“Good that you tried. Were the games alright?”

He gives an involuntary cringe, a half shrug and starts to say something, then pauses. I nod to him, “Got it.”

McKinney walks over with two more pitchers. He works here as a bar-back, doorman and regulator on the weekends.

”

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Bancroft’s out east with Bestwick, I’m headed back north up Interstate 5. I’m blasting my music and thinking about McKinney, Moeller, Johnston and Amy, Bancroft and the rest across the Atlantic, thinking of new tricks, about the reality that there is absolutely no reason to stop riding, as well as no option. The blood must run pure, and riding is blood. Up ahead I see a shot and take it, a gap that lets me onto the 5 just before rush hour locks up the lanes behind me. I look back to see the beginning of the gridlock. Up the freeway a mattress comes off the back of a worktruck. I swerve and watch it flip over in my rearview. A few workers are chasing after it now, and it’s almost time to start climbing the Grapevine, which is better going north, and going down the grade a cop is harvesting a speed trap in a work zone, a windstorm up and off the next exit is blowing a dust screen across the median that I blow through and pat the head of Chico the dog, and the life around us is going on as it must. The road is there again, and I am paid with new ideas. A trucker surrenders the left lane as one of his tyres flattens and peels off the rim. I check the mirror for cherries then floor it, while the track ends in a long scream: A chronology for survival, and a wretched end for the pathetic.

Strays 106

DAN COX, fastplat to wallride, Sheffield Photo by Joe Cox

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A Bum and a Bazooka X Games 17

The X Games took place right in the heart of downtown LA. Outside the fence, on the street that runs between the Xtreme Village and the Mega Ramp, there were homeless people sat down watching and preachers with loud hailers heckling the crowds. They were shouting at all the kids with purple mohawks and Monster Energy t-shirts. The kids with mohawks just scuttled past them with their heads down. They were dressed like punks but didn’t know how to deal with a confrontation – especially one about what they were doing with their lives and why they had Monster Energy t-shirts on. Pseudo punks, or maybe they were biding their time.

Once past the security guards, metal detectors and bag searches, the Xtreme Village offers endless options: you could hold a gun and a bazooka, wear a navy diver’s suit, meet a UFC champion, get a ‘Shark Week’ foam fin for you head, have a photo with the Hooter’s girls. . . the list of activities went on and on. With an absence of guiding principals Generation Y is a marketers dream and everyone from the Army to the Church to the Bare Knuckle Boxers was queueing up for young blood.

I resisted the distractions, I was there solely to watch Jamie Beswick and pseudo street riding, both of which were very good, but neither lasted for very long. Due to the events being aired live on TV each discipline only lasts for 10 minutes, so there’s a lot of waiting around. I split my waiting time between eating the free food in the media centre and watching the preachers and homeless people outside.

It was during one of these waiting periods that I meet Davison. He was a bum. He stopped his trolley in front

of where I was sat and gestured towards an empty can of energy drink that was by my feet. I picked it up and handed it to him. With a grunt of gratitude he put it with the rest of his cans, next to his sleeping bag, in his shopping trolley. I asked him how much he got for each can.

“5 cents” he snorted bluntly. Undeterred by his hostility I asked him his name. “Davison” he croaked in a harsh but slightly warmer tone. His voice was broken and distorted, his teeth and eyes where the colour of tobacco, he smelt like he was rotting.

Before he rolled up I’d been half watching skateboarders ride the Mega Ramp. The ramp was so big that you didn’t need to be inside the Games to see it. I asked Davison what he thought of the Mega Ramp. In a voice like Zed from Police Academy he said “I’d do it in my cart if they paid me the same money.” I asked him what he thought of X Games. He really rose to the question, taking it very much to heart “These fools ain’t no extreme.

They don’t know no extreme. Livin’ on these streets for 10 years is extreme.”

Words and Photography by STEVE BANCROFT

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We continued an awkward broken dialogue for a while and I told Davison that there were as many cans as he could carry just the other side of the fence. Energy drinks were being given out free and bin bags were overflowing with the 5 cent cans. I also told him about the Hooters girls and free food. He wanted to go in. I asked him if he had any cleaner clothes “only got what’s on my back” he replied.

I hatched a loose plan in my head. I figured I’d walk with him to security and use my media pass to get him in – it’s a free event anyways. If questioned I’d make sure he kept quiet and I’d tell them his name was Pierre and that he was an influential extreme sports journalist from Europe. A vegitarian too. I’d rebrand him as the next big thing in Xtreme.

He stashed his shopping trolley under some scaffolding and the two of us walked towards the entrance. We got within 20 meters and I saw one of the doormen talk into a radio. As we approached the gate the bulky man in a stewards t-shirt put his hand up for us to stop. “Sorry sir you can’t come in here” he said to me in a firm voice.

“But I’ve got this media pass mate! I’m working here like you! I need to get in to do my job!” He takes a look at my pass. “Well you can go in but not your friend!” he said nodding towards the visibly agitated Davison. As he finished his sentence two thick set security guards appeared behind him and started where he left off. “I’m sorry Sir, we’re going to have to ask you to leave the premises” one said as they approached the dirty smelly tramp. Davison was ruffled, he looked around over both shoulders before making some illegible noises with his

Ty Morrow, Access Hop Wallride, X Games Street Course, LA mouth while starring at me. Feeling somewhat responsible for his situation, I mounted a lame protest “Erm, excuse me, I thought this was a free event open to the public. . . “ I began.

