Tasmanian Scene Report

It's been a long time overdue for the tight scene down in Tasmania. It was great to catch up with a few of the fellas so big thanks to Matthew Wootton & Chris Letchford for getting this piece together & out there!

Introducing..
My name is Matthew Wootton or (Wooto) for short and have been riding since I was about 15 years old (now 26) but went cold turkey for about four years in the middle of that due to the love of bodyboarding and a bit of travelling. I was born in Adelaide but moved to Tas when I was five and grew up in a small country town with about three or four riders. Now reside in Launceston, I didn't get seriously into flat until about five years ago when Twaff pulled me up at video ezy and saw I had a semi flat bike . After hookin up with him, Lenny and Dame I haven't looked back. As for what makes me tick Id have to say travelling, bodyboarding, mates, Coopers Pale Ale, My Girlfriend Brogan and of course Flatland!

Chris "Lenny" Letchford gives the down low on the scene...

It's well known that the overall BMX scene in Tasmania is strong. How does flatland compare to all this?

Flatland is already well known to be an individual sport, but in the land of Tas there is only a small handful of us here, compared to other disciplines its harder for young people to start probably because its not he cool thing to do or the difficulty and dedication or a bit of both.

How is the relationship between flatland & the other BMX disciplines?

The whole BMX community in Tas is still real close regardless if you are a dirt, street, park or a flatlander rider, we often have sessions down the park just to get some other riders involved and to take some interest in the other side of bmx, there is a few guys down there learning some basic moves like hang fives so they can link up some park riding and make it a bit more tech. But there are still some people who just don’t understand it all, I (Lenny) got teased for having pegs on my bike ha ha and been called an old school rider and shit like that but all you can do is just laugh it off.

Would you consider Tassie one big scene or made up of many smaller ones?

Up until maybe 10 years ago BMX was just one scene: everyone rode flat, jumped the local jumps, rode some vert and terrorised security guards with riding something somewhere you shouldn’t be. At the moment I think it’s made up of a few little scenes. There are the guys that are hardcore/dedicated to riding street/park and absolutely rip it up and don’t give a shit what anyone think and just love to ride, then there are the guys on the most expensive bikes with least skills. Then there is the older guys who rip by doin' there own thang, Then there are us the flatlanders who keep to their own little car park in suburbia hiding from the publics eye rarely seen.

Who are the key riders/players in the scenes?

In my eyes everyone is playing there part in maintaining BMX for the future and hopefully being role models for the next generation of rippers.

Considering Tasmania is somewhat separated from the rest of Australia to a degree, do you feel this has some impact on the local scenes?

In my experience I have seen a lot of people come in and out of the riding scene but there has only been a few who really take it to that next level, I think that isolation is a big key with companies not wanting to invest any money into riders that live on an island, therefore these riders aren’t getting pushed hard enough to meet there potential.

Tell us a little about your video project? When can we expect to see it?
The Camera has been put down for a while at the moment and I (Matt Wootton) have just been focusing on riding and getting new tricks down but It should be all finished by Christmas time. The Vid is really all about getting not just the Tassie scene out there, but hopefully Flatland in general because there are not many (pretty much no) young riders paying any attention to this side of BMX. Apart from that we do want to show off a bit of this beautiful state we reside in because it has heaps to offer and check out if anyone is up for a holiday down south.

Where would you like to see flatland going in Tasmania?
I’d like to see a new generation of younger guys take it on and help push the scene to that next level, and to realise that it is actually sillier than it looks and more frustrating, but that’s why we love it

How would you go about getting the flatland scene to that point?

Just hanging out down the local skate park encourages some of the younger guys to start trying some easy tricks which is a good start, whether they keep practising more and more tricks is up to them, I’d like to try and organise a jam/comp here at some stage very soon and get some of the mainland crew over for a visit to our island. It would definitely open some of the younger guy’s eyes.

Any final words or thanks?
I’d like to thank mongoose for my first bike, diamond back for my second and Haro for my 3rd 4th 5th 6th and so on and my wife for loving smashed up shins. I’d also like to thank the support from our local bike shop in the past and to High Roller BMX just for being the one and only soul BMX shop in a Tassie. And thanks to flatlandfuel for having parts at our fingertips. Also like to thank Back bone BMX, Colony BMX, Freestyle Now and all the other kind hearted companies that have noticed flatland in the past few years, Cheers to ya all, Peace!

