You may have heard by now all of the rumblings about the latest "find" -- the thought-to-be-completely-extinct SRT-1 frame. The original Quad Angle, with the twin down tubes cradleing the BB shell - the Stu Thomsen Replica has been one of the most sought-after, dreamed-of pieces in the vintage BMX world. This is a key element of how SE started - their first prototype product.

Check out how the tubing from the headtube to seatmast is one long, single tube ... a tube-bender's worst nightmare. 

JT has been a fan of Stu Thomson since he opened up his first BMX News magazine back in '75 when Stu was doing a "Helicopter" (360) that blew JT away. JT had to have a Redline Squareback and continue to BMX to this day! With the buzz on the awesome Stompin' Stu DVD thought JT would combine some of the Stu rides in which some saw live at Rockford BMX Gathering, including Stu and Tanya. First up is his original Squareback that was similar to Stu's setup but this one is exact. JT fills you in on more:

The UNIVERSITY of BMX wants to inform you about the fact, that their EUROPEAN BMX HALL of FAME has found a domicile at the Dutch "BMX MUSEUM" run by old school BMX'er and BMX artifact collector Mike Janssen. At the BMX MUSEUM in a small town called MEGEN, situated close to the city of OSS in the South part of Holland, the museum created a Wall of Fame, where all the names of the Hall of Fame inductees are shown. The Hall of Fame members are presented to the public via a giant banner with all names on it.

The BMX MUSEUM is open for the public every second Saturday of the month.
For appointments and more info, check www.bmxmuseum.nl

Frame: 1987 Haro Sport Freestyler
Fork: Haro 1"
Headset: YST caged bearings
Stem: Group 1
Gyro: Odyssey 1st gen
Gyro cables: Odyssey 1st gen
Handlebars: Haro
Grips: A'me Tri White
Levers: Dia Compe 128 

Frame: 1987 Haro Master Freestyler
Fork: Haro 1"
Headset: YST caged bearings
Stem: Group 1 Gyro: Odyssey 1st gen
Gyro cables: Odyssey 1st gen
Handlebars: Haro
Grips: A'me Tri White
Levers: Dia Compe 128
Brakes/pads, rear: Dia Compe AD990 

Bicycle cross with sidehack discipline in Amersfoort.
  Amersfoort, September 1958. Among the people who live in Amersfoort a lot of events are organized, and sports play a big role in this. Yesterday we had a talk with one of the youngest organizers who, if the signs don't lie, has a big career ahead of him. The organizer is Dickie van Heugten, Hooglandseweg 44, one of the youngest brothers in the family of well known motocross riders. His organizing talent showed after the very successful motocross race of M.C. "De Keistad" which took place on 7 September at the Hooglandseweg. Two weeks later you could see the first results at the Bicycle Cross which had the character of a real terrain ride. It became an enourmous success and despite the rain hundres of people kept watching the battle with lots of crashes and mud splashes.
 
  This was the reason that Dickie continued in this direction and the

As was to be expected the yanks haven't been into the BMX movie from the fifties that we showed on FATBMX earlier this week. BMX history needs to be re-written and they know it. This time however we're not going to let it slide. We'll make sure people will know where bicycle motocross really started. We've placed articles on FATBMX about BMX in the fifties but people might have thought we're good at photoshop or something or the races were not "organized" enough to be recognized. Not only the movie we showed earlier explains that BMX was around in The Netherlands in the fifties, we

Ask any pro BMX racer from the '80-s/'90-s about Ponypark Slagharen and they'll tell you a story or two. The place has got some history, which kicked off with the first IBMXF World Championships race outside of the USA in 1983 which was won by Clint Miller (not Colony's Clint Millar!). With the AVRO Fietscross series, European Challenge Cup races with their legendary King Of Dirt events, and some freestyle demos by the likes of Eddie Fiola, Dave Breed, the MBK team, Ron Wilkerson, Dennis Langlais, Martin Apparijo, Carlo Griggs etc., it's clear that the place smells like BMX more than it does like Pony's. Gerrit Does found it time for a BMX Reunion which took place last weekend, at the park.

Knowing Gerrit you could expect more than just a get together at the bar bringing up old stories. Gerrit had contacted BMX collectors to see if they would be into displaying their bikes during the weekend. With close to 100 bikes present you could say that this was a big success. You can read about who won what in the FATBMX report right here. 