“Sir, we are in charge of security and entrance to this area is at our discretion. Now will you and your friend kindly leave the premises.”

“B. . . B. . . But. . . “ I spluttered.

Pierre, I mean Davison, muttered something about needing to get back to his cart and shuffled off passed the chattering queue that had swelled behind us.

I felt bad. I’d let Davison down on my promise of sacks full of cans and Hooters girls. Disgruntled, I walked hastily round to the entrance in the far corner and strolled on though on my todd unhindered. I headed straight for the canteen in the media centre where I loaded up two cardboard plates full of steaming chicken in tomato sauce with veg and salad. I placed up-turned plates over the top to act as lids, filled my bag with cans of drink from the fridge and walked back out onto the street.

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Davison was sat down where I first met him mumbling to himself. It may not have been trolleys full of empty cans, girls in hot pants and photos with bazookas – but it was hot food and full cans and by the way he excitedly devoured the stuff using his stained yellow hands – he seemed happy enough.

I left him to it and went back in to watch street finals, where Garrett Reynolds proved to anyone who was still in any doubt, that he is by far the most consistent street rider alive. The course looked fun but I’m not sure it was so much Xtreme Street as claimed: a name more like “The Nibbly Little Pseudo Street Jib Clique Invitational” seemed more appropriate.

There’s no moral sentiment to this story. I’m just gutted Davison’s wasn’t allowed in but I’m real glad is cart wasn’t stolen. I really like the X Games and I was stoked to actually experience one first hand – it was a great time. The riding was top notch and it was interesting to see all the weird things that go on there.

switch opposite downside whip

ANTHONY WATKINSON

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Quitters Ross Tanner on leaving Metal Bikes for Dolce & Gabbana.

I

’m minutes from meeting Ross Tanner. Fourth time lucky I think. The first time it had been “an argument with the Mrs”, my second and third failed attempts to meet Ross were less insightful, they were just blunt no shows. But Ross’ story should be worth a wasted journey or two. In the years around 2005 BMX’s longing stare at America momentarily shifted to the unlikely seaside town of Hastings, England. The heart of that British charge was led from a single household, 10 White Rock Street. It is in that household Tanner cut his teeth beside the likes of Baz Keep, Caleb Kilby, Boyley, Fids and Dan Price in a hot bed of progression captured by the legendary video – Number Ten. With his ‘fuck it’ approach to riding and a stand out Sid Vicious dress code, Ross was the UK’s answer to Jimmy Levan. But quicker than Johnny Rotten can say ‘fuck’ on a live TV, Tanner left the BMX wealth of Hastings behind for the temptations of London. He quickly disappeared into an abyss of rumours involving drugs, private jets and A-list models. He left the pages of Ride and Dig, only to reappear photographed aboard yachts in celebrity gossip magazines and half naked in fashion campaigns. As I approach the Birdcage pub in East London, my concerns of yet another no show are forgotten when I see Ross patiently waiting, sat on a curb and smoking a roll up.

Ross: Alright Ron [Ross says to an old man who walks past].

Ron: Evening Ross.

Albion: Is this your local then?

R: Yeah, I love this pub – good karaoke on Fridays.

A: How long have you lived in London?

R: A good few years now. Moving here played a big part in me not riding. I’d probably still be riding if I’d stayed in Hastings. The scene up here is a lot more intense, going out wise especially. When I moved here I distanced myself from my mates who rode. It pulled me away from riding. When I moved here I wasn’t putting anything into riding. I thought the kids deserved to be sponsored more than me.

A: Did you feel you weren’t good to be sponsored anymore then?

R: Everyone’s good enough to be sponsored. For a lot of companies I rode for like ShitLuck and Metal Bikes it was more about personality. But at the point you get sponsored and into the public eye, your sponsors expect a lot from you and I felt I was cheating them.

A: Do you keep in contact with any riders?

R: I still speak to Sandy [Carson] and that, Peter Adam, Dean Hearne, Ben Jukes…that kid is fucking nuts, he’s always in and out of prison. I speak to Stricker once every two weeks as well, he came to London, he came to get fucked, he didn’t bring his bike. Jimmy [Levan]

came to stay with me too, I speak to Leland [Thurman] every now and again, and Fids always texts me racist jokes. I miss the tightness of the old Hastings scene: Amos [Burke], Dan Price, Boyley bless his heart, my brother and Baz [Keep].

A: Good memories yeah?

R: Yeah man. It was all about just travelling around, getting fucked up with your mates and documenting it.

For me that‘s what riding was about. I’ve been in whore houses with Jimmy and Leland, with James Brooks shaking in the corner. I still look at the old videos of trips like Megatour and the ShitLuck trips. Great memories.

A: Don’t you miss any of that?

