BMX Weekly

With the sad passing of BMX icon Harry Leary, it only made sense to jump on and do a quick podcast with Dr. J and share some Harry stories. We also touch on the Olympics, Frogtown, the GT Malvens Classic and the British Championships at Derby and a few other topics. Check it out.

Tyler Brown, fresh off of the plane from Paris, and I catch up at San Diego BMX and talk about the French dominating the Men's podium, and we also cover the Women’s from the weekend's Olympic Games.

Photo Credit - Fifteen BMX

2024 UCI World Championship wrap-up with Tyler Brown.

Tyler gives us his take on the World Championships in Rock Hill and his thoughts on the Challenge and Masters Class cancellations during Worlds week, how it went down, the vibe, and how the UCI handled the situation.

Of course, with the last chance for the Elite Men and Women to gain Olympics points and qualification in Rock Hill, it was a high pressure weekend for a lot of riders and countries to make it to Paris for the Games.

We talk about both Elite Men and Women classes from the weekend who made the main, who didn't, and thoughts on both Alise Post and Joris Daudet at 33 years old winning their 3rd Elite Rainbow Jerseys and being the oldest to do it in World Championships history.

Lot's more discussed, check it out.

Photo: Craig Dutton/craigdutton.com

Photo by Kenny Hunter

It’s been a long time coming, this podcast featuring my good friend Martin Murray, who had spent a few weeks in the US for DIRTYFEST and the Sea Otter Classic in Monterey.

We recorded this episode at Robbie Miranda’s house in Huntington Beach while Robbie was hosting a BBQ, so expect a few guests chiming in with questions for Martin during the podcast.

We delved into Martin’s early days in the UK, including his 4th place finish at the Brighton World Championships in 1996 in the Junior category, which kickstarted his pro career alongside his brother Stephen.

Martin shared insights from his time in the US, including his battle with Dylan Clayton for the UK Pro/Elite title, winning the 4x National Series, and landing a Dirt Magazine cover with Steve Peat, who he now works with at Peaty’s.

We also discussed some of the UK teams Martin and Stephen’s family managed over the years, his time at 6th form college with Scott Beaumont, Martin’s win at King of Dirt at the age of 13, trail riding, participation in Red Bull’s Empire of Dirt, retirement from racing, and more about his current role at Peaty’s.

And, of course, we touched on how Martin’s brother Stephen is doing these days since moving back to the UK after his injury almost 20 years ago, and more.

Alan Foster Podcast up next.

Alan talks about moving to California, working at a bike shop, living at the POW house, riding Twin Palms, riding for Elf, TNT, Airwalk, Schwinn and Free Agent.

We talk about Alan winning his first AA race at the ABA Del Mar Nationals in San Diego, being in the mid 90s when sponsorships and the industry caught a good wave, with magazines, company cars and plenty of opportunities as a pro rider.

We also talk about training in the 90s, being race-smart and reading the race. Alan talks about transitioning into the business side of the industry with Airwalk while still racing, buying houses and schools and really setting himself up for his post-racing career and being wise with his money.

We talk about current times, riding bikes, traveling, Dirty Fest and much more.

Good to sit down with Clive Gosling over the weekend while he is in California for the week and catch up on everything GT since he took the new role 6 months ago as the global head of marketing for the brand.

Clive talks about his history with GT that goes back to 1984 through the 90s and onto today and plans moving forward.

I'm also happy to announce and stoked that I will be working once again with Clive, Steve Spencer and GT with my Grass Roots and Team programs with some really cool things in the works on the race front in North America over the next few years which we talk about on the Podcast.

We talk about GT's Kye Whyte after his World Cup win going into this summer's Paris Olympics, GT's presence in the UK and France, some of the riders, programs and teams GT supports in racing.

Clive also gives us his thoughts on marketing, branding, sponsorship, social media, MTB, Wyn Masters, Tyler McCaul and more.

PC: BMX.Photos

Kiyomi has been on the short list for a few years now to do a podcast and last week we finally sat down and recorded one which was Kiyomi's first ever podcast.

Kiyomi tells us about growing up at Camp Pendleton (San Diego) with his mom and brother, discovering BMX in 77 and first racing in 79 in El Cajon.