The 30th anniversary of BMX in Holland turned out to be a 52 years aninversary, Gerrit Does showed a movie with BMX riders in 1957 somewhere in Amersfoort Holland! We will have this clip on FATBMX soon, after pictures of 1957 and the film of 1958 it is up to the Americans to prove that BMX is an "all American sport" hahahaha. Ten Old School bike collectors put up a great show in the "music hall" at Slagharen with about 100 bikes! We were really impressed with the turnout and lots of nice bikes were on display for the audience. Three judges were pointed and they had a hard job to find the right winners in 5 catagories. Paul's Boutique BMX supported this event with 5 pairs of VANS RAD SERIES signature shoes and Marcha Blanker made nice trophies but they got lost in the post somewhere but will be send to the winners later:

Best 70's Bike:
1 Peugeot CPX300 1979 by Paul de Jong , 75 points (pretty good bike but far from perfect) 

Old school this, Vintage that, the USA ain't got nothing against Holland when it comes down to the start of BMX. New photographs showed up from 1957 of kids racing their bicycles on a dirt track in Amersfoort, Netherlands imitating their local motocross heroes. Numberplates, roped off track, crowd to cheer them on, etc. We've challenged everyone for photographic proof in this post but the 1950-s were never matched. To make things better (or worse for the Americans who still don't want to accept it), there is footage of this

BMX wasn't invented in the United States of America. It was invented in The Netherlands by kids who rode bikes and imitated the motorcross riders. One of the first ever Bicycle Motocross riders was Ton van Heugten, shown on the photo with the # 5 plate (year: 1958), who later on became world champion in sidehack racing. We received sad news today. In the night of 26 March Ton van Heugten died of a heart attack, he was 62 years old. Let's pop a wheelie for Ton next time we ride. May he R.I.P.

When we posted the article about BMX in The Netherlands from 1956, we expected the forums to go nuts. Not that we hang out at these places much but showing a photo of Dutch kids riding bikes with numberplates on a dirt track in 1956 certainly was a good catch. We received two (American) reactions on the post, one from JT, the other from TGI Byron Friday. Both were stoked on it. We have now decided to make an ad of it showing that Joe Kid on his Stingray has got nothing against Ton van Heugen on his Gazelle.

History class never appealed to me. I dropped it as soon as I could. When it comes to BMX history, it's a different story. You see I’ve always thought that BMX originated in the USA in the late sixties until I walked passed a bookstore the other day. On the poster in the shop window was a picture of two kids riding bikes at a “fietscross” in 1956. The photo was taken in St.-Anthonis, Holland 15 miles from the FATBMX office. I walked in the store, searching for the mag and found “Ach Lieve Tijd”. The € 4.95 cover prize was a steal for a piece of BMX history. A quick search for more BMX pics was a negative but a story about Motocross I found. It mentioned that the sport of Motocross was started in the Netherlands on modified Nortons, DKW’s and BSA’s. Seeing that there is a truth to this, it is acceptable to believe that there were kids around pretending they had motorcycles but riding their bikes instead.

Bicycle Motocross anyone?

As we all know, American BMX in its special form (20 inch bikes etc.) started in the late 1960‘s and early 1970's because of youngster imitating motorsport moto-cross stars. Early '70 ‘s BMX became an organized sport in the USA (check the History of BMX ). As a matter of fact, although not known as BMX (Bicycle Moto-X), in Holland BX (Bicycle Cross) got off the ground in the mid 1950's and also because of youngsters imitating the at the time, motorsport moto-cross stars from Holland and Belgium. 

the man with whom International world wide BMX started
by Gerrit Does

Renny Roker, a unique promoter of among others, BMX.

Recently I received an e-mail from the USA by someone called BMX MOM. This mail made me aware of the fact, that Mr. RENNY ROKER, the promoter of the JAG BMX World Championships in the early days of BMX (1978 and on), has been instrumental in finally getting BMX recognized worldwide.

transponders and big screen, a new impulse?
by Gerrit Does

October 3rd. 2004 the FIM MOTOCROSS of NATIONS took place in LIEROP – Holland, a small town close to the city of Eindhoven. Of course, as former MX rider, I had to be there.

Each year, after the Worlds, the University of BMX releases the results of the "World Championship Quality Survey".

A selective group of international people (riders, officials, organizers and guests) do give their opinion on the World Championship run that year (check out the enclosed overall historical overview).

No more pulling back or jumping the gate!

Just the other day, I received a revolutionary idea from former cruiser World Champion, Teun Stam - Holland. Teun did sent in a reaction on my article "Opinion on the 2004 Worlds" more specific the section were I talk about the false starts I did see during this years Worlds (watch the TV pictures).

After a couple of years running the UCI - Supercross of BMX events at Woodward - USA, talk is that this year will be the last of these events.

The real Supercross of BMX has been at the European Challenge Cup events at Slagharen - Holland. I named this event the Supercross of BMX. UCI started the Woodward event in order to replace the World Cup series, but in fact the results were even worse. It did not work.

A few week after the UCI-BMX World Championship 2004 in Valkenswaard - Holland, I want to give my opinion on this prestigious event, which was rated THE BEST EVER. (check out the WC statistics 1982 - 2004 and Press-release). Perfect in BMX in the field of organizing an event is impossible, but this came very close.

Just recently we learned that the most famous and professional starting gate in Europe, used by the Valkenswaard BMX club Lion d'Or (Worlds track), has been taken away and has been replaced by a uni starting gate.

In 1986, Ponypark Slagharen had a special starting gate built on advise of Gerrit Does and made by Hans Croes of the Waalre BMX club. It concerned a gate, designed by HONDA MOTORS Japan engineers and used during the I.BMX.F. Worlds on Suzuka circuit in Japan - 1984.