It wasn't meant to be the last issue of FAT-'zine but it sure was. Since picking up a job at the European GT marketing offices in Belgium I was too busy with work. In fact, it was my first real job and one I liked a lot so screwing around wasn't an option. The Condor made the last cover and I'm glad it's him who got the last FAT-'zine love. Since these 'zines didn't come out every few weeks any longer the content list just got bigger and bigger. We'll rush through it and leave it up to you to flip through all the pages here online. -Ruben Castillo interview, -BMX race Schijndel, -Schwinn show Atlanta, Georgia, -Volkel BMX race, -Burnside Oregon session, - Telebel show, bunny hopping ten bodybuilders, - BMX Wo Venezuela, - Bo's trails, - Basic Boys House in Vancouver, - Crimetime with KOP, - BMX Race Doetinchem, - Hard Volume (Music section), - Jamie Staff interview, - Video reviews, - Best and Worst with Todd Lyons, Lawan Cunningham, Robbie Morales, Darrin Mitchell, Neil Wood and Mike Hammond. And free stickers from Powerlite, GT, 360-Grad, Pantera and an anti smoking campaign.

The cover of issue 33 is one I remember well. Jay Miron, Mark Losey and I made a trip from Huntington Beach to Vancouver. We stopped in San Jose where we visited the Garcia family, had a tour at the Skyway factory in Redding, rode Burnside early in the morning and then cruised on to "the Basic house" in Vancouver. We had nothing but rain all week long and did not much else than drink and play fuSball. Every time we got back from a club Andrew Faris was still riding his bike in the garage downstairs. He was working on a new trick and I promised him the cover of FAT if he pulled it. Well, he's on the cover isn't he? 12 years later he turned up at the Nora Cup party in Vegas. It was good to see you Andrew. Anyway, back to the content. Taj on vert on the contents page. This was 1996. Bicycle Stunt finals report (Florida), Andrew Faris interview, ABA Grands report + KOD, DIG sticker, VIDEO reviews, Brad Blanchard interview, 10 memorable places where I spent the night, Bartman comic, Dave "Hot Guy" Osato interview. Play sticker, Christmas Classic KOD,

We are almost nearing the end here of the FAT-'zines that were made between 1987 and 1996 before we got involved with that WWW. John Parker got the cover of issue number 32. Again GT hooked it up with a free sticker on the inside cover. The computer was doing its job and made it easier to read the text. No more fading typewriter ribbon. The BON section has always been a big part of the FAT-'zine. Read it, it will make you go: Oh yeah, I forgot about that.  The Beerfelden comp is one to remember. We bring it up every time we run into Alex Reinke and Detlef Richter. Good times. Read about it on page 12. A terrible accident on the way to the KOC in Kalle's dad's car did not stop us from getting there as planned. It was a close call but we survived. The car was a write-off though.We had a Rob "Ninja" Sigaty interview before people started calling him Sarge. BS Comp OKC report by PdJ who also provided a free Paul's Boutique sticker. Iwan and Choq went on a trip in a 2CV. Read all about it in FAT-32. Free Vans sticker; check. A4 trails report, Sprocket Jockey tour report, 

Mark Losey has shot many covershots in his life. This time he makes the cover himself, mouthguard and all. Brian Foster had just discovered the freestyle scene and puts his aluminium Schwinn to the test by doing a 300 X-up in Chicago. Third rider ont he cover is Trevor Meyer. Has anybody heard of him lately? The year is 1995 and I just got my first computer and played around with Coreldraw a bunch for this issue. For once FAT had different fonts, different font sizes and more of that stuff that did not work on a typewriter. The news section was big again. We went straight into the S&M warehouse ramp followed by a Robo interview. Megafestatie report, free Haro sticker, and a report about the Chicago BS comp followed. The Sjappi Jam in Maarssenbroek was always fun. Dirt , Vert and Lake jumping this time. KHE provided a sticker and then we went on the Jinx-tour. One of the best trips ever. We had to smuggle Jay Miron across the Spanish border in order to do a show. Read all about it in issue 31. We had a session in RL Osborn's backyard. Rode some pools in the USA. Went to the ABA Grands. Had a free Webco sticker and visited

