Tag Archives: Throwback Thursday

Throwback Thursday: Ricky Feather

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Ricky Feather has been a much loved rider up in the North of England for many years, way before this photo was taken in 2008. He’d been on a few NSF trips, stayed up in Newcastle numerous times and was always a real good laugh to hang out with. Turns out now he’s a real good builder of road and race bikes and if you haven’t already checked out his website head over there after you’ve had a good look at this photo below.

These red brick quarters must have been around since the 90’s but it took until the early 2000’s for most of the BMXers in the North East to actually ride them. Tucked away in a Gateshead Council estate before the likes of Google Earth and Street View and any sort of social media it was a question of talking to the right people to find out where they were and then a mission to weave in and out of the streets and alleys to find them. Back when I shot this photo with Mr Feather not many people could ride these let along blast a tweaked table out of the top of them. Ricky was always good at the table and this photo on the classic Nikon D70 does it great justice. Enjoy the snap straight outta the camera..

Be sure to also watch his amazing split edit that United did back in 2009, both Ricky and team mate Theo Simpson killed it in this edit and it would still hold itself high in todays standards!

G33K: iso 200 | 10.5mm | f9.0 | 1/500th

G33K: iso 200 | 10.5mm | f9.0 | 1/500th

Ricky Feather and Theo Simpson Split Edit

Throwback Thursday: Mass Transit London

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My apologies for not putting a TT the other day, so in an attempt to say sorry i’m putting up two photos for the price of one. Back in 2006 when DFTU was running the streets and bedroom industries were all the rage a small clothing brand called Mass Transit were having a road trip in London. The trip consisted of Joe Fox, Marv, Mouse, Mike Mills, Dan Cox, Cookie, Will Herman, Ratty, DFTU Steve, Baz, The Mitz and Rhys “McFleece” Coren. I wonder if anyone has the video online from the trip? Ratty??

Anyways here’s two snaps for you from that time, the first one is of Cookie doing a x-pegs smith at St Pauls and the second is over Mouse doing a wall ride to table in some playground down in Laaandaaan. Enjoy.

G33K: iso 400 | 10.5mm | f4.0 | 1/8th

G33K: iso 400 | 10.5mm | f4.0 | 1/8th

G33K: iso 200 | 10.5mm | f5.6 | 1/500th

G33K: iso 200 | 10.5mm | f5.6 | 1/500th

 

Throwback Thursday: Marc Bell

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Hearing that Marc Bell was getting back into riding a couple of years ago was some of the best BMX news i’d heard in ages! Marc was a legend in the North East, he had shut down rails that even at today’s standards would still not be approached by most. The most memorable rail of his era was the gap to rail at Newcastle United’s St James’ Park which you can see at the beginning of his shared section with Rob Strong in NSF2 after the photo.

Within weeks of Marc getting back into riding he was out eyeing up stuff he’d spotted in the past. We went to this spot over in Jarrow which had a meaty rail one side that he’d already done years ago and a possible hop over into a bank on the other. The bank was about as thin as this photo shows and I had to make a quick exit to clear the path for him once he’d chucked the Geoff’s. I had always wanted to get some decent photos of Marc and finally the chance was in front of me.

Marc Bell, Barspin rail hop, Jarrow, 2008

G33K: iso 100 | 16mm | f7.1 | 1/250th

G33K: iso 100 | 16mm | f7.1 | 1/250th

Rob Strong and Marc Bell in NSF 2

Throwback Thursday: Derek Strickland

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Throwing it back to when I used to work for Federal Bikes and I was up in Milton Keynes at the time snapping away with Federal rider Derek Strickland. Charlie Jobling was on hand filming what was going down for their series of web edits that they were dropping regularly. It was coming to the end of the night, the batteries on the video light were going down and we were about to wrap up but Derek and I had unfinished business. Derek took us both to this crazy looking monument type thing that had a tight flatbank on it. I wanted to light up both Derek and the structure so after a bit of messing around with the lights I think we got it just right. Two lights are on Derek, the rim light being one stop brighter than the main light and then another flash was in the middle of the structure picking out the blue details from within.

G33K: iso 400 | 105mm | f4.5 | 1/200th

G33K: iso 400 | 105mm | f4.5 | 1/200th

Throwback Thursday: Seth Kimbrough

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When I worked for Seventies I was very honoured to be able to meet some of the people in BMX that I had really looked up to and grew up watching as a teenager. Seth Kimbrough was one of those guys, even though he’s about the same age as me we’d get the videos and DVD’s arriving over here in the UK and all of us would be watching the lates moves from across the pond. Seth has always been an interesting and inspiring rider to watch with a style that for me is mixed between the midschool of the late 90s early 2000’s with burley tricks, gaps, grinds and the new school of technical lines. He has a banging section in The Shadow Conspiracy’s Into the Void video and you can see it after the photo.

