Keith Duly flat as a pancake over the biggest doubles at Brighton's track. Photo by Mark Noble.
E-wire zine.
Ashboard and the history of trails.
Martin and Stephen Murray interview.
Scott Stevens interview.
Oxford jam.
Phil Dolan and James White interview.
Radlands jam.
Bike test: Powerlite FS Expert, Diamond Back Reactor Pro, Schwinn XS.3 and Ruption New Boy.
80 pages.
Jason Davies clicks a turndown at Stone Edge Skatepark, during the BS finals contest in Florida on the cover. Photo by Brad McDonald.
Road trip America!
Richard Brown interview.
Ollie Matthews and Rob Ridge's KHE Catweasles.
Phil Dolan's 96 Morales.
RADLANDS CONTEST
BS Finals.
BIKES: REDLINE 640, MONGOOSE MENACE, HEAVY TOOLS RULER, HEAVY TOOLS FREESTYLER.
72 pages.
Neal Wood jumping a set of doubles on the cover.
Steve Grace interview.
JAMIE BESTWICK & HARO BLAMMO
BATH RAMPS
BIKE 96 REVIEW
SUSSEX TRAILS, BO PEEPS ETC
FASTEST BRITISH PROS
NEC TRADE SHOW
RUPTION CHOGGER, SCHWINN PREDATOR, DB VENOM PRO, HARO ZIPPO, PROLITE TESTS.
80 pages.
Ollie Bland on the cover.
Exeter Jam, The Notts and South Shields BMX scene, Jason Davies, the new KHE Beater, World Cup racing, Dennis McCoy interview, ...
80 pages.
Simon Tabron flats an invert during the Bath BCR contest on the cover. Photo by Mark Noble.
1996 Backyard jam.
Fat jam.
Bath BCR jam.
1996 Freestyle World Championships.
Kris Bennett interview and poster.
Dave Osato interview.
Chico Hooke interview.
DMR Trigger and Dragonfly Double Dynamite tests.
72 pages.
James Shepherd, Sheep Bites column from the October/November '96 issue of Ride: "Remember your roots." Old guys with real DX pedals and a closet full of magazines love the roots. Hey, I'm down with the roots just like the next guy, but you can't go boverboard. Sure, looking back a lot of really cool stuff happened. In general, though, the sport was pretty gay. Mostly because the average rider had no clue. I had no clue. Jimmy'Z shorts. Fold-out-motorcycle-style-bitch pegs, mags and no fing clue.
Today, with rider-owned magazines and bike companies, people know what's up. John Q. Rider wouldn't stand for the crap that used to be shoveled out. It wasn't anyone's fault, really, the sport was new and just blew up. One day you were some pin-headed kid, and the next you're a high-paid pin head pro riding for a company run by an old man. It's really pretty funny. I won't go over everything, we'll just wade through a few of the more idiotic parts of the sea that was BMX AND FREESTYLE.
First of all, let's talk bikes. I hear people whining about how some new frame sucks, or that forks bend too easily. You want to talk about crappy bikes, bikes used to SUCK. I mean really SUCK. Try getting a Spin Master to work with caliper brakes on mags at the age of thirteen. It just doesn't happen, my friends. Clueless companies made stupid frames with standing platforms that extended as far back as the rear axle. Great for carrying luggage, not so good for schralping on down at the spot. If you want to show your roots, ride an old MCS Styler, but you won't be retro, you'll be retarded.
Now let's talk pros. Ex-superstar Mike Dominguez took his bike out of its box a total of six times one year. Those six times were to ride contests, which were part of his contract. No longer wanting to ride, but still wanting to draw a check, he rode as little as he possibly could, and people loved it. It was a little before the whole "ride to live, live to ride" thing.
Then there was the rollerskating retard, Fred Blood, who crossed over into the pro freestyle ranks. This fruitcake had about as much skill as an I-hopping 10-year old, but put him in an ad with a chick, two minitrucks, a complete bike, and you've got yourself a pro. That couldn't happen today, unless Jess Dyrenforth makes a comeback.
Then there were magazines. There is no doubt that almost everybody with roots considers BMX Action and Freestylin' to be the riders bibles, but even they were not without flaws.