Cheesy Hundertmark is in the business somewhere. I got an e-mail from him some time ago and he sure does remember getting the cover of FAT-'zine issue 30. Also on the cover in small video grab pics is Ian Morris doing a humonguous rail in our hometown back in 1994. It was a good year. Ice Money popped up in Cologne and later in Munich, Germany and England. Even in the Lageja ad! The Editorial is still accurate. I do have a car now though. Free stickers this time from KDL, BigBoy, Busy P and GT. Huge new section. I hope to see some of these guys in Vegas next week at the Nora Cup. At the Trierer Cup we almost got blown away by Hurrican Ike. The tent took off but the Chevy stayed on the floor. Paul Osicka got an interview that starts on page 22. AK Helmond race report. Freestyle World's in Cologne. The real world's, none of that LG fake World Championships stuff. VANS Cup in Amsterdam. Dam right! Wateringen trails report by Petrik de Heus. Bartman comic by Deamer. Magazine interviews with Marco Massei, and Freedom BMX. The 1994 FAT-JAM was one of the best ones.

Issue 29 came with a bunch of free stickers; Mutation, BMX PARTY (Mental Jimmy'z), Forbidden Planet, VANS Off the Wall and a Gatorade postcard featuring Mat Hoffman doing a backflip. These little items were nice extra's that came free with the 'zine. Webmaster Jos sent me a copy of page 4 a few weeks ago. Read it and smile. 8 pages of BMX news followed. Then the report about the trip to Copenhagen for the X-Mas jam followed by a Solingen miniramp session report.
Woody Itson gets interviewed and we went to the Phoenix Winternationals in the back of Chris Moeller's pick up truck. Back to Holland for the first NK of the year. Also covered in issue 29 is tthe BS contest in Moreno Valley, California. Those comps were fun. Thomas "Tarzan" Hansen gets interviewed, Axel Reichertz and Jay Miron get sequences. We posted the I-punkt BMX comp results, did an interview with Mike Daily and Cruzin' Chris, went to another race in SoCal, and also Markus Wilke gets an interview. Just read it.

The cover of issue 28 shows what we were all about in 1993. In fact, it hasn't changed much. Road trips are the best. We brought you the BMX news in 1993 and we are still doing it now. 7 pages of BON in issue 27 and you were up to date of all the BMX news. We received Huphter and Rabbit stickers for the free sticker page. Achim Kujawski received an interview and then we're moving on to oiur annual Mission Trails jam. When noone was putting on a jam at SoCal's best dirt jump spot we took things in our own hands (again) and had a good time. I missed the 1993 world's in Limoges, France but got some pics from Ralle and printed the results. Your pro champs? Retey, Hoffman and Wilke. A 6-page Paul Roberts interview follows. He must have said something funny in this. Hope you can read it as the text is small. The UCI BMX race world's took place 30 minutes from our place. We went there and even organized a KOD on the first straight. We also had a Las Vegas session at "The Pits". The 1993 FAT-JAM can be looked up for the record books. Will Smyth 

Matt Pingel was a big contributor of FAT and to show our love to him we gave him the cover of number 27. You must have heard of Jerry Galley too. He's on page 2 shredding the ramp in Dennis' backyard. We got a free STD foundation sticker on page 4. Six pages of BMX news and another freesticker (Big Boy). Thomas and Moni Stellwag get an interview. Greg Higgins contributed some art. Wow, another sticker: Mutation. We did a report on some SoCal trails: Honda Hills, Mission Trails, 6th Street, Hoover and Dover. RAD-LAME. Did you make it on the list? Backyard Jam 1993: Tom Lunch, Keith Treanor, Aju, Steve Geall, Grotbags, Congo, Grace and the Maddog. The mag interviews were with Brad McDonald (sitting in his "office"), a flatlanding Mark Losey, seatless Hal Brindley and going backwards James Hudson.  The Lord (Dave Voelker) gets an interview on page 45. Nico Does gets the Bizznizz interview that starts on page 50. I went to China for some demos. Crazy but good times. Read the report. Freedom BMX Magazine provided another free sticker.

