The Powers BMX museum in Richmond, Virginia

In this video, Chad Powers, owner of Powers BMX bike shop and museum, gives a tour of his amazing collection of  BMX bikes, components, clothing, magazines and videos.  The Powers shop and museum is located in Richmond, Virginia.  If you're into BMX, and get near Richmond, go check this place out.  You can buy from the Powers BMX website here.*

All of us who got seriously into BMX at some point, remember the bikes, media, and unique frames, forks and components of that era.  It's like the cartoons you watched as a little kid, that first period of being into BMX gets imprinted on you.  Years later, when you see a bike from that era, or an old set of cranks or handlebars at a garage sale, or find an old video or magazine from that time, it takes you right back to your early days of BMX stoke. 

In the weird journey of my life, I landed in Richmond, Virginia, more down and out then usual, in August of 2018.  I had never been to Richmond, I didn't know anyone there, as far as I knew, and I had $3.50 in my pocket when I got off the Greyhound bus.   About three weeks later, much to my surprise, Former FBM owner Steve Crandall called me up, and said, "Hey, meet me at Powers Bikes this afternoon, I'll help you out."  I figured out where the shop was, which at the time was on the side of this big, old industrial building, where several companies manufactured different products.  When I got there, Steve wasn't there yet, but I met Chad Powers, who is one of the coolest guys in BMX.  

I wound up staying in Richmond for about eight months, and made several trips to Powers during that time.  Both Steve and Chad helped me out a lot personally while I was in Richmond, and I really thank them for all their help.  But that first day, the shop looked like this high roofed place, more a small warehouse than a bike shop, with dozens and dozens of bikes hanging high up on the walls.  

When Chad found out I was a former BMX industry guy who had worked at BMX Action and FREESTYLIN' magazines for a short period of time, he led me into a back room with dozens of binders of magazines.  Much to my surprise, he asked me to sign my first published article, which I wrote as a freelance guy, for FREESTYLIN'.  The article covered the AFA Masters freestyle contest in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in the spring of 1986.  It appeared in the August '86 issue of FREESTYLIN', with the iconic cover featuring a tiny photo of a new ramp rider, Josh White.  

My article wasn't great, by any means.  But it just happened to be the article that Mat Hoffman's first editorial photo was in.  The industry didn't know who Mat was then, and I had to call around to find out his name, after editor Andy Jenkins said they had a great photo of some young kid doing a no footed can-can, which only two people could do then.  They didn't even know Mat's name for the photo caption, but I mentioned him in the article, and he was in the results, winning 14-15 expert.  That contest was amazing for me, and seeing the magazine took me back to the weekend that launched me into the BMX industry, and changed my whole life.  So that's my personal story of Chad's collection taking me back to my own beginnings in BMX.  It's done the same for many other riders before and since.  It will be a trip down memory lane if you visit Powers BMX.

Back out in the main part of the shop, which was more of a small warehouse packed with stuff, I saw a bike way up high that looked almost identical to my first bike.  I told Chad about it.  It happens to be the bike Chad points out in this video, a 1984 or so Skyway T/A, with red Z-Rims and a red pad set.  I didn't realize, until watching this video, that finding that bike cheap started Chad's collection.  Yep, I had a pad set on my "freestyle" bike, because I was still racing when I got that bike.  Chad pulled it down that day, and I got a photo with the bike.  Here's me in 1985, on my second BMX bike, and the first frameset I bought new.

Yes, it's a really dorky photo, shot by my co-worker, Vaughn Kidwell, at the Boise Fun Spot, the summer of 1985.  I learned a bunch of Robert Peterson style balance tricks over that previous Idaho winter, since I couldn't ride outside much.  

While I was in Richmond, Chad told me of his dream to get a bigger shop, and actually be able to have a BMX museum, with his huge collection of bikes, components, jerseys, clothes, magazines, and other things BMX.  When I was about to leave the area, he told me he was looking at a new building.  So it's great to see this video of Chad taking the time to give a tour of the huge collection displayed in the new building.  

For all of you old schoolers and mid schoolers out there, if you have some BMX stuff that's cool and vintage, and you'd like to put it somewhere that lots of other BMXers and see it and appreciate it, think about donating to the Powers BMX museum.  Again, if you're into BMX, and wind up near Richmond, Virginia at some point, go see Chad and the BMX museum, you'll be glad you did.  

Here are a couple of photos I shot at the BMX DIY World Championships jam in 2018, put on by Steve Crandall and Chad Powers, at Powers BMX's old location.  

I had been away from the sport for so long that I don't know who either of these riders are.  If you do know, hit me up on Facebook or email, and let me know.  

* Not a paid link.

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A few more random photos from recent days...

