This is an editorial I wrote in late 1991, and much to my surprise, was published in the February 1992 issue of Go Magazine. I was originally just going to run this little story in my ‘zine, SToKe, but I was feeling the vibe of the story, and thought I’d send it over to the guys at Go Magazine and see what happens. About 6 months before I’d sent the magazine editor a photo I shot from a contest I went to in New York City. They ran that photo in the news section of the magazine (you can see that below) and that kinda blew me away. I figured if they didn’t run my story, I’d just use it in my ‘zine, so I really had nothing to lose. I was pretty shocked a few months later when the magazine hit the newsstands – and there was my piece in the coveted magazine editorial intro space. Holy shit! This completely blew my mind.
I posted this story on the Chase BMX Magazine website back on Jan. 11, 2001 – it seems so, so long ago. And to put that into perspective, two days before I put that on the website, we broke the news that Ruben Alcantara had just signed with MacNeil. Wow. Here’s the post of what I actually put up – this time I was digging through digital archives when I came across this, and thought I should probably archive it on my site. We’re packing up the house, moving into a townhome we just bought, so looks like I’m moving those several boxes of old BMX magazines one more time.
I was digging through one of several boxes of old BMX magazines (ranging from the present back to 1982) at home the other night the other night when I came across this old editorial I did for Go Magazine waaay back in the day. I totally forgot about it. I mean, I wrote in more than 9 years ago, so I sat down and read it. It got me thinking… as cliché as it is – the more things change, the more they stay the same. BMX has gone through some pretty crazy changes over the last decade, but it all comes back to that first rush you got when you pulled that first trick, cleared that set of doubles, or finally got above the coping on a vert ramp. Another thing that hasn’t changed – I’m still a horrible writer…
Well, at least I’ve worked on the writing a bit now…
Here’s the cover of that issue… Dave Clymer roasting the stairs at the Nude Pool (I’d have to dig out the issue to confirm that was the Nude Pool, but I’m pretty sure that’s what the stairs looked like).
This is the photo I sent in from the Mullaly Park contest in New York City (South Bronx actually, right by Yankee Stadium). I have to admit I was pretty stoked at the time to get this photo of Jeff Harris’ barrel roll attempt published. Today that photo would never run, because a magazine would never run a photo of an un-pulled trick. At the time this trick was completely unfathomable, and now 22 years later I think you could count on two hands how many times it’s been landed. Looking back at the rest of the photos that ran for the coverage of that contest, I should have sent more of mine in. This was just supposed to be a smaller contest, and the magazine probably didn’t have to budget to have one of their pro photographers there to cover it. But the quality of riders there made this a pretty large contest. I would have to say that this was probably Taj Mihelich’s breakout contest. His style still stands out in my mind, hitting that super small jumpbox (most certainly by today’s standards), his Grizz airs over that thing were legendary.
updated: August 26, 2010 — link to part 2 added
A little while back Bob Kronbauer from VancouverIsAwesome.com hit me up to see if I’d be interested in contributing a short series about the Vanier Park Dirt Jumps – something that could explain a bit of the process that happens behind-the-scenes of getting a project like that to become a reality. I’m always keen to get the word out about these kinds of projects, and Vancouver Is Awesome is exactly the kind of platform that’s perfect for this series. I’m really down with the VIA concept, so I’m quite happy to do put some time into this. And, maybe somebody will learn a thing or two and be inspired to make something like this happen in their neighbourhood/town/city. I’ve got over 15 years of experience working with city councillors and park boards on skateparks, so I’m happy to share some of my ideas.
I’ll admit it’s quite a challenge to edit down the past 10+ years of this process into a digestible (short), interesting story. People aren’t likely to sit down and read a story like this on a blog, so this series will merely skim the surface of the process, but maybe people will be interested in knowing a bit more about how much work goes into getting a skatepark or dirt jump facility made. They just don’t magically show up one day. Public projects like this drag on for years, and are mostly uninteresting, so I’m interested in what kind of feedback we get on this.
I’ll be sure to come back and add links the other parts of the series as they go live, but for now, you can start here:
In The Dirt Series! Part One: Vanier Park History
In The Dirt Series! Part Two: Coming Together
This is great timing for this series to come out – fresh off the very successful launch of the Vancouver Skateboard Coalition’s Kensington Park skatepark/pool (the last 2 pictures shown here), we’ve had a lot of momentum as of late, and a lot of the projects we’ve been working years on are all coming to completion by end of summer.
You can find the original story on VIA here.
Monday night the Vancouver Park Board voted unanimously in favour of the Dirt Jump Park proposal for Vanier Park. I’m pretty excited this has finally happened, as this is a project I’ve been working on since the original jumps at Oak & 37th were plowed when that park was redesigned. That was 2004/2005… It’s been so long I can’t even remember exactly when it happened. Couldn’t have done this without the help of Commissioner Sarah Blyth, and the rest of the Park Board Commissioners. And, of course Mark Vulliamy and Park Board staff. Mark V kicks ass.
Tuesday night I was interviewed live-on-air at the new CBC Radio headquarters downtown. It was a fairly brief interview with Stephen Quinn on the On The Coast Show at 5:50pm. If I can get an .mp3 copy of it, I’ll try to post it. It went pretty good, as I was pretty prepared going in.
Quick pic I fired off at CBC Radio while waiting to go into the sound booth. New offices look good.
Here’s the text of the VIA press release here:
“Last night the Vancouver Park Board Commissioners voted unanimously in favour of the proposed Dirt Jump park in Vanier Park. With the Park Board office beyond capacity with BMX and Mountain Bikers, the group listened in on delegations presenting in favour of the park, with no parties speaking against. One-by-one the Commissioners expressed their positive thoughts about the project, and thanked those whose hard work has made this possible. Opinions were expressed to ensure that the park will be designed with elements for all levels of riding, from young children right up to advanced users. And, that the park should be designed in such a way to fit in with Vanier Park, which could be done with landscaping. The project was given the blessing by the Vancouver’s Bicycle Advisory Committee.”
“One of the delegates, a mother who came to express her thoughts commended the Park Board on the approval process. She was impressed, and expressed how pleased she was with the inclusion of the community, Vanier Park stakeholders, and interested parties all were heard on this proposal. Multiple generations were in the room with her to see a positive outcome, which will hopefully inspire more youth to be involved.”
“Very special thanks go out to Commissioner Sarah Blyth for her dedication to this project, and the rest of the Park Board Commissioners for keeping their promise of engaging the youth and keeping them active as one of their platforms. Mark Vulliamy and Park Board staff have also been vital to making the Dirt Jump park a reality.”
You can learn more about the project on our Facebook page:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=53459006970&ref=ts
A few years back I helped contribute a story to Ireland’s DigBMX magazine about Paul Buchanan, a somewhat elusive rider that shied away from all the magazines and media back in the day. He’s originally from London, Ontario, so I’ve known him since he was a kid. Dig just recently posted the ‘Solo Mission’ story onto the classic archives section of their site, so it was good to see the article again… I’d completely forgotten about it.
You can check it out here: www.digbmx.com/mag-archive/classics/dig-archives-paul-buchanan
Here’s the original story, text only (for my archives)
Continue reading “DigBMX Mag: Paul Buchanan Solo Mission article” »