Ronnie Farmer on the cover, yeehaaw. While in San Diego we rode Mission Trails on a daily basis with the Dirt Brothers. Ronnie Farmer was one of them. He was born in East SD and the Dirtbrothers house was on the edge of that shady area. We have not heard from Ronnie in a while an really hope he is doing well. He sure knew how to stretch them no-footed cancans. Internet sites did not bring the news back in the day, FAT-'zine did. The Believe it, or Not!? section is huge, full of news. We traveled to Phoenix for a Bicycle Stunt contest in our 1970 Buick Estate Wagon which had a 454 engine and was hella fast. We made it over there too.
Ronnie Farmer gets a full on interview in FAT-'zine. Maybe the only interview he has ever had. Read it. We were doing Magazine reviews in issue 26 with Matt Pingel (BMX Freestyle magazine-Germany), Mark Noble (RIDE BMX magazine) and Vincent Ranchoux of Tracks BMX Power mag (France). 

Man, this issue is bringing back some more good memories. One of my favorite contests of all time was the World's in Budapest, Hungary. I could go on an on about it but you just check out issue #25 and read the party-part about it. Sheps actually gets the contents page doing a nosepick with front brake. Only poor bastards that could not afford a front brake did toe jams at that time (Jon Talyor?). When we went to the USA and there were no jams anywhere, we organized one ourselves. At Mission Trails. The Boost jam was born. We went to the KOC in Markus' van and had a blast. From there I got a ride with Kay Clauberg in his VW Golf (4 people, 4 bikes) and we visited Tim Ruck's area (raced at Exeter's BMX track) and then went to the Rider Cup in London. More good times. Also did a trip to Malaga after the World's. Man, no worry in the world at that time. What else can you expect this week? A Mat Hoffman interview. We are talking 1992 so keep that in mind when you read it. Kai Uwe Lohff got an interview, we went to the Muenster Monster Masterships in Germany,

If there is one issue that stands out to me it's issue number 24. It basically got me a job in the BMX industry, or at least the first steps were made. I showed this very issue to GT Bicycles president Richard Long at a trade show in Germany and asked if he (GT Bicycles) wanted to advertise. When he saw the cover of his team rider Dave Voelker flipping off the camera and not wearing a helmet he was not amuzed. When Richard Long turned over the page he started reading the contents page. He noted the following: "He hates GT, but still rides 4 'em" and turned to the Jon Peacy interview on page 65. The discussion was long but he got to hear what was wrong with the GT brand at the time. I felt strong about it because I had spent some serious time with the GT riders over in California. When I left the meeting GT was advertising in FAT, they provided stickers for the free sticker page, I was offered a new Dyno Slammer and it was okay for me to get a temporay job at GT's headquarters in the USA. I seriously wasn't expecting all that. Anyway, back to the content:

The new typewriter is doing its job making it possible to read the text in issue 23 which has Geoff Martin on the cover while doing some flatland riding in front of Hamel's in Mission Beach. This issue has a lot of USA stuff in it. We visited the first Bicycle Stunt contest in Texas with the GT team, we also made it to the next round in Glendale, Arizona. Sheep Hills looked different in 1991 and we also checked out a Todd Anderson/Eddie Fiola trick show. Jimbob reports about the East coast of the USA in two stories and we also covered several European events like the King Of Concrete, the Tourcoing France contest from March 1992, and we had a pictorial of the 1991 World's in Denmark. We were pretty international back then with a Barrow in Furness jam report (UK), Axel Reichertz' roadtrip to Spain, European team championships in Abbeville, France, an international contest in Eindhoven (NL), and a skatehouse report from Essen, Germany. I wonder how we did it all but somehow it worked out. Mario Schepers, Alan Peterson, Barker Barrett and Effraim Catlow got the interviews.

