Archive for August, 2007

Chaz has been a busy boy building dirt jumps, not just in Bournemouth but also back home in Banbury… Got the train over to see him and had a rad day chilling out and taking a few photos. Also saw Banbury skatepark which looks like a really dialled setup also enough kids ride round there, so props to the Banbury massive!

The trails are in a real nice spot, where an old railway line used to be so there are all sorts of nuts abandonded buildings around. They hadn’t been riding all that long, so stuff wasn’t completely dialled in yet. This looked pretty fun, quater pipe thing at the end of the set.

Gunny dirt quater air again (right name?)

Chaz whipper style.

Chaz table.

Greg jungle quater… This is probably a better view of it. Check out the coping on the top too ghetto!

Chaz table from the front, Chaz’s hat up a tree too which caused havoc later on…

Chaz cheating angle table! Yeah Chaz!

Greg booooost

Gunny dirt quarter air

Chaz fast plant on the dirt quarter.

Later on we went to some random village outside Banbury which had this sweet little setup looked too fun for nibbling on. Flat-bank to flat? So yeah good day, cheers Chaz aka ‘fix a fence’ for driving me around. I can now carry my camera bag so that means more updates hopefully. Shoulder is doing pretty good now, I have loads of exercises to do and am also going to start swimming and going to the gym to get full movement and strength back in it!

This was the first time I had taken any BMX photos in about 8 weeks so sorry if the old photo skills are a little rusty! Just is rad to be able to pick up the camera again and be able to lift it high enough to see through the eyepiece hole! Go see Craig Tull for some playground flips.

I might do an update of pictures of me doing my exercises as they are pretty comedy! I have one of those big ‘gym’ balls to play with along with an array of Therra bands and other treats. Here’s the update from the trails when I crashed and dislocated it… Thats all bye!

The Welshside site is finally back up and online, and apprently all the local scene checks in Ride magazine including the Welsh one are going to be now part of the ever expanding blog network on the Ride site? Not sure if I think that’s a good thing or not, it’s good to read a concise monthly update from places rather than sparadic internet writing. Anyhow apprently Denny will be doing that and he takes some good photos so hopefully can’t go too far wrong. Now if Scott could only update Welshside more than once a year… Here\’s an oldish video from the Welsh boys with one of the most savage drop gaps I have ever seen… Wrist check.

There is also a good write up from a trip to Madrid on ride online, with another pretty wild gap over some railings, ending a little better than the one above.

If you’re into photography and BMX then go check out Tom makes pictures. Enough archives to keep you busy for days… Also Jirtjumping is worth checking out, it has some good trails photos.

Here’s a photo of the Malvern hills sunset at Alianos dirt jumps from a while back. The Aversion trails trip should also be a trrrrreat! The 2&8 jam should be good here too.

Went on a little expedition today to visit Chaz in the fine town of Banbury. Can’t ride, but took the camera along and chilled in the semi-sunny weather! Went to his trails later on which were pretty fun looking. Not sorted through the photos yet but will do soon and put them up here. For now here’s some videos I liked.

This is the best thing I have seen in a while. Destroy BMX jumping some 40 foot doubles. Go to the site for better quality videos yo.

Pipe said him and some other people went to the Rebel jam this weekend, here are some videos from it. Looks like the weather is crap in Berlin too but dried up enough later on for the riding to get going.

These ramps look super shady but fun and some funny ass bails too. I will put pictures up from Banbury and Chaz’s jumps in next few days.

This weekend I headed back to the wonderful seaside resort of Bournemouth, where I have of course been at uni the past 2 years. Friday night drive down straight to the mighty Slade’s Farm for a little session with Pickles. This was then followed by my lack of recent drinking making a small number of Stella’s equal a large amount of kookedness at Jesus’ place. Underexposed photo assortment starts HERE.

Ollie wiggling his behind

Woke up Saturday morning feeling a little haggard, G had to head out with his son so I chilled it for the morning watching foot and mouth news. My Dad’s a farmer so this was quite a frightful story to hear. Especially as he was supposed to be selling 200 lambs that very morning. Let’s hope it gets sorted out a lot better than it did a few years back.