Bob Osborn, who owned BMXA and Freestylin', had a son named RL. RL happened to be a great bike rider. He was so great, in fact, that during his pro career he got (I'm guessing) over thirty covers of his father's magazines. Ask Woody Itson (one of RL's main competitors at one time) how many covers he got. I'll bet he could count them on one hand.
Bob also had a daughter named Windy who shot photos for the magazines. Windy had a boyfriend named Eddie Fiola. Maybe you've heard of him? When your girlfriend works at a coffee house, chances are you can get free coffee. When your girlfriend shoots for a bike magazine, you're the king of coverage. Actually, the real king of coverage was Mike Loveridge, because he lived down the freeway from BMX Plus. Whooaaa!
Location didn't hurt Chris Moeller, either. In 1987, when Chris was still Mad Dog, he made the cover of BMXA four times. In case you don't know, getting four covers of the same mag in one year is ridiculous. Chris is definitely bad ass, but come on. If Ride's overlord, B Rad, pulled that crap you guys would have his ass tarred and feathered faster than the autowind on his Nikon.
Honestly, I don't think the sport was entirely gay, I'm just trying to make a point. Some people miss the past so much, they don't enjoy the present. It's not that bikes were so great, it's that you were young. Everything was great. No rent, no bills, just riding and trying to get laid. That's what people really miss, and hell yeah, I miss it too. If you're young and just got into bikes, this time in your life is the shit, so live it up. 'Cause one day you might grow up to be some fruitcake burnout with a beat-up old Dirt Bike that rambles on for hours about how great growing up riding was. If you are some fruitcake burnout with an old beat-up RL20II, sorry, but "F 'em if they can't take a joke."
Remember your roots, just don't let them keep you from where you're going.
Rich Siebel unleash a superman in Bournemouth on the cover.
Neal Wood interview.
1996 King Of Concrete.
Neal Wood interview.
Amos Burke & S&M Sabbath.
Slades Farm jam.
Dale Holmes interview.
Non Stop jam.
Tests: Schwinn, KHE, Fisher, Redline, Dragonfly, Heavy Tools, GT.
88 pages.
Steve Grace fufanu at Bristol Indoor Skatepark on the cover. Photo by Mark Noble.
Frames: Morales BTS, Bully Hot Rod and King Liberty.
South West and Guernsey scenes.
Radlands Jam.
Nick Cox interview.
Homemade bikes: Geoff Cain.
Roof drops; Patrick Borges poster.
Curtis DSR and 2Hip Big Boy bike test.
French Supercross in Grenoble.
Skate and Ride skatepark, Bristol.
Deftones interview.
92 pages.
Sean McKinney on the cover. Photo by Keith Mulligan.
US Trails.
The Sean McKinney interview, the longest interview we've ever run at over 7.000 words.
Wordsley trails.
The biggest races ever: ABA Grands, NBL Christmas Classic, UCI World Cup round 1.
Ricky Ratt poster.
Major interview with Christophe Leveque.
Giant Mosh bike test.
What's the best BMX frame material ?
GT vs Powerlite.
92 pages.
Darryl at the Slades Farm jam on the cover. Photo by Mark Noble.
The dropout dilemna by George French.
Zach Shaw interview.
Sheep Hills locals.
Real life at the HB house.
Bike 97.
Frame check: Curtis Powell, Standard Trail Boss, Homeless Mack and S&M Next Generation.
Southsea easter jam.
Brian Foster poster.
Slades Farm jam.
Jamies Staff interview.
Northern John interview.
Mike Griffin interview.
1st three GBBF Nationals races and KOD.
The Herbaliser.
92 pages.
John Dye, trails style. Photo by Paul Roberts.
John Dye interview.
Bristol Cider Riders, BCR '97.
S&M Next Generation bike test.
Frame check: SE PK Ripper XL, KHE Premium Lagger, TNT Super Fong, Mongoose DMC, Mongoose Fuzz.
Liverpool Rampworks comp.
Ian Morris poster.
Coppull GBBF National 4 and the Grands.
Mike Mullen interview.
Mansfield National.
Rated: Mark Theaker.