Shane Badman & Simon O'brien bars & forks update!

Simon O'brien & Shane Badman have their signature bars available through Colony. While Simon's is already available, Shane's will be dropping September & available somewhere near you.

Simon's Deja Vu bar...

*Flatland specific 4 piece design.
*6.8” rise with 23.25” width.
*6º back sweep.
*1º up sweep.
*Weight: TBA.
*Available in Black, White and Assorted Limited Edition Colours.


Shane's Cube bar


*Flatland specific.
*7.9" rise.
*24.4" wide.
*2.5 degrees up sweep.
*2.5 degrees back sweep.
*Weight: TBA.
*Available in Matt Black, White, Candy Red & Candy Blue.


And here's a sneak peak at the new forks available shortly....

Deja Vu fork (offset)



Cube fork (zero offset)

Sequence Hook stem & pegs - reviewed by Ali

So I get this phone call a few months back, it was a flatlander asking me to review some pegs and a stem that Sequence had set him up with as part of some shady contra deal.

This flatlander also tells me to get some good photos taken of the products to go with the review.

‘Sure’ I say, ‘send ‘em on down’.

They arrived a few days later and I ripped into the package with all the excitement of anyone who loves getting free BMX parts in the mail.

After looking them over I paused thought to myself ‘humm, they seem to have been used quite a bit’.

Now used is okay for a written review, dings and missing grip tape don’t generally matter when no one can see them. What’s more if you’re unimportant like me, you’re often at the bottom of the list so it’s not uncommon to get a trashed review copies.

But really, how was I supposed to get good photos out of products that I’d sell for less than half price due wholly to visible wear and tear?

I jumped on the phone to the flatlander, ‘what’s the deal with these parts?’ I said, ‘they look like they have been used for ages’.

‘Yeah’ comes the reply, ‘sure have, I rode them for about six months’.

‘So why didn't you write the review?’ I asked.

‘Couldn’t be bothered’ he said.

There was a pause, perhaps even an uncomfortable silence.

‘Oh’ I said, ‘well, what did you think of them then?’

‘Honestly, the stem didn’t slip once and pegs are pegs’ was his evaluation.

Never have more profound words been spoken about BMX products. I’d suggest that at a minimum, when deciding which stem to buy, one that does not slip would be a great place to start.

I too ran the stem for a few months and sure enough, I can confirm that it didn’t slip once and I had no remarkable issue with it, indeed when installing it, it went together like Lego.

Which surprises me considering that the top part of the stem only had about 5mm of steer tube to grab hold of.

You see I run forks with a 165mm steer tube which I’m convinced were designed back when things like ridiculously long head tubes with oversized novelty internal cups were the domain of guys who wore cleats and shaved their nut sack.

As such, I don’t have a huge amount of slack in my steer tube, I don’t use spacers and the Brickhouse stem I’ve been running forever (which has a lower height than the Sequence Hook), grabbed hold of the whole tube. The Sequence did not. If I was going to run this stem over the long term I’d make sure there was sufficient room for it to fit to my forks.

Which would piss me off had I paid money for it – having to buy new forks that is. But it’s all a trade off, the stem is light because its had all sorts of bits cut out of it, so it has to be big to compensate for the missing material that would have provided contact and in turn grip.

I guess the law is: the more you remove of something means whatever is left behind is all the more important.

According to the Sequence website, the stems come black only and have 26mm and 50mm reach options, Flatlandfuel has them in other colours for some reason.

The pegs? Well, pegs are pegs aren’t they. I’m not a fan of grip tape, even the softer rubberised type used on this product. One of my main gripes is that the adhesive melts in the hot summers we get here in Australia. I personally think knurled is the way to go with pegs, if a little bit of knurling is hurting you hands then perhaps you should harden up.

Each peg is made from two different materials, I think its aluminium with a steel cap insert. I’m not sure how they get the cap to stay in (and I have seen it fall out on other models). They come in 1.5 and 1.65 inch diameter options and black only.

The thing about both these products is they are very flatlandy. By that I mean they are really trying to place themselves on the leading edge of flatland products.