R: Not really. When you’re leaving something it sits right at the back of your head. I found it easy to leave riding behind, I was getting on. A big reason why I stopped riding was age. I got to 25 and thought I need to think about getting a career, but it’s hard to hold down a job and ride. When you work and you’re constantly phoning up sick with injuries it looks bad.

I got sacked from British Gas for it. I used to write ‘dead by 30’ everywhere, on toilet walls and shit. I said that when I was 27. I’m 29 now, 30 is round the corner but I’m still here.

A: How did you part ways with your bike?

R: I swapped my BMX for a fixie bike. At the time I was doing a lot of plumbing work and I was arriving

Interview by GEORGE MARSHALL

130 to jobs on a BMX with a backpack full of tools, it was killing me. So I swapped my BMX for a big bike, that was my Metal.

A: How long did you ride for Metal for?

R: About three or four years. I was on a ShitLuck trip in Louisville and Jimmy said ‘who are you riding for right now?’ At the time I’d just been thrown off Federal, Ian [Morris] chucked me off for various hotel incidents.

A: Hotel incidents? Like what?

R: Just going on tour to film and only getting fucked up, ruining hotel rooms and doing a lot of drugs. Anyway, Jimmy gave me a bike on that trip. It was more relaxed on Metal, I felt more at home.

A: A while ago I saw you in a celebrity gossip magazine on a yacht surrounded by models. It’s fair to assume your life changed after riding?

R: Yeah it did. [he says putting his face into hands laughing]. I was dating a famous model [Alice Dellal] and I was travelling round the world going from shoot to party with her.

That time I was in Cannes on the Dolce & Gabbana yacht. In that magazine they thought I was in that band the Gallows, before they realised I wasn’t really anybody. Cannes was fucked up.

I got thrown out of a party there with Claudia Schiffer and all those fucking people. That party was total red carpet, photos on entry with my bird and then free vodka shots with Pixie Geldof and Peaches Geldof…dickheads.

I got so fucked that I got chucked out.

I was out my mind. Another time we flew first class to Dubai with beds and shit, just so Alice could DJ at one party. I turned up at Dubai airport and I got strip searched for drugs.

A: So you got into that life all through your girlfriend?

R: Ex-girlfriend. But…yeah. That life just sort of came to me. I met her through going out. I knew she had a lot of money and we were into the same music and stuff. But I quit riding about a year before all that happened. Everyone got the idea when I quit that was the reason, but it wasn’t.

“

A: What do you mean?

R: I don’t know… too much Ketamine, coke and fucking GHB, a lot of drugs.

A: And you worked as a model yourself?

R: Yeah for a bit. I was with Alice for a shoot in Paris and they were like ‘do you want to be in the shoot?’

I said ‘are you going to pay me?’ After the shoot her agency asked if I wanted to go onto their books and I said ‘look I’m a plumber, I’ve never done any of this.’

From the word go I said I’d never do catwalk. And I’d only do it if I got paid.

A: What kind of money did you earn?

R: The most I got was two thousand five hundred for a day, that was in New York, with flights and hotel included.

A: What did you do with the money?

R: Spent it. Money’s for spending.

I don’t have much stuff. I give my stuff away. Whenever I got a new set up I’d always give the old bike to a kid, never sell it. Fids would always sell his.

A: Are you still living the high life?

R: You say high life but I was still living in a shit flat. I never had any money. I wouldn’t say I lived the high life at all.

It had ups and downs. That life lasted for about a year and it was good.

But no…I have a job now. Nowadays I’m back to being a self-employed plumber and I play in a shitty band with my mates. I’ve got a new girlfriend, I live with her, we have a mortgage. The exciting phase of moving up here has past. Now all that stuff is behind me and I’m settled, I’m thinking of getting a BMX again – I just don’t know whether to phone Stu [Dawkins] or Ian.

FROM THE WORD GO I SAID I’D NEVER DO CATWALK

”

A: What did you think when you found yourself living that life?

R: I just went with it. I was oblivious. She got fucked up all the time.

When you have that much money and you get chauffeured around there’s not much to do but get fucked up. That’s all we did every day, in different cities: New York, Milan, L.A. I was following her around the world. Where she’d go, I’d follow. To talk about that time, it’s quite hard. On paper it sounds worse than it was.

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Video Days Fireworks, spine ramps and casual bullying. The perfect recipe for 1998’s classic, ‘Nails in the Coffin.’

1998 was a seminal year. It boasted big changes and a huge increase in popularity for BMX. Key to that were Road Fools, Livid and Nails in the Coffin. This new era of BMX was the very era I was experiencing first hand as a fledgling BMXer - I knew no other kind of BMX, therefore the protagonists from those first few videos I watched became legendary in an instant. What they said and did formed the very foundations for my BMX belief system. Unfortunately none of them were kicking about East London so I went to a BMX shop near my house and interviewed John Dye instead… which is, of course, a joke. The sort of joke the great John Dye might in fact say himself.

Albion: Describe Nails in the Coffin to us.

John: BMX… 1998… UK (this was followed by John taking a big swig from his cup of tea, drank from a cup with a knuckle duster handle) Bicycle Union?

Yeah. We wanted to make somink that portrayed exactly what we did and what a lot of other scenes were doing… and wasn’t so family orientated. And it had to have an edge and have what we all thought was a progressive attitude at that time.