 Top photo, downtown Richmond, looking from the Mayo Bridge over part of the James River.  In the photo above, the little blotch near the top of the tree is an osprey.  They're big raptors, hawk-type birds, with wingspans of about 5 feet, that catch fish in the river. Ospreys carry those fish headfirst, aerodynamically.  No other bird got the aerodynamic memo.  I need a better zoom, (or a real camera), this is the best  I could do.  You can see ospreys in early mornings, flying over the river near the Mayo bridge, looking for a fish breakfast.  There's really cool bird watching there, which includes, cormorants, Canada geese, great blue herons, vultures, and a bald eagle or two, if you're lucky.  I'm surprised there aren't more wildlife photographers on the Mayo (and other) bridges catching the action in the mornings.

 As an old school, HAS BEEN BMX guy, "squirrely" is a term we used for people who don't pedal smoothly.  When sketchy BMX bike riders die, they probably go to the Squirrely Gates.  But people here can just go to a game at The Diamond, to go through them.

Also as an old BMX/skateboard guy, I'm always watching the local sticker culture.  It's a low key form of street art to people like me, and seldom noticed vandalism to most.  I've seen a few of these stickers around town, and I think it's funny AF.  Finally got a pic of one downtown.

Richmond's Shockhoe Bottom are in photos #5

 Here's some art pieces I stumbled across on my little exploratory photo hike in the Shockhoe Bottom area of downtown Richmond, Virginia.  These are through the weird little portal doorways a couple of posts back.  Really cool looking in the early morning light.  #RVAallday

Richmond's Shockhoe Bottom in photos #4

More photos when form last weekend, when I walked around the "urban jungle" part of the Shockhoe Bottom section of downtown Richmond, Virginia.  I was walking to a bus stop around dawn, so some cool, backlit flowers, and just started taking pics.  I didn't have anywhere to be, so it turned into a fun hour exploring the crazy architecture of this area.

Richmond's Shockhoe Bottom in photos #3

 Here's some more photos from my photo taking hike around the Shockhoe Bottom area of downtown Richmond, Virginia, last weekend.  I started around dawn, and wandered around for an hour.  I started near 14th Street and the James River, along the canal.

Richmond's Shockhoe Bottom in photos #2

 Continuing on with my wandering photo hike through the "urban jungle" part of the Shockhoe Bottom area in downtown Richmond, Virginia.  It was about dawn when I started snapping pics, and I walked around shooting photos for about an hour.  It's a really cool area with all the overhead roads and train tracks.  It has a sort of dystopian movie set feel, while having this crazy cool mix of shapes and light and shadow.  I started all this near 14th Street by the James River.  #RVA all day.

Richmond's Shockhoe Bottom in photos #1

 Last weekend, heading to a bus stop one morning, I wandered through the Shockhoe Bottom area of Richmond, the urban jungle area where there are all these raised highway and railroads elevated up high.  Walking by, I saw these pink blossoms above, totally backlit by the dawn sun. It seemed like a cool photo, so a snapped a few. Since I wasn't in a hurry, I wandered around a while, shooting photo of the weird urban landscape, which is this brutal mixture of concrete, metal, shadows, light areas, and lines and angles.  Then there were some spring blossoms as a total juxtaposition in places.  So here are the better pic from that outing.

Rock climbing wall and a river resident

 I saw three great blue herons on my walk along the river.  This guy was kind enough to let me take a close photo.

 I actually went down the riverside trail looking for a bunch of street art I know is there somewhere.  I went the wrong way for that, but found another really cool thing I'd heard about, this old bridge support wall turned climbing wall.  It's hard to believe now, but I got into bouldering (low altitude rock climbing without ropes) in '92, and maybe I'll get back to it someday.  This is some good motivation to keep losing weight.

 Sport climber nearing the top.

Another wide shot, with a climber hanging, trying to figure out the next moves.

Under the bridge downtown...

 For the whole five months I've been in Richmond, I've been fighting just to survive day after day.  I got here after my quick escape form NC, and landed in the bus stop with about $3 in my pocket.  It's been rough, starting out homeless in a city I'd never been to, not knowing anyone or where to go and not go in the city.  There hasn't been much time to wander around and explore, which is what I normally do when I get to a new city.  But on New Year's Day, I took the bus down to Manchester, and walked west on the walkway on top of the flood wall by the big James River.  Here's a few pics I snapped.  Above, cool looking bridge supports.

 A group of kayakers doing a little brown water rafting.  The river was high from recent rains, so the water was pretty brown with sediment.

 The direct line down this bridge's supports.

 Rapids downtown?  Hell yeah, Richmond's got 'em.  I even saw what I think was a young bald eagle soaring above this island.  It looked too big to be a hawk, and the head was still brown.  A sign on the walkway said there are nesting bald eagles in the city limits here.  Cool.  There are also muskrats, beavers and even otters in this river.  Crazy.