Racing in the SD area at Rancho, Lakeside, and Kearny - meeting Johnny Johnson, progressing through the local ranks to expert, racing every day of the week including trips to the Orange Y and seeing all the factory riders that were winning Nationals at the time.

We talk about sponsorship, riding for local teams like Hidden Valley Bicycles with Shawn Texas, moving onto the Torker Support team, looking up to guys like Eddy King (Factory Torker at the time.)

Kiyomi talks about his first National win, still struggling to get support and the frustrations that came with it and quitting for awhile, going to school, working and coming back to riding and racing in the late 80s in the 17 and over x class and getting on Peddle Power, Tech and later Redline and Haro.

We talk about Kiyomi being up for Am titles, turning Pro, riding for Parkpre, racing mountain bikes, winning the ABA Pro Cruiser title before catching the mid 90s wave of BMX on the up, getting on Trek and being one of the highest paid AAs at the time. We talk about Kiyomi's other Pro Cruiser titles, World Championships Mains and his first AA Win alongside being the rider/team support for Oakley.

We talk about being let go mid-season on Trek, going back to Haro, racing the Vans Triple Crown, retiring, coming back to race Vet/Masters in 05 and winning the NBL Masters title, riding MX these days and working at Magnaflow in San Diego for over 25 years now and counting.

We also talk about some of the magazine covers Kiyomi has had, riders he looked up to, his riding style, training and so much more.

Photo: @usabmx

Great to catch up with my friend Joey Albright while he was out in California with his son TJ for the 250 West Coast Supercross Series.

I became friends with Joey in the 2000s and we raced together in Vet Pro; since then I've always followed what he’s up to through social media.

Joey talks about getting into BMX racing at the Jockey Hill and Kingston tracks (just outside New York) and racing both ABA and NBL.

Joey talks about meeting the Henderson family, progressing to racing Nationals in the 90s while riding for Dans, battling with Colin Proctor, Timmy Sonner and Mike McGonigle in Am, getting suspended and eventually turning Pro.  

We chat about him moving onto Felt, GT, Madera Profile, Haro, Fly Racing A Pro and later Vet Pro and some drama with John Purse - once in Rockford and an incident at the NBL Grands.

We hit on some of Joey's highlights in racing including winning the NBL Vet Pro title the final year of NBL in Kentucky.

We move into talking about Joey's son TJ's BMX career, winning at a young age, getting into dirt bikes and climbing the ranks, the cost and sacrifices of it all and how much some families plow into racing and training on the MX circuit; TJ making his way to Pro and signing this year with West Coast Supercross for the Rock River Yamaha team.

Great to catch up with Joey, to talk BMX and moto, what BMX racing could maybe learn from moto in media, the depth of US Pro racing and so much more.

Photo: @rockriveryamaharacing

New Year Podcast with Dr. J and Jorg de Louw in the back of the van. Just a quick one this time: Are we kooks for watching old races on YouTube? We talk about team changes and why some riders are let go as late as last week with not much time to put a new deal together.

Jorg gives us a little history on the inception of the UCI World Cup in 1995 and some of the behind the scenes stuff he and Gerrit Does did to get the series up and running, working with the UCI. We discuss how the series evolved and changed over the years, including Downhill BMX events and some of the World Cup winners in the pre-Olympic era.

Jorg talks about some of the stuff he's been up to while in California for the holidays and a little about which Dutch men and women are looking good for qualifying as we go into the Olympic Year. Cheers!

Next up on the Podcast, Eddy King and I sat down with the 3rd ever ABA National number 1 Amature, Jason Wharton. This was recorded last week while Eddy and Jason were in town for a mountainbike race.

Jason talked about starting racing in Arizona, the local scene, progressing, riding for JMC and tripling at the 81 Grands, and in the process becoming the ABA Am number 1. Jason talked about getting on Diamond Back with the likes of Eddy, Harry Leary, Doug Davis, Pistol Pete, and Jason's dad becoming the Team Manager as well during the 80s.

We also chatted about some of the riders Jason battled with from Monty Gray, Jeff Moten, Jason Jenson, Eddie Sigmund, Robert Swick just to name a few.

We talked Jason about being on Diamond Back, traveling the country, winding down racing, life after BMX, becoming a barber, and family man and mountain biking.

Check it out.

Photo: USA BMX