So there was a progressive attitude to the riding, but you were also quite naughty?

Yeah, the attitude was probably… well, there was more emphasis on fun and what we got up to than there was on the riding. Music, fireworks… just mischief. We had fun on our bike and fun off it. At the time a lot of people were making family orientated videos that didn’t offend anyone.

What’s an example of a family orientated BMX video? Props?

Yeah, Props… and even though I really liked the Backyard videos, they were a bit more family orientated, you know? They had a real good feel to them, but it wasn’t what we was doing.

They were like a PG rated version and I really wanted to see raw mischief.

And this is all 1998?

Filmed in 1997 and 1998, yeah.

That’s the era, that’s definitely the most core time in BMX, when the third string of rider owned companies were starting.

I watched Nails earlier and spotted my good friend Martyn Tambling. He crashes at Skate and Ride and winds himself. A crew of onlookers stand around him and you can just see a ring of big old Etnies trainers and huge baggy jeans hanging over them. That’s 1998 for me.

That was definitely a bad jean era.

So the scene and the spots.

Where were all the trails?

Pinner, Ashford, Sidley Woods, Harefield trails, Skate and Ride, Playstation has just opened… some stuff up north.

Benson: Do you remember the first time I saw you guys at Playstation? Basically, all the Union guys were sat up on the mini and you had a £5 note attached to the end of a fishing wire. I’ve never see anyone so happy. you were just dangling it down and getting kids to chase it. But, one time, when they were pulling it, someone rode over it and the fishing wire snapped. You didn’t see where Words and Images by RHYS COREN

the fiver had gone so I though, fuck it, a fiver’s a fiver, so grabbed it and rode off. When I got round the corner I fished it out of my pocket and it was a really shady photocopy with ‘you mug’ written on it!

Hahaha!

So, you were all pretty harsh to each other in them days too.

Well, a couple of guys, like Birdman and Lemsip, they were kind of like the young kids, even though there’s only about three years between us, so they got it. And, if you were good on a bike, you got even more shit.

(An elderly Hasid gent walks in and interupts us. “The mind boggles at these prices, thank God all my kids are married!” He says, sounding exactly like a sound bite from one of the miscellaneous clips from Nails, “You’ll damage that rail one of these days!” We are silent for a second and he walks off).

Handlebars… the signature Union handler? How did that come about?

Well, I think I was the first to put them on. Actually, fuck it- I nicked it off Colin Winkleman and Castillo.

So everyone copied you? Did you give them all shit for that?

Probably, I give people shit for everything. If they put them on they

134 got shit, if they didn’t put them on they got shit! But, there were a few people who didn’t have them. I don’t think Adam (Peters) had them.

And your section song? Is that from the rap-rock genre?

Urgh, no. That’s NOT actually a rap-rock song!

Well… I dunno, John…

It’s more a screamo-fackin-emo song. It’s a band called New Day Rising, and they were just a young band from Canada. I definitely wouldn’t pick that song now…

Did any of the bands on the video ever find out they were on it?

Nah, though the singer from Hardskin comes in ‘ere, though. But, about that song I had… I was in the USA one time, around 1999/2000, and I was in Austin I think… and I met Scerbo when he was on an old FBM trip. Anyway, he said he saw that video and that he really liked that song! He was Dickies / FBM Scerbo back then. He was young and probably wouldn’t admit to it now!

Right… quick fire questions: Large, black bollock?

Hmmm, yeah. That one… don’t think it was the one I got at Leigh on Sea… don’t even remember how I got that one.

Switch footed tailwhip air?

That was this guy Alan Glass. He made some skate videos. He was all like “You can do this with the footage” and mirrored it and never turned it back. They were showing off their software. It was probably the most obvious place to mirror a clip as the extension on that miniramp at Skate and Ride was only on one side.

Tollis?

I heard he went mad on LSD and went back to Greece.

Stuart King?

He’s into surfing… and snowboarding Really? He made a comeback, didn’t he?

Yeah, he made a few comebacks, and they were always good too. I think his part was my favourite part in the video.

You don’t appear to have aged much. Is that the secret to clean living?

Maybe.

Cong?

Well, he’s still about isn’t he, riding vert with Zac. Birdman?

Birdman still rides and he lives in

Hastings. Back in the day he was known as the Millennium Man. Ha! Why? Because he was a couple of years in front of everyone else. And he would let everyone know that as well!

But, just his mates, not with anyone

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I THINK I WAS THE FIRST TO PUT THE BARS ON. ACTUALLY, FUCK IT - I NICKED IT OFF COLIN WINKLEMAN AND CASTILLO

”

else… everyone thought he was quiet and that we was real hard on him.

Galley?

I haven’t seen him for about 6 years…

I dunno. I heard that he still rides. I met him in the 80s and he was always quite a phenomenon. He was splendid. He was fackin awesome.

Out of him and Birdman who was the most naturally gifted?

Jerry, 100%... he was somfink else.

All the music is pretty hardcore on your video, with a few exceptions like Harry J Allstars and The Bangles…

There’s definitely a few songs on there that I wouldn’t use now.

