-Saturday was a special day. Not only did I enter my first contest in over 10 yeas, I entered it together with my son Philip. The Rookie Jam in Cologne was the perfect place for it as they had a Rookie class for first timers and an ET class for the old dogs (30 and over). With over 130 riders entering the contest is shows that we don't need to fear the future of BMX. 
-Sunday was reserved for the first motocross Grand Prix of the 2008 season. Call it A1 if you like. After a full day of rain on Saturday (the Rookie jam was indoors), we had a full day of sunshine in Valkenswaard on Sunday. We ran into several BMX-ers at the GP and both the MX1 and MX2 winners do ride BMX on occasion. Tyla Rattray won the MX2 class and Ken de Dijcker won the MX1 class.-We got some bike checks in this week Matt Mcleod, Ryan Nyquist, Ronnie Napolitan and Wagner Pedroni.
-Maxime Charveron returned back to France from a trip to the USA just in time to hit the second round of the FISE Experience contest series. With the overall prize being a brand new Fiat SUV, the contest series became really interesting, especially for the 17 year old. Here are the results from Auron:Pro:
1. Maxime CHARVERON
2. Louis PEYRE
3. Justin FOUQUE
4. Ludo LEGRAND
5. Julien BONGOURNO
Maxime has won both rounds so far. Next contest that counts for the overall: FISE in Montpellier. He will have to compete with Dave Mirra, Mike Spinner, Dave Rytell, and Mike Laird in the park class for some points.
-And then there was the X-Games vert drama this week. The vert discipline was off, but after some heavy protesting the event is back on for the 2008 summer edition in Los Angeles. And we're okay with that. A couple of other X-Games events are about to take place in Brasil and China. Both have BMX vert too and real street too. What will happen with Superpark remains to be seen.-Issue number 6 of FAT-'zine made it online and issue number 7 will go live tomorrow. These 'zines are getting better and better. Issue six has Carlo Griggs on the cover and interviews with Dennis McCoy, Robert Moeller, Tommy Guerrero and Rick Allison. Enjoy. Today I finished shooting all the pages of issues 22 - 27 so I'll have sore muscles tomorrow from all the knee bends I had to do to flip the pages. What a man has to do to get you guys your updates. Thanks to Jos Wissink for getting the pages online in a flip mode. It's almost like the real thing.
- Bike thieves suck. Daniel Dhers found out too. Give him that bike back you jerk.-Sam Foakes won the first round of the KOG series in Yokohama, Japan. The Brit has been riding flatland forever and was ready for a big win. It happened in Japan where he beat Justin Miller (2nd) and Yoshiki Uchino (3rd).
-The two winners of the duo tickets to the T-Mobile Extreme Playground Dirt Session in Duisburg are:
1) Fabio Van Put, Edegem, Belgium
2) Alexandra Buchholz, Bergisch Gladbach, Germany.
-BMX Supercross fans who did not leave for the UCI SX in Australia can watch the races live on www.freecaster.tv. 13:30hr CET on Sunday 13 April.
-The following riders are on eastpak's A-team:
Ben Hennon - UK Arthur Dietrich - FR
Mike Miller - UK
Stefan Lantschner - IT
Tobias Wicke - GER
Hannu Cools - BE
Raphael Chiquet - FR
with plenty others receiving support.
-More team-rider news:
Waldemar Fatkin is off KHE
Scott Ditchburn is on Orchid shoes
-RedBull Elevation has moved from Whistler to Guadalajara, Mexico. The world best dirt riders will meet there from 9-11 May 2008.-Parano Garage still have a frame sale going on. Ultra cheap yo!
-You can win Kye Forte's old bike by clicking here fast. You've got until 15 April. Hurry.
-The "Flatland für Arme, Flatland für Beine" contest went down in Friedland, Germany. Your Pro top three looks like this: 1st Michael Steingräber, 2nd Waldemar Fatkin, 3rd Dominik Nekolny.
See you next week for another edition of FAT Friday..
BdJ
After doing a BMX 'zine for ten years (1987 - 1996) FATBMX made it on the internet. The year was 1998. Here to stay.