The Worst Rider in a Trailer Park in Idaho in 1982

 In the summer of 1982, my family moved to Blue Valley Trailer Park, outside of Boise, Idaho.  I just finished my sophomore year in high school, I was a runner, but a bad one.  It was hot as fuck during the days, and there wasn't much to do in trailer park, so the ten or so of us teenage guys, and a a couple girls, would emerge after supper, and ride our K-mart special BMX bikes on these little jumps and berms some motorcycle rider had built a couple years earlier.  I quickly realized I was the worst rider in the trailer park. 

We pushed each other every night, talking shit and trying to out jump the others.  Two foot high jumps to flat.  We got better.  We broke parts and bought better ones.  Our bikes improved.  That fall we found the Boise BMX track and started racing at the last race of the year.  We rode on the frozen pond that winter, doing flat track slides, and we made snow jumps.  In the spring, when the jumps were still muddy, we made ramp to ramp jumps with cinder blocks and plywood. 

BMX became our thing.  We started buying BMX magazines.  The first I bought was the December 1982 issue of BMX Plus! with Stu Thomsen on the cover.  The next summer my family moved back in town.  I raced all year in 1983, and into 1984, then focused on freestyle, and joined Idaho's only trick team.  I eventually got a Skyway T/A with red Z-Rims, like the one I'm posing with above (photo by Steve Crandall), which is from Chad Powers' future BMX museum collection.  The other guys in the trailer park all faded.  I kept riding.  Four years later, I landed a job at BMX Action and FREESTYLIN' magazines.  That's how it started for me.

 Wall ride over my sister's head, 1990.  Blues Brothers Wall, Huntington Beach, California.  Yeah, it's a bit undervert, but this wall is sooooooo fun.  I tried framestand wall rides on it, but could never let go of the bars.

 Double Wall ride, Randy Lawrence going opposite up top, me with a little wall bounce below.  Alan Valek chillin' on top of the wall.  Blues Brothers Wall, H.B., 1990.

 Carving tile in the Nude Bowl, on a 105 degree day, at a session that included Brian Blyther, Xavier Mendez, Keith Treanor, John Povah, and Mike Sarrail shooting pics.  I fucking loved the Nude Bowl in those days where no parks existed.  Middle of nowhere, SoCal desert, near Palm Desert. 1990.

 I never could do a proper fakie wall ride, except on the Blues Brothers Wall.  Josh White told me about some walls near the beach one day at the H.B. Pier, and we went looking for them.  I'd ridden the bike path above them for a year, never knew they were there.  We found this wall, and I sessioned there for the next 15 years on and off.  Josh, being Josh, was doing 7 foot high wall rides that first day, and wall fakies then popping off the wall and doing a lookdown out.  He rocked it.  1990.

I started trying tailwhips off small jumps in early 1987.  Believe it or not, I was the only guy trying tailwhips at the first King of Dirt at Rich Bartlett's trails in Palmdale in 1987.  Everyone else hadn't thought of it, and didn't think they were possible on dirt then.  I started trying bunnyhop tailwhips in the summer of 1987.  I never landed one off a jump.  I came close to bunnyhop tailwhips, landing a few with a foot on the frame, toedragging the other foot, in December 1989.  I never landed one clean.  Bill Nitschke, a WAY better rider than me, made those happen and The Whopper was born.  I did do some pretty cool tailwhip variations, though. 

Have fun at the Old School BMX Reunion this weekend guys.  Let's see some pics...