I downloaded most of it off Napster back in the day.

So you have the song off my section?

Yeah.

So you know it ain’t rap-rock, then In iTunes, in the genre section…

‘RAP-ROCK!’ Fack OFF! Which WWF wrestlers would you see as equivalent to riders in Nails in the Coffin? Starting with yourself… Macho Man? Nah. Ravishing Rick Rude?

Nah. Million Dollar Man? Nah. None of them. Jerry, he’d definitely be The Rock, wouldn’t he?

They both have something special about them… the ‘it’ factor.

What would Lemsip be? Razor Ramone or something?

Nah, he’d be an English wrestler.

Mick McManus or something.

Birdman? Sean Michaels or someone cocky like that?

Oh, definitely…

Stuart King?

Bit more technical… Brett Hart.

Adam Peters?

He’d be one of the Godwinns.

The quote on the back cover of the VHS??? I have one here, it says ‘Silence your tongue for 35 minutes and take a look behind the mask of Bicycle Union.

Once you’ve taken a look run a couple of copies off for your friends. This video is for the promotion of BMX. Fuck the FBI and copyright laws. LIVE LIFE… RAISE HELL!’ Common sense, ain’t it? Everyone had these FBI warnings and we just thought, Fuck that! Get real! Ride UK reviewed the video and they took offence to ‘Fuck the FBI.’ Rob Ridge reviewed it. They thought we were just trying to put out some sort of fake image, but it was reality. If anyone was putting out anything fake it was by saying the FBI were actually going to knock on your door for copying a BMX video, you know?

What did you film it on? Your XM1?

Nah, some old High-8 one I bought for £50 from Adam.

Hookey?

Course.

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EDWARDES

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221-225 Camberwell Rd London SE5 0HG 020 77033637 Rider Jason Forde, photo by Chris Hill-Scott

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Brian

Castillo Words and Photography by STEVE BANCROFT

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T

echnical street riding is without a shadow of a doubt the most popular aspect of BMX today. Just take a look at the big names right now, where riders are concerned, the most prominent names in BMX are those of street riders, and for good reason. With its raw grittiness, unrivaled accessibility and unlimited opportunity for creative expression the streets are the perfect environment for BMX to flourish. Brian Castillo is one of BMX’s all time great street pioneers. Growing up riding the schoolyards of southern California, Brian was part of a select few who were pushing the discipline and laying the foundations for where it’s at in 2011. Today, his influence can be found in near-on every web edit that hits the internet. With his riding mostly based around grinds, tricks out of grinds and long flowing street lines, Brian’s early vision helped set the ball rolling over 15 years ago. He was instrumental in growing Primo into the influential powerhouse of a brand that it was in the late 90’s but after a long stint running their BMX program he left to start his own brand, Volume Bikes. That was 12 years ago, and since then he’s expanded his company to include a parts brand and a distribution centre as well as exploring other avenues in bicycle design. We caught up with Brian at the headquarters of 180 Distribution to chat about all things BMX. Albion:What’s that thing there? Is that a flip cam?

Brian: No, I listen to Howard Stern every morning, so this is my serious radio. Do you know who Howard Stern is?

A: Yeah, I think so. He’s that presenter guy?

B: It’s just a digital radio that I plug into a dock. I listen to him religiously every morning.

A: Is he really controversial?

B: I guess, it depends who you talk to.

A: Speaking of controversial, before I came here today I got the impression that you were a bit apprehensive about doing this after reading the Robbie and Moeller episode. What was your take on that controversy?

B: Well it got some people talking. It was definitely an interesting article [laughter]. I mean, I had shops asking me for copies, I had friends asking me for copies, they’d heard about the controversy you know.

A: What do you think? Were we right or wrong to print what Chris Moeller said?

B: Ermm… I could go both ways [laughs]. I get on with both those guys. It was definitely an interesting read though. I think he [Moeller] may have overstepped a mark with the naming of names.

A: I’m going to X Games tomorrow and I’ve heard Robbie has some words for me when I get there.

B: Well you were only the interviewer.

A: Yeah, you’re right. I’ll stop worrying about that. Let’s keep this one clean though eh, you may be a Howard Stern fan, but I’ve had my fill of controversy for a while. Well, can we just start off with a little bit of background: to help me write an intro?

B: Well, OK. What sort of stuff are you after?

A: I don’t know, just something about your background in BMX. B: Ah man, that’s a loaded question… I’m pretty bad at these interviews, really.

A: It’s OK, so am I. B: Erm, well I grew up on a regular street, riding bikes just like everybody else. My whole street rode bikes, you know, jumping curbs and doing that whole thing. Later on my brother got more serious and rode with a guy named George Smoot. Do you know who that is?

A: Uh Uh. B: Well he was like an old dude, he rode for Hutch back in the day, I think he went on to GT. But anyway, he was the hot pro in the area and he had a ramp in his backyard and I got connected with him and just started riding more and more. We built dirt jumps you know…

I grew up riding with Shaun Butler and Rooftop and we all rode in a pack.

A: What, like a gang? How old where you then?

B: I was probably like 15.

