I went out to NYC a few weeks back to meet with Brian Tunney and the rest of the ESPN Action Sports staff about doing some BMX content for them. I’ve been notoriously critical of television produced BMX/Skate events like X Games, but I think from a online content perspective ESPN have done a great job putting together original content, and hiring the right people to do it. The first feature I did was an extended version of an earlier post I did on here about the legendary Boston BMX and Skate spot known as Turtles. When I originally wrote the post on here I hadn’t found my old photos from the final session, the day before they bulldozed the place. After digging through some filing cabinets I found a folder of old New England stuff, and there it all was. So check out ESPN for that.

I also have a photo of the day on the Freestyle Motocross blog over there on ESPN.

I was down in So Cal this weekend shooting the Supergirl Jam (a women’s skate and snow contest), and a had a day to kill, so I went and met up with John Parker, Coco Zurita, Gary Laurent, and others, who were all doing demos at Six Flags Magic Mountain as part of Mat Hoffman’s Danger Defying Daredevil Stunt Show, which has been running all summer long (with some of the riders swapping in and out along the way). Gary Laurent rode for Mongoose as a BMX Pro when I was a kid. He still rides (and quite well as you’ll see in a couple photos) but in these shows he announces and rides in the Globe of Death on a motorcycle (the sphere you see motorcycles riding around, going upside down, etc). Gary lives in Vegas and for years ran Planet Plywood skatepark. These days he’s riding his bike and motorcycle in performances all over the world.

The set of the Magic Mountain shows is actually the old set of a multi-million dollar Batman Stunt Show that ran their for years. They made some funny modifications like changing a Batman logo on the set to an “M” and adding little “Condor” details all around. The globe actually sits up on top of the cityscape. Neat. I shot some photos with the Globe of Death riders during one of their demos. It was pretty freaky to be hanging out under the globe with motorcycles (sometimes three at once) speeding in circles in front of my face, but with a fisheye lens the photos turned out pretty cool. Then between shows I shot some stuff with Gary, Coco, and Parker. Check out a gallery after the jump.

Note: the black and white images are shot with an iphone.

From 2005-2007 I helped publish seven issues of a magazine called Sophisticated Rider with Pro BMX rider John Parker and Pro Skateboarder/Writer/Commentator Paul Zitzer. The magazine focused on Skate, BMX and FMX (the winter issues had a bit of snow as well)… an Extreme round-up as Zitzer would call it. All seven issues were distributed for free at skateparks around the US (and beyond).

About two years ago we decided the amount of work vs. the costs involved were getting to be too much. We didn’t have anyone focused on selling advertising, and none of us wanted to deal with that end, so we put the project on indefinite hiatus.

I’ve intended to put the issues online for a while and this week decided to put some effort into it. Unfortunately issues 1-4 were created in Quark Xpress, and since most of the design world has moved on from Quark and into the InDesign realm, it’s a bit of a clusterfuck to to get those issues into PDF form. I can’t believe I was still working in Quark in 2006. I’m not sure what I was thinking. So those 4 Issues remain a bit of a ball-up. Issues 5, 6, and 7 however were created in InDesign, which made them much easier to translate to PDF form.

So the last three issues at least are online for download (5, 6, and 7). I hope to at least get 3 and 4 sorted out and online in the future, as those are two of my favorites, at least design wise. If it comes down to it I will have to just scan a hard copy. Feel free to download the last three issues anyway, and maybe there will be more to come. They are in PDF format, so just click the link below and you’ll be able to flip through each issue, ads and all. At some point I’ll do another personal print project. When and exactly what remains to be seen.

Download the issues here>>>

Issue 5: Spring 2006
Issue 6: Fall 2006
Issue 7: Winter 2007

Freestyle Motocross rider  Jeremy Lusk passed away as the result of injuries from a crash at the X-Riders competition in Costa Rica. There is more info on the Metal Mulisha’s site. Jeremy was the 2008 X Games Gold Medalist as well as the 2008 Transworld Motocross Rider of the Year.

A couple portraits from 2006: Fabiola da Silva and Jeremy Stenberg (shortly after breaking both legs).

Robbie Maddison w/ Mike Mason and Beau Bamburg — Inland Empire, CA, 2008

A couple days ago I posted a few action shots from the LG Championships this year, and now, some portraits… 30 of them. BMXers, Skateboarders, Inline Skaters and Freestyle Motocross riders. Of over a hundred faces we shot, here are 30 very different faces.

Click on the first thumbnail, and then click the next button at the bottom of the pop up image to move on.There’s a little of everything from X Games gold medalists to Guiness Record holders.

I just spent the weekend down in the hot, dusty Inland Empire of Southern California shooting the LG World Championships of FMX. It was a bit windy during the day, so the mid-day seeding rounds were canceled which meant most of the shooting was at night.