The stem and the pegs both scream ‘I’m up with the latest in flatland products (or trends) and I care about weight’. This is not a bad thing, Sequence are clearly trying capture a part of the market but these products exist in the domain of pretzel top tubes and tiny chainrings.

Will I run the Hook stem and self titled pegs after reviewing them? No, but that’s not because they are bad products, it’s because they are not to my taste. I’m a wedge bolt skeptic and prefer knurled pegs.

You can’t buy Sequence products in Australia, so no supporting your local with this purchase, check out Sequence for more info.

Ends.

Roll Call: Oz riders!

Shaun Jarvis has been keeping a close eye on the Oz Flat Scene of late. He just worded me up on what's been going down of late...

The Tasmanian crew love the rain and the cold...
Leigh “Twaff" Waddingham is riding in the paint and panel workshop
Matt "Woodo" Wootton is almost getting hang fives to half packers on lock
Chris “Lenny” Letchford said that when he is not platting his pubes and eating beef he’s been outriding.

The Brisbane lot are rollin it hard...
Brett Dighton wants a video camera pointed his way to show the progression
Roni Rampton is learning cross foot whip to cross foot hitch hikers and opposite karl kruzers.
John Walsh is keeping it and Roni said some other groms are getting involved

The Sydney siders are mixing it up...
Simon O’Brien is going hard and has recently been riding with Tomacz
Rhys Mason - ex Sydney rider now living in Alice Springs has been riding and keeping it up to date.

In West Oz Aaron Bandy has been riding so hard that he and his wife have made a baby and that he and Russ are riding as often as they can. Trent Karrow said he has been on 92.9fm radio and at channel 7 don’t know what for but I don’t think its bike related. Could be casting for a show??

Canadian Eric Effinger will be arriving in Perth in a few more days time. Looking forward to that.

Ben Moran throwing down...

Shane Badman featured in major Swedish newspaper!

Colony rider Shane Badman has been living the life in Sweden for a while now. While flatland is not huge in the country, the interest for it is definitely there. Recently Shane got asked to do an interview for one of the major Swedish newspapers, Sydsvenskan (South Sweden). Here's how it came about....

I was riding at my local spot in a small village called Staffanstorp in the far south of Sweden. Randomly a couple of people came up to talk, interested in what I was doing. One was a journalist, the other a photographer: they had seen me here practising regularly & were curious to know more about the sport & myself.

So we sat down & went through some details about myself, my riding history & flatland followed by a quick photo shoot. Their plan was to do a full page spread in the Sydsvenskan paper that would be released over the next few days.

A few days go by & I get a message to give the journalist a call. After a short conversion, the word is they would like to do a little more than just a paper interview - but do something for the web too. Great! We scheduled to meet the following the following Monday at their studios in Malmo.

10am Monday arrived quickly. I was welcomed & introduced to the "video guy" & "another photographer" saying they would be with me for the next few hours. The plan was to get a few clips riding & few photos on site.

Riding outdoors in Sweden can be tricky business. I love the country, the people & everything about it, but the weather can make life tough. Even in the middle of summer it can be sunny one moment & raining the next. And the wind.... whoa - if you own a wind farm I imagine you'd be doing pretty well. So we headed down to a place I'd been a few weeks earlier & though thankfully it wasn't raining, the wind was making up for it. We filmed a few things, talked a little bit & headed back to get the photos done.

So after a few short hours since walking through their door I was thanked for my time & advised the final product would be available in the next 24 hours.

And here it is:

You can read the translated article by clicking here.

The short web vid is found here.

And the article was also printed in the daily newspaper - full page no less!!

So a massive thank you to everyone who has made my stay in Sweden an amazing experience. Though I'm leaving in less than a week I'll always remember my time here & the close friends that I've made.

See you all soon!!!

Game of B.I.K.E... West OZ style!

As always, the guys over in Perth are keeping busy through the winter. Progression sessions seem to be going down on the daily - cross handed 5's the trick that's opening doors for them right now. Check out the Freestyle Now website here for the downlow....

Andrew McDermott vs. Shaun Jarvis

King of Ground: Round 2

Congrats to Colony flow rider, Shintaro Misawa who finished 9th at the KOG recently. Awesome contest, awesome riding... check the vid below for the highlights....