Me wiggling my bum too - Ollie photo boss

There’s a new bike shop opened up in Bournemouth, BMX only, meant to be really good. Wayne had gone on a spending spree and turned up with Pickles late morning with a Chase frame to build up. Dialled. Soon after, Ollie turned up too, which was amazing as always, boy do I love that Polish giraffe. Once we had sorted everyone’s business out and Wayne’s bike was sorted, we headed to the place my dreams are made of, our jumps. All the pictures in this update are taken at that session on Saturday afternoon.

Ollie’s tables are the best

Saturday night involved meeting up with a bunch of guys, of which Aron and Ash were already pretty leathered. There were lots of chants of last night of being single, pretending we were on a stag do, to lure vulnerable women into getting their lovely lady parts out. We also saw the hottest chick with the deepest, roughest voice. Aron introduced himself in some manner or another…

Me tabletopper - Ollie the new Bancroft…?!

When we got to Ollie’s in the early hours, I passed out, to wake up with three unknown guys in the room with me, sketched me out proper badly, pretty funny I guess. Turned out they were Ollie’s friends from school staying in Bournemouth that night.
Woke up in the morning and arranged to meet Gilly at the wonderful heaven that is Bar End in Winchester. Sunday afternoon sessions in the woods are always rad, and we all rode pretty sweet considering the hung over states we were. It’s always good to hang out with those guys too, and they were awesome as always. Probably the best ride I’ve had in about two months I’d say, along with the previous day’s at our place.

Ollie T bar, not the most flattering angle

Rob Castle and Barclay turned up later on which was rad, they were even more haggard than us. Castle always has a good story to tell, including videos of Netley and him bubble bathing together, and possible placenta feasts going down. I hope my tale by tale update has hit your sexy time spot; it was the raddest weekend in absolutely ages. Same again some time soon I hope if the weather stays dialled. Just a shame I don’t get my arse into gear and take a greater quantity of photos. I’m getting lots of sleep again tonight; my body is so drained right now. Take it easy, and go sun yourself at every possible moment. Byyyyeeeeeee.

Nicest car ever

Check out this badass from the car park at Abingdon, the ultimate BMX automobile.

Table at Abingdon’s new park

Went and met up with young Aidan at his new park in Abingdon last weekend. Him and Yak never ride good when I’m around. On this day, Aidan snapped his chain and crashed five minutes into the session. There’s some sort of bad karma going on, and I have no idea why. One of his friends took this photo of me that day, cheers buddy.

Gunny T bar

Gunny had never ridden Radley before, and got so excited it was unbelievable. He loved the place, and with good reason too. My weekdays have been some what dull and repetitive, with work being pretty good, and monotonous sessions down the park in the evening. I want to go cliff jumping at the quarry very soon.

Sunset in the shire

Five of my friends are now three days into a two week tour around Spain and France. Lucky bastards. I am counting the days until I head off to Australia and New Zealand for four months. Twelve weeks Wednesday by my calculations. Yeeeeeeha.

Rob Blackley fakie air

Taking photo’s of skating is sometimes more satisfying than shooting bmx pictures. One evening last week was an example of one of these occasions.

Rob Blackley stalling

I was watching the news earlier, and a guy from ‘Plane Stupid’, a group working against climate change caused by airplanes. He was clearly an educated chap, and was nothing but ridiculed and patronised by the news reader. Whatever your view on the subject being discussed, I hate the manipulation involved in the news, moulding and shaping the majorities opinions, here trying to make this group of people look foolish. I have become a proper sceptic of anything the news or politicians say, and for good reason I think. More rants on that matter some time soon maybe.

Name of the trick here?

I don’t know what this trick is called. I worked with my mate Tony who also skates last week for a few days. I’d never really chatted to him much before, but it was amazing how many similar opinions and thoughts he held with me. It’s always good to chat to like minded people.

Rob Blackley backside air steez

These are a few of my favourite photographs I’ve shot in a while. Working with different people recently makes me hate commercialism and mass marketing even more. Some people live their lives around every aspect of popular culture, especially with music. Listening to completely terrible stuff on the radio that people think is brilliant, I don’t understand what people see in it. I guess it’s just easy to take the decisions made for you by the well funded media about what’s good and what’s not, and then to be able to relate to the masses.
Bournemouth this weekend was amazing, but I’m real tired now and feel pretty rough. Fell asleep at the wheel today on the van and got a lucky escape in a seriously scary circumstance, early night tonight. Bournemouth update real soon. Goodnight.