1991 was the year I had to join the army. Everyone had to back in the day and it was my turn. Had my personal UZI 'n shit and made it to the Corporal rank in just one year, whatever that's worth. The best part of the 12 months in the army was that I managed to pass for my truck drivers licence. I rented a room so I did not have to live on the military base and could ride a bit after "work" and still manage to do the FAT-'zines. The pace had slown down to only a couple of issues per year but they were stacked with stuff. Just like issue #22:

-Did a commercial in Gran Canaria for ProSpecs shoes in 1991
-Reported from the Trier contest
-Rode the Vogelsang dirt spot in Cologne
-Went to Abbeville in France for a contest
-Was there a contest in the Jugendpark every 4 months or something? -Mini-FAT-JAM Aarle-Rixtel
-Christmas Jam report from Denmark

We've arrived in 1991 with the FAT-issues. #21 has 104 pages and includes all stories from my first trip to the USA. It was the best. For year I'd been reading the american magazines and now I was there, in San fucking Diego! Before I had put my bike together Vic Murphy called to see if I wanted to go ride some street. Hell yeah! 20 minutes later Knock knock, who's there? Vic Murphy, Pete Augustin and Kaarlo Wik. Damn, is this for real? I hurried getting the re-welded HARO Master together to hit the streets. Wow, this was good! Places visited were Mission Trails (daily session?), Ron Wilkerson's spine vert ramp, the San Diego Home Ave ditch, Imperial Ditch, backyard pools, rode some flatland at Mission Beach, went to the Nude bowl, the 2-HIp meet the street in Palm Springs, Balboa Park, a ditch in LA, the DirtBros mini, and much more. It was a great time and you can read about it in this issue. But there's more. Interviews with Alexis Desolneux and Eng San Kho, reports on the FAT-JAM, a trip to Longjumeau France, UK KOV report, KOC report, the Lageja '91 comp and of course free stickers and stuff.

Let's start this review by a quote from Vic Murphy who was a regular contributor to the FAT-'zines back in the day. "I ride to get better. Not to get money. Not to impress anyone. Not to improve the envirenment. But just to see how good I can get riding from one place to another. Some people don't understand me. Well, I don't understand them. Ride to death."  Vic Murphy. D.B.I.

Issue 20 of FAT-'zine came out in the fall of 1990 right after we had finished another FAT-JAM (report in #21). We traveled around in the summer and visited the World Championships in Trier, a few VANS shows in Germany, went to the ECC in Slagharen, and we had a few lakejump sessions when it got really hot. Interviewed people this time were Jason Jessee, Joop "Sloop" Smulders, Raymond Tabak, Frank Schnuetgen, and Dan Hubbard. We also had reports from the UK King Of Vert, a street jam in Aalborg, Denmark, the 2-Hip comps in the USA, and a full report from the contest in Cologne, Germany.

You know what I like about all these FAT-'zines? it gives me a nice timeline of things that happened years ago. I couldn't really remember when we started putting on the extra FAT-JAM to start off the season. Now I know. 22 April 1990. This means we've done a "Mini-FAT-JAM" for 18 years now. It was dubbed Mini-FAT-JAM as it was a smaller version of the actual FAT-JAM. Mario Schepers seriously messed up his ankle by going  Sky Hi after being towed by a moped to get some extra speed. It was nuts and the pictures show it. We still talk about it every time we hang out at OJA and the pics help remember. What else did we have in this issue?
6 airs by Mat Hoffman on that Coca Cola quarterpipe in Bercy and boy did he go high. Frans Swinkels got an interview, and we made a photo trip around the world starting in the USA and ending in France. We went to Nantes, France for a contest, and the Pingel-Maier duo took care of the Tropica Contest #2. The poster was a fold out promotional piece to wear a helmet. Zonder Helm, Kop Kapot. 

With 92 pages we were allowed to call this a double issue. Most 'zines at that time did not have more than 48 pages and FAT was establishing a name for itself in the underground BMX media world. Mat Hoffman made the cover and rightfully so. He had just performed a trick in Bercy that noone had seen before. A backflip on a quarterpipe! And not a low one either. Way out of the top of the Coca Cola quarter pipes. Sick!