A: What, so you grew up with Roofers and Butler?

B: Yeah, riding back then was such a small community of guys and everyone was tight knit, it wasn’t like how it is now, how everyone has their own little groups everywhere.

A: Ah the good old days.

B: Yeah, if you rode a BMX back then, you were friends.

Whether you were a goon or quiet or whatever – you were friends. So we all rode together it didn’t matter.

A: What bike were you riding back then?

B: Whatever was laying around, from S&M Dirt Bikes to old race frames.

A: How about sponsorship history?

B: Eeeerrrmmmm… I think my first hook up must have been through George, he knew Woody Itson who was the team manager for GT and he just gave me GTs. Then Etnies came after that. Then S&M came through riding with Keith Treanor all the time at the P.O.W. house.

A: I remember seeing and hearing about that place all the time. What did it mean, Prisoners Of Westminster or something?

B: [Laughter] Now it could probably mean ‘Prisoners’, but back then it stood for ‘Pros Of Westminster.’ It was a gnarly crew of guys who I looked up to. It was Dave Clymer, it was Todd Lyons – I rode their backyard. I was the grom. I’d never talk to anybody and just rode their backyard all day long.

A: You must have seen some sights? It looked ‘raw’ around there to say the least.

B: You have no idea [laughs]. It was Sal and all those Posh guys now [Ed: the legendary trail riders/builders from PA, who ironically don’t speak with plums in their mouths], Jay Lonegran, Todd Lyons. Moeller was there off and on. Foster was there, I think he had a room. And Dave Clymer was there in the back shed – and that’s a whole other story.

A: It’s crazy where everyone is, or isn’t, now huh?

B: Definitely. Dave Parrick and I used to ride there, we’d meet Rooftop there everyday. We’d ride their whole little course and their mini ramp.

A: What was the last you heard about Dave Clymer?

B: Well, I hear he still goes to S&M parties and just hangs out. He works construction or whatever. I haven’t seen him since the old days of the house.

A: So who was on Etnies when you first started with them?

B: Erm… I believe the first team was Rooftop, he started the program with Don Brown, then Mike Griffin, then I came along shortly after that. Then it just grew from there.

A: Oh, back to the P.O.W. house quick, when Keith ‘The Mad Man’ Treanor threesixty jumped between the ramp and the smaller halfpipe ramp.

Was that a big gap? I’ve seen it on video well over a hundred times but I can never really tell?

B: Yeah, that was a big deal. That was gnarly back then. That was crazy at the time.

A: Do you know who that dude was that was calling it out and offering the money?

B: I can’t remember his name. He just used to live down the street and come over to hang out all the time.

A: I’d like to hang out with him, I feel like I kinda know him.

B: We could probably look him up. Keith was the man back then. He was the dude.

He had the best style. I’ve never seen anyone with that kind of powerful style – kinda like Taj had his style – you don’t see a lot of that with kids these days.

A: Where were those ramps in BMX Inferno, when he was riding to that Cowboy Brown song?

B: They were at RL Osborn’s house. They were built above his swimming pool.

A: We tried to recreate that ramp set-up in my friend’s back garden when we were 15 – didn’t really turn out the way we planned it though. Think we set our sights a little high for a first ramp.

B: Those ramps were awesome. RL used to come out sometimes and check out what was going on, but he’d never really ride – we were all like “Holy shit dude, that’s RL Osborn”.

A: Did you ever ride comps? Did you ever do the whole “Going Pro” thing?

B: Nah, not really. I guess I was like “Video Pro” or whatever you want to call it. I rode some BS comps back in the day but I was always nervous and couldn’t get into it.

A: It’s quite well known that you don’t like riding in big crowds and never really have?

B: That’s not really the case. I probably kind of worded it a little fucked up back then. It’s just that I’m shy and I hate it when people are like “there’s that guy from the magazine, he better be busting”.

A: What, you hate people judging you?

B: Yeah, yeah. I’d much rather just ride for fun than have to deal with any of that.

It’s not like if there’s another guy then I’m not gonna ride with you, or anything like that. It’s just… I don’t know… I’m weird.

A: What was with the nickname ‘Captain Hardcore’ – can you explain that?

B: [laughter] I don’t even know. We were doing some show called Bike ’99.

A: Oh, I remember that one in Birmingham right? I was in the audience.

B: Right. It was at some hotel. I think it was me and Rooftop, we used to get into arguments, and somehow he blurted it out. And then Joe Rich and everyone started calling me it.

A: Yeah, but what is it actually about? What’s it referring too?

B: I was ripping on Rooftop… just on him being ‘Rooftop’. Kinda knocking him for that and he was all like “Oh, OK. Look at Captain Hardcore over there keeping it real.” It just carried on from there… whatever.

A: I remember you were on the front cover of Dig’s Straight Edge Issue, doing a Cannonball. A lot of people who featured in that issue have since fallen off the wagon. Are you still onboard?

B: Yeah. I’ve still never had any alcohol, ever.

A: Really! Ever? Not even a Babysham at Christmas when you were younger?

B: A what? I’m not like a ‘Straight Edge’ guy, it’s just not my thing you know.

A: You’ve never drunk beer!