92 pages.
John Dye, rideukbmx.com, cover story, may 2009:
Spot: Pinner trails in Middlesex, this was the trail spot we rode and built at back in the 90’s, Adam Peters lived just up the road from the trails and although Grotbags lived the closest, he definitely did the least digging, in fact he had a pretty good amount of coverage, and I mean loads from Pinner, he had pages of pics from the place and a poster, in full race gear in the mid 90’s-way uncool-anyway you got to love the Grotbags. Pinner was a seminal spot back then and had its fair share of good local riders (Scott Stevens, Elliot Mcgrath, Birdman, Jerry Galley, Stuart King, Lemsip and many others all rode there) the place was a stop off spot for any trail tripper’s from the north and sometimes Europe coming through in the summer. It featured in many old 90’s videos and can be seen on the Backyard box set that came out late last year. Basically if you are over 30 now and ride trails you would have rode Pinner. Also on a side note one of the girls from 90’s Grange Hill used to walk her dog through those woods, Birdman knew her or something-Louise Bradshaw-White. She is in a bunch of TV shows still.
Photographer: Grotbags. The ciggie smoking pot demon with a thousand sponsor deals and a fleet of free race bikes stashed in his garage had taken up photography and was at that point the main contributor at Ride magazine.
Trick: Eeerm? So I was shooting some pics with Grotbags (Paul Roberts) for an interview in Ride back in 97. The interview was pretty horrible and full of teen angst, although I was way passed that age by then anyway! We shot at Leigh on Sea skate park-a one handed flatty on the 8 foot, bar spin and tail whip over the hip in the mini complex, a stinky x up at Bristol skate park, a 360 tyre tap on the indoor spine at the first Seventies warehouse and a table 3 at Pinner, actually I didn’t like many of the pics other than the 1 hand flatty and the table 3 from that interview- not so much the photography but the bike moves. We shot for a day at Pinner trails, I’m not sure but I think it was a weekday when we were doing these pics. We were shooting on one jump, the last jump in the line, back then most people’s trails had one trick jump per line and more often than not it was the last in the line, so this was the obligatory “trick set” in the line. Anyway I remember doing a whole load of 360 variations that day, one of which, the table one ended up in the interview inside the magazine. At the end of the session I was f@cking around doing some 1 footers, at that time there wasn’t really anyone doing that trick that I can remember, back then it wasn’t really even worth doing, this was the era of bar spins to x ups, truck drivers and all kinds of no footed variations. I was just messing about and telling Grotbags to check it out its like that motorbike thing where they dangle the foot off all lazy and leave it out there for a while, I’d never done it before that day and didn’t do it again for a long time after that, years after. A few weeks later Grotbags told me “I think you’re going on the cover’, I wasn’t even sure if I wanted to be on the cover, so I asked him what pic and he told me “that moto cross dog leg thing”, I was just like f@ck this, I thought it was pretty lame and definitely would have binned that move if some one else was on the cover doing it! Which is funny cause I still do that move today alot!
Adam Volk double seatgrab on the cover.
1997 Backyard jam.
Aberden scene
1997 World freestyle championships.
1997 King Of Concrete
Andrew Faris interview.
Rated: Jon Cryer
Bideford and Bournemouth GBBF Nationals
Local: Chris Dane
Ryan Brennan interview.
100 pages.
Jerry Galley no-foot x-up and Jon Barnett toboggan 360 on the cover. Photos by Paul Roberts.
Videos reviews: Ride Thunder, Reaction, Organised Confusion and Ells Bells Hoice.
Dean Hearne interview.
Pinner generations: Martin Allmey, Elliott Magrath and Scott Stephens.
Simon Tabron and his new Mongoose DMC.
Trails: Ashford, Bromsgrove, Hampden park, Sidley woods, Cotmanhay.
The Dortmund Pipetribe.
Poster: Fids nothing at Sidley.
Frame check: DNA Hopper, KHE Catweasle, Eastern, KHE Premium Lagger.
Jams: FAT jam, Revenge of the nerds, Slades jam and New Malden jam.
Rated: James Moon and Paul Stathan.
Jon Barnett interview.
108 pages.