OK so a few months ago I saw there was a video uploaded onto facebook. It featured Chris Cole and Dak Roche doing "equivalent" tricks of skateboarding and BMX.
Its pretty awesome that this video shows the equivalent tricks in each respective category. It presents BMX and skateboarding in a way that kids can grasp and understand how similar, yet so different, each artform can be. I'll get into that sometime later.
But heres the thing, Dak is actually a much better skateboarder than this video makes him look. Dude can boardslide a handrail easily and got some nice manny tricks up his sleeve also.
This video is pretty sweet though but they coulda gone to a better park than the Berrics. Either ways it shows that these BMX riders actually got some talent on the skateboard also. I mean you can see that on a Bike or Board these dudes got talent. Especially Cody Levesque. Dude could've been a pro skateboarder if he wanted to. He's a pro BMX rider, which is equally as awesome because he gets to do the things he loves for a living. Just shows that its a combination of natural talent and skill to be able to manipulate these two different forces and bend them to your will. That backside flip over the hip had a fucking sweet catch.
Well here are just some videos to show the dudes riding and skating. Talent right there.
Hey everybody! My name is Roger and I started this blog out to document my experience in trying out Dirt Jumping and Street MTB and BMX.
First and foremost, I am a skateboarder. I've been skateboarding since I was 16 and havent really stopped since then. I never got really good at skateboarding, but I did get somewhat decent enough to keep going on skating and having fun at it. Was never able to land a kickflip and I dont care to, but I did learn how to nollie flip and variations. Skateboarding is just weird like that, and as I found out also, BMX is also weird like that too! You can go on forums and message boards and read all these "rules" and "standards" to riding and skating, but when you go to a skatepark or a street spot, you'll see all these dudes breaking those "rules" and they awesome at doing so!
OK so enough of that. You are now probably wondering "What compelled a skateboarder to start riding bikes?" Well I'll answer that to you right now. I've always been able to bunny hop from my younger years when I did some XC MTB and I have some bike control skills already, but I just used my bike to commute to the skate spots close to home and lock it on a secure pole. It was an old bike that had definitely seen its better days, but it did serve its purpose in providing me with skills that would later help me out again when I really decided to take up MTBMX.
It all started with me being indoors one rainy day watching youtube videos.
Every skateboarder knows John Cardiel, the living legend who's style is the true embodiment of "SKATE AND DESTROY", paralysed from the waist down due to a freak accident, to being able to walk again, skate again, and FRONTSIDE GRIND and pool again. Grown-ass men were brought to tears upon sliding through instagram then seeing and hearing the kkkrrruuunnnnkkkkkhhhhh of Cardiel's truck on pool coping.
Even before that, the introduction of his Sight Unseen part has words by an even more legendary man, Mark Gonzales. Anybody whos listened to those words will remember John Cardiel riding dirt jumps on a BMX bike.
Thats enough for me to not knock on BMX bikes. Through John's recovery and rehabilitation, he has talked about taking up fixed-gear bicycles as a rehabilitation tool. As everybody knows, theres no coasting when riding these kinds of bicycles. Well this constant pedaling on a fixed-gear bicycle, it has helped him build back leg muscle and control. Watch his Epicly Later'd secion on VICE to get a better understanding of it.
Unfortunately that was not the video that sparked my interest in bikes. It was this joke of a video from one of my favorite skateboarders, David Gravette, did that made me want to get a MTB.
Even though this video is meant to be a joke about bike-only-skateparks and the sign at the front, I seriously thought it was awesome that he had 360s and tailtaps and some good bike handling skills. This video got me looking at my old XC bike a bit differently. One day I left my skateboard in the trunk of my buddys car and I was gonna go grab it a few days later. During the meantime, the itch to skate came, but I didnt have a skateboard (I would have but I usually give my old parts that are still in decent condition to kids who need it), so I grabbed my mountain bike and started riding it like I would a skateboard. In my hiatus of not riding bikes and just skating the board, I somehow developed the coordination skills to properly ride a bike.
Then I saw these two videos:
and
These two videos sealed it for me. I wanted to get a proper bike and hit dirt jumps. So I aimed to get a dirt jump MTB. Well back in April I got a used cheap dirt jumper that eventually got replaced by a proper Dartmoor Cody + Marzocchi DJ1 (I'll talk about that build in the future).
So I ride my bike all over the place. Mainly on grass banks and rugged spots that I could never roll on with a skateboard. And boy did I have FUN! After riding street spots for a while, I eventually got invited to a local trail by the shop owner (who is also technically trail boss) to ride some actual dirt jumps (rather than a mound of dirt that I can get some air off of. Ride it I did.
In the meantime, as much as I was riding bikes, I also wanted to grind. I have plans to build a Street MTB that can accomodate pegs, but that was a bit away and I wanted a fast and cheap complete to get me through this period. So the idea of getting a BMX bike slowly started, but at first I was hesitant about it, really really hesitant. Every skateboarder has heard stories and seen evidence of BMX pegs smashing the chunk out of a marble ledge or putting a huge dent in a handrail, and I've actually been hit twice in a skatepark by a BMX bike (they apologised for loss of control and hitting me, I apologised for not being aware of my sorroundings, we were both hurt but everything was cool) AND I've also been the skateboarder that crashed into a little kid. So my point is that accidents happen.
So when a buddy told me of this young professional BMX rider thats pretty steezy on a board, I was getting interested. Devon Smillie is a shredder and a ripper through and through. Man that kid can ride a bike and a board like no other. I've seen talented skateboarders on BMX bikes and talented BMXers on skateboards, but this kid is in a league of his own. I can see how skateboarding influences his riding (freecoaster fakie manual's got some skate steez going on there).
Well having seen these videos from Devon Smillie I decided to get a BMX bike once and for all. I knew enough from reading on forums about not cheaping out and Chromoly 4130 frames and forks to know not to make a mistake. I stumbled upon a rich kid selling a WTP Crysis 2013 for really cheap (over 50% its original price) and it was in more or less a 98% new condition. The kid didnt even ride his pegs and just used them for homie-hauling. So he sold it to me for cheap. Ironically the first thing I did when I got home was take the pegs off the bike and I planned to put pegs back on when I got plastic pegs. While riding around for a day or two, there was this ledge that I just could not resist. Pegs or no pegs, I had heard and seen enough about pedal grinds to know that I actually dont need pegs to grind (pegs make grinds easier and open up a variety of grinds). I learned and landed some Pedal Feebles on my first day of trying. I was stoked on the bike! Well that bike happened to be the starting point of what I wanted, and to build on from there. I do plan and have changed some parts and modified the bike a bit already since I got it. Oh yeah and since I havent gotten plastic pegs yet, I put my metal pegs back onto my bike. Fuck it, a lot of the ledges I've grinded with my bike are in spots that you literally cannot skate.
And that brings us to here. Googling and trying to find answers to questions I have about bikes, a lot of those questions turn up unanswered. So this blog is also me trying to answer those questions for myself, and the journey of me as a skateboarder learning how to ride bikes.
So I hope I didnt bore you guys out with my whole essay of a blog post, but thats just how I am. Hopefully you guys will keep returning and checking out this blog in the future.