 Looking northwest from under the bridge with the arches.  Pilings from a long gone bridge, and the big pedestrian bridge, with a lot of people out on New Year's Day.

Downtown Richmond (aka RVA) from across the river in the Manchester area.  Every section of the city has a long established name here. 

Caffeine Addled Nonsense: Steve Crandall's Art Show last night

 It was a dark and stormy night...  No, really, it was.  OK, not really stormy, but was dark and rainy as I walked from the Pulse bus stop in the Scott's Addition area here in Richmond.  I was looking for an industrial place called Cut and Bleed, the site of Steve Crandall's art show.  Cut and Bleed isn't a nightclub playing The Cure and Morrissey 24/7 for depressed Suicide Girls.  It's an oversized item printing business.  Need to wrap Grandma's car with photos of your kids, or a 30 foot tall banner of The Ramones?  Cut and Bleed can do it for you. In the shop there are a couple of rooms which are the perfect size for an indie art show.  FBM Bikes founder Steve Crandall, throwing some peace above, held a solo art show displaying his signature style of cool coffee cups and cinder block ramps there last night, December 14, 2018.

 The 3,000 pound concrete elephant in the room.  If you were at the D.I.Y. World Championships Jam at Powers Bikes in October, or if you saw video it, you saw this HUGE cinder block with a curved ramp set up on it, a MEGA launch ramp.  One of Steve's big themes is the idea, seen often last night, to "build your own fun."  His simple icon of this is what so many of us BMX guys and girls started jumping as kids, a cinder block and a board.  I remember jumping similar ramps as an 8-year-old on a tall handlebar banana seat bike, and doing the same thing on my BMX bike at 17.  Nearly all kids who have ridden bikes much know this simple set-up and remember it.  To Crandall, it's the epitome of using what's around to build something to ride and create your own fun.  This simple, but awesome, idea is a main theme of Steve Crandall's outlook on out world.  You don't need a ton of money, you don't need to be sponsored by a basketball shoe company to have fun on your bike.  Look around.  See what's sitting around, grab some stuff, build a little something, and go session.

Somehow, in a Stonehenge-like mystery, Crandall had the 3,000 pound monster cinder block from the D.I.Y. Jam transported to the art show.  To me, walking in and seeing that humongous object there just made me laugh.  It totally reminded me of the Cadillac Ranch outside of Amarillo, Texas.  It just made people smile, whether you  wanted to or not.  The absurdity of this huge chunk of concrete in the middle of the show, with the launch ramp on it, was just hilarious.

 If you are at all familiar with Steve Crandall's paintings, you know coffee is his main theme.  Coffee cups, to be exact.  I heard him tell someone last night that on a cross country trip a while back , he was guzzling coffee to stay awake, and the coffee cup idea took root in his brain.  Coffee cups took on a mystic importance to him, or something along those lines.  So there were about 10 big paintings on plywood, most of them huge coffee cups, and maybe 40 small paintings on paper in the show.  Each one is was a bit different, and all were reasonably priced for the people at the show to take home.  The blue painting above had a bicycle for eyes, while the brown one has a bike inside a heart.  Love coffee, love bikes, ride, have fun. 

If I had my act together financially right now, I would have taken this painting above home.  That was my favorite of the show, except for the two big photos.  Below, the real thing.  Life imitates art imitating BMX. 

 Another look at the monster block, with local BMX racer and BMX Hooligan mom's funny jacket slogan behind it.  She's definitely NOT ugly, by the way.  This was also the most kid friendly art show I've seen.  The mega-sized launch ramp and mini quarterpipe (with the yellow arrow in the background), made a little halfpipe.  A few of the kids burned off energy running back and forth between them, like riding a halfpipe without a bike.  Hey, they were real ramps, not art show props, go ahead kids.  Have fun.  You won't brake these.

This was my other favorite of the show.  It's a very vintage ironing board with a happy coffee cup and "surf's up" on it.  All in all, it was a really cool indie art show, and the old school BMX crowd of Richmond, a really good crew of people, showed up to check it out, and support Steve's work.  Plenty of people went home with art.  We all pigged out on the snacks, and wine and beer for most.  One idea if you ever do a BMX world art show, put some art up next to the snacks (which were in a side room).  A whole bunch of us stood there munching, for a long time, because we're mostly cheap ass BMXers at heart, and talking.  I'd put a few pieces up (and plastic covered), by the food, beer, and wine.

It was a good time, with a cool, BMX scene crowd, and a chill and fun vibe all evening.  Props to Steve Crandall for doing a ton of original work, putting the show on, and showing us all a good time.

I was inspired.  My mind was racing on the way out for ideas to do my own art show somewhere down the line.  Oh, if anyone needs a dining room table that will survive a nuclear holocaust and the zombie apocalypse, call Crandall.  That monster cinder block may need a new home. 

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