B: Never.

A: Well how do you know you don’t like it?

B: It’s just the smell of it. It smells like piss to me. I just never got into it.

A: Is that because you saw people mess up on it?

B: Nah, I’m just not interested. People getting drunk and loaded doesn’t bother me, I’m not like that Straight Edge Nazi, it’s just not for me.

A: Well, what do you think of some people who appeared in that issue and have now fallen off the wagon?

B: [laughs] I think it’s pretty funny. They should do a Straight Edge Issue now and see how those guys are getting on. Some of those guys actually preached Straight Edge and now they’re headed in the opposite direction.

A: [laughs] That would be sweet, like a ‘Straight Edge Revisited’ issue.

What do you think about all the weed smoking that seems to be so prolific in BMX these days – personally I’m not into it. I don’t mind the weed smoking – it’s just the glamorising of it I’m against.

B: What are you talking about – you have dreads – you smoke weed right?

A: Nah, I look like I do, but I’m no pot head. Sure, I’ll have a few toots on a jive stick once in a while, but I’m not about to put a ganja leaf on the cover of this magazine.

B: Why is it all the people I know that have dreads don’t smoke weed?

A: I blame Bob Marley.

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B: You’re just putting on a front so people you interview think you’re all baked out of it.

A: Yeah, it’s a disguise. Would you a sponsor rider who openly and outwardly smokes and promotes smoking weed?

B: [laughter] What are you kidding! That’s our whole team! I just went on a road trip with that crew. They’re baked all day.

A: What’s your take on it?

B: [laughter] They even called me, before the trip, and were like “You’re not going to be a Nazi about all this are you?” I told them that as long as I don’t smell it then I don’t give a shit what they do.

They had this thing called a ‘Humidifier’ and they’d use it every hour. I couldn’t smell a thing – so it didn’t bother me.

A: What, you let them smoke in the van– ever heard of passive smoking?

B: Yeah, they smoked in the van. I told them “As long as I don’t smell it and I don’t get high myself – go nuts.”

A: Do you think that just by featuring weed smoking – that is promoting it?

B: I think it’s tacky. We are selling bikes to kids and I don’t need those letters from Dads and Moms. But, the majority of pros do smoke weed you know, but you just need to be cool about it – you don’t need to be putting it in people’s faces.

A: OK enough pot talk let’s get back to your riding. These days, the majority of videos feature

“

I GET A LOT OF SHIT FOR RIDING THE SAME SPOTS EVERYDAY, BUT I’M 35 AND I DON’T CARE ANY MORE.

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long street lines – linking tricks together into smooth flowing lines is all the rage. In my eyes, you started that. Would you say you were the first rider to really push in the “street line” direction? Have you heard that before?

B: Errrmmm, not really. That’s just how we rode back then. A lot of it was just Rooftop and me just battling.

I hate to say it, but back then we studied skateboarding. We just watched how they did lines and we always wanted to do trick after trick and just keep it flowing.

That’s just how we rode.

A: Have you never been credited with that before?

B: No, I don’t think I have.

A: Well congratulations, I’m giving it to you now.

People still put out video sections with tricks like feeble hard 180 mixed with like a smith 180. You were doing shit like that 10 years ago on legit high stuff – what do you think of that.

B: Thanks. Well yeah we were doing some of it. I don’t really know what you want me to say?

A: [laughs] Yeah, I don’t really know what I’m fishing at. I guess I’m just trying to give you props and point out that you were way ahead of your time and some people are only now catching up.

B: [laughs] Thank you. I appreciate that. I think that’s one thing missing from BMX – and that’s respect. I’m not saying I want it for things I’ve done in the past, but old school guys who people don’t even know. People like Chris Day, he was doing bashguard grinds down rails all those years ago and no one’s heard of him.

Craig Campbell too, he’s another one. Young BMXers have no idea. I hate to keep mentioning skateboarding but they still have Lance Mountain and Mark Gonzalez, they’re still the idols. They’re still in the magazines

and stuff like that. I guess I don’t think the media shows enough respect.

A: Well, we do. So don’t lump us in with that massive generalisation.

B: Well, kids need to know.

A: Just this week we’ve been to see Wilkerson and Bob Haro – so put that in your straight edge pipe and smoke it.

B: That’s huge, totally. Those are the founding fathers you know.

A: OK, let’s move on. What happened to Metal Bikes? What was your involvement there?

B: I’m not really sure how me and Jimmy got involved… it was a long time ago. It might just have been that we were both sponsorless, both looking for something at the time. At one point Zak over at Kink was involved and we all met up over at Jimmy’s in Louisville, and then it kind of just dissolved and Zak wanted out… I don’t know. I think Jimmy and my perspectives were a little different on things so I guess we both went our separate ways there.

A: So did you go straight from that to starting Volume?

B: Yeah, we started going then with Volume as a frame, fork, bar company.

A: What was the story behind those Mad Dog bars you guys came out with. Was that retaliation at Moeller for still making the Castillo bars after you left S&M? B: Yeah, they changed the name to AD bars, but they kept making them.

A: What does AD stand for?