We're getting more American stuff in the 'zine so from now on the FAT issues should become more interesting for our American visitors. Ralf Maier and Frank Schnuetgen did a Cali trip in the winter of '89/'90 and showed what it was like down there (page28 - p33). Vic Murphy wrote a story about the 2-HIp comp at Trend. Mark and Chris Noble sent some Cali stuff from their trip and we also had an interview with 2 Hip announcer Kevin Martin. The other interviews in the double issue are with Klaus Dyba, Thomas Fritscher and Patrick

Cover boy Ralf Maier is turning 40 next week. Fucking 40! I had many good trips with Ralf Maier. Most of them are covered in the issues of FAT-'zine. Ralf got an interview in issue 16 and so did Vic Murphy, Mike Golden, Sander Cornelissen and Gerrit Koornwinder. Back in 1990 you sent a letter to the other side of the world with the questions you had. You were hoping in a few weeks you would see a reply. Vic came through with the answers and I typed them out. He even put some pics in the envelop so I xeroxed them and then sent the pics back to him. Gotta love the e-mail of present time. Matt Pingel contributed a lot of pages and went sandboarding. We had reports on a skate comp in Valkenswaard, a freestyle contest in Leiden, the Wath Jam, Spanjer's skate comp in Hengelo, and a concert report about the Digital Underground. The free sticker came from Invert magazine (UK, now RIDE). We checked "The U" which was a crazy dirt spot where you rolled down a huge hill and did a fly-out at the end. We reviewed the following 'zines in issue # 16: UHS, RIDE -'zine, RADAzine, Albert 'zine and Mental Chaos. Remember those?

It was the late '80-s when issue number 15 came out and these items made it on the RAD side of the RAD-LAME list:  Bresie'Z, Robert's graffitied Renault 14, Speedfreaks video, Vla, Divorze Posse's Demo Tape (that's a cassette by the way....), A Full PO Box, Watching Jason Ellis cutting Mike Canning's hair, Prantl's 360 at the Energie hal, English riders visiting the Leiden freestyle contest, DP's Black Medallion, Advertisers, D-signs designs, On Edge Apparel, DJ Kid Sundance, Tye Dye shirts, 'zines, Lambert's Harley, Mini-ramp Hengelo and Double seatpost clamps.

Man, most of these things aren't too hot any longer but back in 1989 they made it on the RAD list. To see what made it on the Lame side, turn to page 17. We have a Jason Ellis interview in issue 15,  a street sk8 comp in Eindhoven, 540 sequence of Albert Moonen, the Circus came to town and brought 2 BMX-ers from England, The Cologne contest Number 2 took place at the Jugendpark, Merijn Bonte got

The first double issue of FAT-'zine. With 88 pages it was also twice the size of most 'zines back in the day. Issue 13+14 featured over 150 photos. The quality was terrible but at least it brought the message across. The typewriter was still doing its job but the ink ribbon was fading. I loved freshly new ink ribbons as it also had a white line up top that you could use to correct the typos. But more than once the machine got stuck behind a photo and the letter didn't line up correctly and you had to bring out the Tipp-Ex to change things. It was horrible compared to the computers we use today. FAT-'zine was getting a structure with an editorial, contents page, news section, staff list, RAD-Lame section etc. and the double issue had the following features: Lageja contest, Freestyle contest in wherever, Bart & Martijn Deijkers interview, free VANS sticker, Kees Lemmens interview, Phantasialand report where some American riders were doing shows, Incertitude concert review, 8th Muenster Mastership report, Albert Retey interview, Amsterdam skate trip, Tropica and StokeBros

Issue 12 had a green color. In the beginning we picked our color but after some issues we did not care. As long as it wasn't the same color as the previous issue it was okay. The cover photo on the green paper came out nice. Issue 12 had the infamous Believe it, or not?! news section, a reader photo section and also an MBL concert report. We used to have some ramps at the end of our street that we set up differently all the time. It was our ghetto skatepark but it worked for us. We also rode our scooters there, see page 9 and 10.  RAD-LAME list, of course! Entered a Talent Show at school and won! One DJ, one rapper and me flatlanding on stage. We got a trophy and a day off. Sweet. 2 Hip King Of Nothing (Rotterdam) report where they stole my camera. Bad news it was. Free Dave Vanderspek Curb Dogs sticker in this issue. RIP Dave. Yes we rode fullpipes back in the day. 19 years ago in Lieshout. Take that. Tony Hawk did a demo in Eindhoven and we were there. Ryan Moniham interview, Dynamo Open Air '89 report, Bresie interview, Miniramp pics, Pingel art,  Open Dutch vert skate championships, and a freestyle contest report

