Back in 1986, East Coast freestyle promoter Ron Stebenne brought Martin Aparijo from California to a contest he was putting on in Natick, Massachusetts. At the time, Martin was one of the biggest names east coast kids like myself got to see in the magazines. He was on the GT bicycles team, and he’d been in movies like Rad. We’d Martin in magazines like Freestylin‘ and BMX Plus, but having him turn up at one of our local contests — at least for an 11 year old kid like me — was sureal. One thing I remember vividly of Martin back then is that he was always smiling. When he came to Natick he was smiling. When I saw him in the magazines and videos he was smiling.

Fast forward 25 years, and I’m at the fourth annual Old School BMX Reunion at Woodward West. Martin is 49 years old, and, well he’s still smiling. Today is the first day of the reunion, and while I haven’t shot many photos yet, I did get to shoot Martin during Miami hop hops under a California sky — something I never anticipated back in 1986 (above he’s doing a one-handed Miami hop hop). There’s another photo of Martin after the jump that I also liked. As for the Reunion, there are plenty of faces that have been here the past few years like Mat Hoffman, Eddie Fiola, Tony Murray, Rich Sigur, Xavier Mendez, Pete Augustin, Dennis McCoy, and Brian Blyther as well as some new faces like Duncan Gore and Troy McMurray. I’ll have more photos tomorrow, but for now, here’s Martin.