B: After Death. I thought it was funny. At the time the 4-piece bar was a good seller and I wanted to make some under my own company. So I figured if he was still

selling my bar then I’d call them Mad Dog bars [note: Mad Dog is Chris Moeller’s nickname].

A: Were the bars the same?

B: I don’t know. Maybe they were a little different. But they were probably the same [laughs].

A: So you design the products, you do the marketing, you shoot the photos, you lay out the adverts and catalogues and you run the whole company here… did you go to University for any of that or is it all self taught?

B: Nah, it’s all self taught. I tell everyone… all you gotta do is pick up a book.

A: That’s quite amazing. Do you ever go out to Taiwan?

B: Oh yeah. I used to go out a lot, now it’s kinda chilled out. You had to back then. When we first started Taiwan was banned from anyone’s minds, we were right behind Hoffman going in to all these vendors. Now it’s so saturated with all these brands… every little kid can go there and get an agent and get whatever they want made. When we did it we went through the ringer with all these vendors trying to make the product better and having to do it from scratch.

A: These days I see much of the BMX industry as just a branding exercise, where all the products are fundamentally identical, all coming out of the same factory with different logos on and people only chose to buy products based on the team and the aesthetic style of the company. What do you think about that?

B: It’s so easy to get things made now. All the original companies had to test all the tubing and designs and heat treatments and everything – but now everything is laid out for you. The template is done, so all you have is the marketing and team and everything else is ready 141

“ NAH, IT’S ALL SELF TAUGHT. I TELL EVERYONE… ALL YOU GOTTA DO IS PICK UP A BOOK.

”

to go. It’s like the skateboard deck, where you’re putting this pro rider’s name on it.

A: Over the years, is there anything you think you’ve brought to the table as far as progressions, innovations, developments.

B: Here and there. There’s not one thing that comes to mind. But we’ve been there since day one. We’ve been through the ringer you know.

A: What year did you start Volume?

B: It was ’99. We were the second company out of Cycle Logic you know [Cycle Logic now make around 80% of aftermarket BMX frames].

A: And that was you guys and Hoffman? How many brands do you think get stuff made there now?

B: Oh my gosh… I have no idea… some fucking retardedly high number. We were one of the companies that created the template used by all these brands now. We just started out to make a product that was affordable and came out on time… which is the opposite of how it 142

is nowadays in Taiwan [laughs].

A: So prices are going up and the waiting times on manufacture are getting longer over there huh?

B: Oh yeah. I think U.S. is probably quicker now and they’re comparable on price these days, so. . . Tubing prices keep going up and all the other shit, so. . . Especially now when a vendor has 30 companies under their roof, it gets tougher and tougher.

A: You guys do a load of other bike stuff too right?

You do road bikes, commuter bikes and fix gear bikes. Is that just natural progression for you?

B: Yeah, I like to cruise around on a bike and go to the video store or the market or whatever… just cruise around you know. The whole thing kinda just happened as an accident really. I kinda just wanted a track bike for myself and it just kinda opened doors and blew up from there.

A: What do you think of people doing tricks on fixed gear bikes and riding them in skateparks?

Brain: Errmmm… I’d rather see them on BMX bikes.

It’s weird, I don’t really get it.

A: Would you ever make scooters?

B: Scooters? No [laughs].

A: Those things are like locusts. They’re stripping skateparks all over the world. I blame Australia.

B: You don’t get that many in parks around here.

A: Really, it’s getting out of hand in England.

John Dye is doing his best to keep the numbers down though.

B: That’s good to hear. I’m definitely a bicycle kinda guy. Scooters definitely don’t do it for me.

A: What about Go Karts? Can I have a go in your Go Kart?

B: If you can get it working then hell yeah [laughs].

A: You sponsor some well known riders. A few who are in the X Games this weekend. How does that come about? How did you hook up Pat Casey and Dennis Enarson and people like that?

B: Pat was a shop rider who lived a block from me, one day I went to his house and watched him ride his ramp and it was the most amazing thing… and Dennis was the same. And Doyle was friends with Bennett and we all used to ride together, so it just worked out you know.

A: Where’s Bennett now?

B: I just spoke to him this week, he’s out in Pittsburg flipping houses.

A: What do that mean? He’s moving house?

B: Nah, he’s buying houses and doing them up and selling them on.

A: Oh, do you pay your riders?

B: Oh yeah!

A: How often do you ride?

B: I try to ride every morning. So I ride every day. I get a lot of shit for riding the same spots everyday but I’m 35 and I don’t care any more. If I relearn something that I learnt 10 years ago then I’m happy.

A: I’m hearing you there. I’m hanging on to tricks by my fingernails right now. But we went out earlier to shoot some photos and from watching you ride it’s obvious you have an amazing talent on your bike, do you think you’ll ever come out with one last video section?

B: I always say I’d like to, but it’s always… [long pause] I just don’t care you know… I’m just happy riding. It’s a lot of hard work filming a section, it’s aggravating. I don’t have any sponsors, I don’t give a shit. I have riders who just kill it, why am I gonna… I don’t want to be that 35 year old guy holding on to what I used to be. I still have fun, I still ride and try to progress… it is what it is.

Fuck, I just don’t give a shit.

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