Freestylin' USA 1988

This is one of the few BMX freestyle videos of the late 1980's, made by a guy completely out of the the BMX and freestyle industry. 

We have my Huntington beach Pier riding buddy Mike Sarrail to thank for this one.  Every weekend in the late 1980's and early 1990's, we were at the H.B. Pier riding for crowds.  While the pros and top ams were touring the country and the world, A handful of us H.B. locals, and lots of random visiting freestylers, performed for crowds of 100 or more people, several times a day, on weekends.  One time I tried to figure out just how many people I rode in front of there, and the number was over 140,000 people, 100 to sometimes 500 per crowd, over a five year period.

Though he lived an hour inland, Mike was a local at the pier on weekends, and was known for doing the undertaker, as well as barspinning and no handed Miami hop hops, among other tricks.  Riding for lots of crowds back then, we inevitably met a lot of people, many of whom think thought freestyle was really cool.  Every now and then, some guy would say he was going to use us in a movie or something, and make us famous.  That never happened.

But one day Mike spent half an hour or 45 minutes talking to a guy who said he made videos, and had some distribution channel to sell thousands of them in mainstream discount stores, like Kmart.  He asked Mike about freestyle, what kinds of riding there were, who the top riders were, and what music we listened to.  Mike gave him all kinds of ideas.  I rode up and talked to the guy to, a little bit. 

He left, and we didn't think much of it.  But then the guy called Mike back, and he ended up helping to set up the Metal MC music video shoot/ramp jam.  The guy rented the then-empty lot on the corner of PCH and Main, across from the pier, the same lot we used for local AFA contests then.  It's where Huntington Surf & Sport, and the Duke Kahanamoku statue now stand.  Mike helped the guy get in touch with GT, and he rented the infamous Stonehenge, 4 sided box ramp, for the jam.  There was no contest, Mike and I just called everyone we knew and told them there would be a jam that weekend.

If was one big, long, causal, totally fun session.  As you can see in the video, Brian Blyther and Dave Voelker were launching.  Rich Bartlett came down from the high desert.  Dave Vanderspek, Maurice Meyer and the NorCal posse came down.  The San Diego guys came up.  Eddie Roman was riding, and if you look close, you can see Brad Blanchard land a 540 jump on the Stonehenge deck, which was pretty epic in 1988. 

It was one of the most fun and drama-free days of riding at any event in those days.  The guy shot at the Camarillo halfpipe, Mission Beach, and several other places.  The guy was completely outside the BMX/freestyle industry.  The camera work is mostly lame.  The editing is hokey.  There was no attempt to get the freshest, most progressive riding. 

But the guy made the video quick, got it on the market, and probably sold more copies than any other BMX freestyle video of the late 1980's.  That was the home video world then.  There's a lot of good riding, and a bunch of amateurs got some coverage.  As weird as it sounds, thousands more kids saw this video than the GT and BMX Plus videos together, which were the main industry video producers then. 

I just started a new blog for Marvin Davits, to promote Marvin's business of installing dinghy davits on boats and yachts.  Check it out.