FATBMX Your Online BMX News Resource Since 1998

Jovink's Zwarte Cross Festival - ook veur blanken Jovink en de Voederbietels are a Dutch rock band with a good sense of humour. They're MX fans and started a race called "De Zwarte Cross" (The Black cross) 8 years ago. The event has grown over the years and attracts more people than any Motocross GP or Motocross of Nations. 55.000 people showed up over the weekend to drink, drink, watch a carnavalesk MX race and uh drink. On Sunday they had to tell visitors who were stuck in the traffic jam to turn around as the MX track in Halle had reached max capacity. Imagine that, telling people to go home because the motocross track is full.

It takes a lot of time, effort and energy to organize an event. We have put on plenty of BMX events in the past and decided to hold a motocross race. Not knowing what to expect we got to work. The Motocross Des teams (MXdT) was going to be a warm up race for the Motocross of Nations which is considered the Olympics of MX where countries send in their best teams to battle for the gold. That race was going to happen in Lierop (2-3 October) which is only 4 miles from Helmond.

Since 2000, Roost BMX and VintageBMX.com have organized a gathering in conjunction with the ABA Midwest Nationals in Rockford Illinois. The Cobras Local 77 posse was rolling deep for the Rockford 04 adventure with a crew that consisted of the following: Phil Rase, Solan Foster, JR Broham, Sean Rakos and me, ST. We left nearly on schedule at 7-something Friday AM. We had a U Haul trailer full of bikes and an Expedition full of big dudes. I was the small guy of the trip at 5'11" and 195. JR was at the other end of the scale at 6'6" and proportionately weighing in. Everyone else is six foot plus. Lumberjacks?

As I did not have any official tasks at the Freestyle World's this year Paul, McGoo and I decided to hit the Motocross Grand Prix of Belgium. Neeroeteren was only 80 miles from Cologne so it should be a quick trip and back. On Friday evening we decided to meet at breakfast at 07:30am to leave at 08:00am. At 07:35 Paul and I cruised downstairs for breakfast to meet McGoo. He had just come in at 04:45am from some extra escapades in Downtown Cologne. Paul had come in at 3 and that left me being the good guy coming in at 02:00am. Needless to say we were all short on sleep. Paul caught up on some as he installed a mattress in the back of the Vito. McGoo dozed off when we neared Belgium.

This is the second time I start typing up the Bike 04 race report. I lost the text after the "Control-Z" shortcut messed me up. I'm not sure if it's worth it or how many people will read this but I decided to get you a little inside on the pros preparation for the BMX race. The Hilton hotel bar was open 24 hours. With most BMX-ers hanging out there it was a good time. Racers stayed up late. 5am anyone?

The more I get involved in the MX scene the more often I come across on how many riders actually ride BMX. The Flockart brothers live 5 minutes away from the Sowerby's in Scotland and ride the Livingston skatepark every now and then. Stefan Everts has been looking into getting his own skatepark, Josh Coppins is sponsored by Stolen Bikes and factory Suzuki riders Kevin Strijbos and Joel Smets can be found messing around on the BMX track in Dessel, Belgium once in a while.

The GP motocross series started off in Zolder, Belgium. After three years with Dorna it's back to two moto racing in the MX 1 (250), MX 2 (125) and MX 3 (grandpa) classes. Instead of 12 moto's, the season now has 32, a big improvement for the fans. 15700 people attended the opening round of the MX1 and MX2 categories. Not all that great but the weather forecast had been terrible all weekend and with the race being live on TV, a lot of fans stayed home on the couch with a cold beer in their hands.

The latest GP we visited was the one of the Benelux in Lichtenvoorde. Sander Nieuwenhuis was doing vert shows at the event so that was cool. For organizing this show we scored a free promo tent that we used to put up the FATBMX flags and put up a lot of HARO and Universal banners, both customers of EBC. We hung out for a bit at the tent on Saturday night drinking a few Bavaria's before we headed to the beer tent across the field. Once they closed that party down it was back to the vans for some sleep. Next morning the sound of the MX engines woke me up. We abandoned the stand and left for some MX GP racing.

If you've clicked on this button you're probably somewhat interested in MX. If not, simply hit the return button and enjoy the rest of this site. With dual interest in both sports most likely we'll be visiting and riding a few MX races here and there. If we've got some decent pics from the action we'll type up a short report to avoid sending pictures to individual riders which takes up more time than for them checking out www.fatbmx.com. With no (B)MX Racing updates for a few months, it's better to have something, than nothing at all.

obert de Wilde has come up with another update straight out of the USA. Robert is Holland's only pro BMX racer ever who made it to the big time in the USA. He's living the pro life with his wife Mariella in Santa Ana, California. Here's Robert's latest update. Hello, It’s been a while. I took a little break after the Grand’s. It’s March now and the season is already on his way for 2 months. Not that many things happened in the last 3 months. But here are some things that happened recently.