Hello everyone, be gentle it's my first post
Firstly thanks for the old school pictures! I grew up in the 80s and loved seeing freestyle whenever I could.
One of my friends pointed me to this site with the interview from Campbell. Interesting read. I, like him, have bought a new bike and am about to hit parks again. I can already hear my knees protest! I was never particularly good at the sport, but enjoyed jamming around in parks, airing mini ramps/quarters and shitting myself up on vert.
My vague relevance to this thread is the mention of Sutton and also Nonsuch park. When I used to ride, from the age of 12-17 (I'm 29) those two venues saw a lot of me.
The Vert ramp in collingwood park, sutton was essentially on its last legs when I first began bmx and was soon taken down. I remember watching the guys assemble there what seemed like every single saturday, always a little frightened of them being what seemed like a lot younger! There was also a big concrete hump that countless riders used to hurl over, myself included. Sadly it now has iron benches bolted in front of it to stop kids on their bikes riding it. I pulled my first ever 360 over that thing and also cut a few manuals and nose manuals before trying to transfer them to mini ramp. There is now a few small quarter pipes and small boxes for skateboarders, but I never rode it.
Several occassions I had the pleasure of seeing Mike Mullen on that 3 panel vert. Despite the rickety nature he was always smooth as silk on that thing. not to mention his friends Sid, Paul (meacher) Mark (Bartlet), James (Whit) Gary etc all had rad riding styles. I went to many spots with those guys, from the vertical park that used to be in hayes and harlington, to sk8 and ride bristol. Leigh on sea, romford and finally the playstation park in london. I'm in loose contact with Mike still via Facebook and used to bump into Sid at a local rock club.
On a few occasions we would all go into wallington and ride the mini ramp in beddington park, but ten to the dozen it was always filled to the brim with inline skaters, very few boarders strangely. We also used to go to new malden where there was a hefty vert and two mini ramps joined at a hip. some time later they added a small funbox and some rails. The vert no longer exists sadly. Health and safety for you....
We used to have a small park in Dorchester road, North Cheam but it got burned down by kids and never replaced. After a few council meetings and some help from local youth organisations, they put a mini ramp (borderline midi really - just under vert) in the newly made park next to the then newly finished sainsburys. I still remember cycling through the park on an autumn day and seeing some bloke welding it together in the rain. I had such a rush that a ramp was going to be on my doorstep. I asked him when it would be finished and went home to call my friends. (mobile phones being a non entity then) sure enough the next nice day we all got to work on our tricks on that thing with many a slam. Soon word got about and we saw a lot of action from loads of people. It was around this time I hung out with Stuart Kidd (memory and a lot of bifters could have ruined this), who used to make bar ends and hubs (at his school - mind) and he went in to sell a few under Kidd Stuff industries for a time. I really wonder how he is as he was a real nice guy.
Lastly Nonsuch Park. Site of a ww2 bomb exploding, or so the urban legend goes. Everyone used to ride into this immense dirt bowl and air miles out of the doubles built. Over the years the place has increased in size and a few of my friends still session down there. The trails are huge apparently! It had several nicknames, but the one I fondly remember is 'Devil's Dyke'. I remember a fella down there called John who totally owned the place. He had a killer sense of humour to boot and we had a lot of fun over the course of a few summers. occasionally he would even forgo the dirt and come to the mini ramp in North Cheam with me and me mates Chris and Mark.
Sorry to blather on, just wanted to share some of my fond memories from my childhood and hope that some of you guys have some memories of these places too. Perhaps they may go further back, I never knew that surbiton racetrack used to be a bmx track!
anyway take care guys.