With 48 pages this was a skinny issue of FAT-'zine. We're still inthe year 1989 and we went to Paris, France for the BMX Freestyle World Championships. The pages got messed up a little. It was pretty tricky to put the pages in order and then Joop had to be on top of it too when he stapled the 'zines together.Kees Lemmens wrote a report about a session in Den Haag, Erlangen, Germany was covered by Matt Pingel,and  Haluk did the Tropica contest. We had an interview with the very talented Scott Carroll (RIP), and Lars from Mars wrote a story about bikers and skaters riding together. We drove over to Uden fr a street skate contest which was won by Dirk Winkelman.  We checked out De La Soul live in Eindhoven and this report was followed by the Paris World's article. Stephan Prantl was interviewed (page 42-43) and we had an anti-drinking campaign sticker (Drank maakt meer kapot dan je lief is) in issue number 11. Still a lot of stuff was put onto the 48 pages and like every week you get to flip through it page by page. 

Lee Reynolds made the cover of issue # 10 of FAT-'zine. He had not seen it until recently when he found it online. That's why we're putting these things on the internet. Those who did not save anything from back in the day still have a way to flip through the pages; digitally. It's 1989 and we made it to the Mega Free event in Paris. We started working the "press pass scam" to get into places for free and to get backstage. Paul brought a suitcase, long jacket and a baret to impress the security guards and it worked. When he opened up the suitcase backstage his bottle of Coca Cola and bag of chips rolled out, but he was in! That game never stopped. Back to the issue:
Carl Inkpen reported from a competition in Farnham, UK, Pingel went to Rom skatepark. We had 6 'zine reviews (Liberty, ACK, Spazum, Shred Zone, Mayhem and R.A.H.F.). There was no Photoshop back then but there were scissors and glue to make a double air on page 15-16. We traveled to Roncq, France for a contest and had a good time as usual.

Did you ever have a cover of a magazine? Yes I did, FAT-'zine issue 9 right here. Putting yourself on the cover is pretty lame but what the heck, make your own (maga)zine and you have that control too. The photo was taken at an event in Amsterdam and "street riding" was a new thing. We got plenty of cool artwork again from our friends at school. Somehow they never got caught. The StokeBros sent over a few pages and again we brought the news in the Believe it, or not!? pages. It's 1989 and a photo caption says that Paul is back on the freestyle scene. A comeback in 1989! Paul also went to see Suicidal Tendencies twice and reports about it. Issue #9 has 'Zine reviews (Sketchy, Fractured and Zenith) and Lars from Mars also wrote a story that you can find on page 18. We did a lot in 1988 and have 7 pages covering the places we went. The free sticker page was filled with a terrible Airwalk freestyle team sticker but hey, it was free. We went to a BDP concert in Eindhoven (P. 29-30) and went back to the University of Duesseldorf to ride the brick banks. The year was 1989. Jeroen Hoogaerts (RIP) and Ron Wilkerson both got interviews. We did

Issue 8 is the 8th issue of 1988. Not bad at all after the first issue (in 1987) was made as a joke. # 8 had 52 pages and on the cover were Albert Moonen, Jason Hassel and Thomas Fritscher. Frans Swinkels and I went to France this time for a contest in dad's Lada. The Germany posse mede it too. Paul went to see a MDC/SNFU & Afflict show in Eindhoven. Dave Vanderspek died in 1988 which shocked everyone. Lars from Mars wrote down his thoughts on a  rainy and sleepless night and sent it in. It showed up on page 18. Pingel went to England and visited the Chingford ramp. Ralf Maier reports from a contest in Bern, Switzerland and Albert Moonen went to the 2-HIp King of Vert in Washington DC and brought us all the latest news and gossip. Back in the day there was no internet guys! Issue 8 had a Joe Johnson interview. On the question "What do you hate" he answered: "When I am staying at Dennis McCoy's house and I have to fix his bike for food." Haha. We took another trip to Amsterdam with the Divorze posse to visit a concert. This time RunDMC, Public Enemy and Derek B and DJ Scratch. Yoyoyo! Matt Pingel itw too and the RAD-LAME list.