Looking through an old box of videotapes the other day I came across one labeled TC Cycles 1988. It struck me that, wow that was 20 years ago, almost to the date of the footage. I can remember that time era like it was yesterday. The people I was riding bikes and skateboards with, the girl I was dating and the album of the summer Run Dmc’s Tougher Than Leather. And the spot to be was TC Cycles or the parking lot in front of Mr. Philly at Hadley Center in South Plainfield or possibly at one of the crazy ramp set-ups in my back yard.  20 Years later I would like to send a shout out to some of the people that made that time a special one for me…. Dave Wynn, Greg McCray owners of TC Cycles, Eric Searles, Waldo Gabaldon , Rob, Brian and Chris Hurst, Bill Valier, Julian Lynch, Frank Valenti, Chris Chang, Jason Schullman,Adam Stack , Bob Ryer  and the General team of the day   Mark Roldan,Brendan Morgan,Roger Sullivan, Brett Middaugh , Jeff Mayer(on crutches)  a special shout out in heaven to Lisa Gayle Fazekus and my Grandfather who were both there that day and anyone else I missed ..  Thanks for the memories and hit me up sometime…. I keep in touch with a few of you guys maybe its time for a reunion……..Oh yeah thanks to whomever made this tape. And what were you thinking with the music..????? ahhahahaha

I'm sure many of you have been over to Raiden Bill Hayden's site, NJBMXRacing.com, to check the NJ BMX racing scene or throw out a comment or two...or more. But for those of you who haven't or those of you who want to see how an ex hardcore BMX racer (Bill is from the Braddock era of BMX racing, so....well....if you've read some of my stuff you catch the drift, to use an 80's term), ex ABA  professional track builder, current dad, husband, part time BMX racer, and one of the I ride a BMX bike and built a set of trails or track in my yard set lives and has fun in the off  hours, check these shots. Bill lives up in the far northwest corner of NJ, near...well near the mountains and the bears and has opened up his yard to the local BMX crew to have fun. Grabbing a machine and his small crew Bill built up a nice set of trails on his acreage. Check these shots and check the rules he runs by. BMXers grow up, some get married have kids, get homes, mortgages, the usual stuff, but you can't take that BMX out of 'em. Push the limits, have a good time and give back to what gave us so much fun over the years.

BMX's first generation has grown up and the words "yardwork" have taken on a whole new meaning.

House rules:

1. I need to know ya
2. No drinking back there, if you are of age you can drink later on the deck
3.Newbies, wear a helmet
4. If you screw up a landing or jump, fix it
5. Throw garbage in the cans we have
6. Check runs before riding, this is important

Live the BMX life.

Well, here it is, the final installment in the Harry Myers interview. This is the part where I actually really got to meet the guy 1987-1989 and sorta be there towards the end, lol, the end of General and the end of the beginning of freestyle BMX. I scoured some of the old mags and found a couple classic General ads with Steve Rulli, Pete Kearney and the infamous General Scooter in them. Harry goes into all the freestyle stuff here and sorta gives us RL's vision of the future of BMX as he saw it in 1988. Which if you were watching X-Games 14, finally came to life this past weekend. To me Harry was a good guy who was there trying to get things going in BMX at all it's stages, I gotta say it just would never have been the same without him. Here's the final installment in the Harry Myers interview. I guess I'll leave with the now famous Wilkerson quote modified for this... There will never be another first generation of BMX promoters. Harry Myers, the General Bicycles years.

General takes freestyle BMX seriously

And then I hear about freestyle and I’m thinking, and anything I wanted to do they let me do, because the bike line took off immediately. General now had a bike line that gave bike dealers a chance to compete and it took a long time before other companies jumped on the bandwagon and did the same thing. But they listened when I suggested the freestyle line. This is a growing sport I like the idea. Let’s start a little freestyle team and we did. And Steve Rulli was one of the original members of it, it really wasn’t a fancy team. But what we decided we would do, is we were going to put on an event at Madison Square Garden.

The Average BMXer ~Part 9~

Fran from Clifton, dumb decisions and AC/DC inspiration...

Fall of 1984 we started getting some coverage, mainly due to knowing Jimmy Cerullo at JV Bikes. (<newspaper front page 24 years ago, yours clumbsily) So as I mentioned last installement we spent the winter of 1984-1985 riding in a nice frosty garage in Dunellen, NJ. By this time, Dan, me and Tom in there practicing kick turns, ramp stalls and rollbacks in there. We would have ridden the 1/4 pipe too but, well, back then it used to actually get so cold that it SNOWED in New Jersey for long periods of time! Hard to believe but it did. Come spring we thought we were so badass that it was time to send a letter into HARO asking about potential sponsorships and we got a signed letter from the main Bob Haro guy himself saying, sure we're always looking for new talent, send in a tape... So we sent it in, waited, and waited a bit more....and then finally sucked it up and called in. We (actually Dan, LOL) were able to talk to his brother Ron and believe it or not, they actually were gonna give us a jersey and a break on parts. Of course in our dumb minds we were thinking, yea we're full factory bad boys (I know, I know, just bear with the old geez  here for a minute), so it's apparent to Ron Haro that we weren't sounding too stoked on that deal and he's like, well guys keep at it man and ya never know but that's all we can do for now. So... we just continue on our way, dreams of being HARO's NJ team dashed to bits!, LOL (check the letter from Bob H over here>)

By spring of '85 it was apparent that a 7' 1/4 pipe with a million 2x4's was not going to be easy to transport if we were going to show people what this BMX freestyle thing was all about. So, Tom's dad who was an engineer, (which is probably sorta why that 1/4 had too many pieces of wood to begin with) goes for round 2 and actually comes up with a killer design for a 7' ramp. (<picture of that ramp is over there )So we get it together and quickly get to playing on that...in a stone driveway with more rocks than Mt. Rushmore.

The series for riders and by the riders has once again stepped up the heat level for it's racing radness. As the NBL National season draws to a close at the famous Trilogy Park BMX in Pottstown, PA, the Hyper Pro-Am has acquired a big purse for a special pre-race pro-am on Friday August 8th.

$1,200 simoleans has been added to the purse for the Pro-Am race that friday night, so head on over to the other side of the Delaware for some pre Olympic race craziness with NJ and PA's current premiere BMX facility. Look for Hyper Pro-Am regulars: Kelty, Smith, Farside, Transue, Mulhern, Weimar, Whipple, etc...to be in full attendance.

This will be the race not to miss. For more info hit up: hyperproam.com read their full news and updated points by clicking Read More