The shot was taken on one of Seth’s UK visits to meet up with his friends and fellow team mates Bas Keep and Mad Jon (at the time Bas rode for Hoffman before Cult) and we headed North to the stomping grounds of the spot master Owain Clegg. After a day out riding street and the local plaza we headed back to Owain’s house to check out his extremely tight ramp setup he had in the back garden. Seth like a bloody pro he is was getting all over it and busted a few clicked tables for the camera.

I haven’t seen him in about two years, the last time I randomly bumped into him down at an art show in London’s Shoreditch, the last place I would have expected him to be but he was travelling with his wife around Europe. Pretty small world! I hope you’re doing well and enjoying the ride Seth 😀

G33K: iso 400 | 16mm | f8.0 | 1/250th

G33K: iso 400 | 16mm | f8.0 | 1/250th

Seth Kimbrough in Into the Void

Throwback Thursday: Joe Cox

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A simple double peg down one of the most famous rails in England, Ponds Forge. This rail has been documented on and within the covers of Ride UK for years but was also seen in such classic videos as NSF2 (Joe section), Voices and Tomorrow We Work. This shot of Joe was taken almost eleven years ago while a bunch of rowdy northerners were on a visit to Sheffield to catch up, ride and get drunk with old friends. There was a strong crew out that trip and if you hit “read more” you’ll be able to see a great group photo of everyone who came down for the trip.

G33K: iso 400 | 15mm | f6.7 | 1/4th

G33K: iso 400 | 15mm | f6.7 | 1/4th

Read more →

Throwback Thursday: Greg Illingworth and the Reservoir

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G33K: iso 100 | 50mm | f5.6 | 1/320th

G33K: iso 100 | 50mm | f5.6 | 1/320th

In January of this year Greg’s UK/JP video dropped, one of the spots that was featured in it is not far down the road from where we’re based. A huge victorian reservoir that’s been featured in the NSF video and on the front cover of Ride UK where Baz Keep was doing a huge table out of it. Last year Greg, Brad (his brother), Dave Summertime, Ross Thompson, Murphy and I went down to have a session and to snap some photos of something I’d wanted to shoot for years, even if it was just to take a photo of the sheer scale of the place. Read more →

Throwback Thursday: Olly Olsen and The Snake Run

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Year back, we’re talking like seven years or more Olly told me about this snake run that existed up in the hills of Blaydon in Gateshead. Back in 2006-7 time there was a lot less riders, google maps was something that wasn’t used day in day out and the top down view of places were coloured blobs on a small CRT monitor.. This was street knowledge, it may have even been Mexican John knowledge as he was the keeper of a lot of street spots, him and Olly would go out on missions to find these random, amazing places that were off the track. Anyways roll on 2007 and Olly and I decided we’d go for a long ride up a very long hill to find this place and it was a mission of rolling up and down streets looking for some signals or local kids you could ask. After a little while we finally got wind of a location, kind of like up this street, find an alley with green railings, next to a big field and you’ll find it but it’s kinda dug in the ground a little so it won’t be obvious.. great directions haha, we found it though and we sessioned the shit out of it for about two hours. It only really consisted of 2 routes and was over in about 15 seconds but it was bloody awesome to find somewhere like this in a city full of rails, ledges and stairs with hardly any transitions.

Here’s a sweet pic that we got from that day, Olly getting his table on, nice and clicked. Shot on the Nikon D70 (one of the best digital cameras I ever owned).

G33K: iso 100 | 10.5mm | f7.1 | 1/320th

G33K: iso 100 | 10.5mm | f7.1 | 1/320th

Throwback Thursday: Chris “The Count” Lee Byker Days

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This shot isn’t even that old, it was taken in 2011 in the infamous Byker (Byker Grove) area of Newcastle. We needed a promo photo for the Seventies catalogue for The Make section so Chris and I headed out to this rail that he wanted to get a grind to grizz on. It’s right outside a metro station (underground) so it’s sometimes a bust but not normally as they’ve usually got bigger fish to fry. We did a few different shots but this one came out the most tweaked, I almost cut his head off on the framing but as he flew higher and faster out of the rail on this attempt.

A simple two flash set up, the main flash was set to F9 and the rim flash would have been about F11 but it didn’t pop as much as I’d wanted. Either way though it came out sweet and we were both happy with it. Enjoy this weeks Throwback Thursday and we’ll see you next week innit.

Chris "The Count" Lee, Rail to Grizz, Byker

G33K: iso 200 | 16mm | f9.0 | 1/320th

Throwback Thursday: Buff House 2.0

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Ah memories, good times, crazy parties and embarrassing photos where people say “did I used to look like that?”. This was Buff House two point ohhh back when DFTU had started, NSF 3 was getting filmed for, BuFF Zine was getting printed and road trips were a-plenty. See if you can recognise anyone in the photo, it was taken on 2nd October 2004 at Holmslice Place in NE6, that was some time ago. Steve had just finished brewing the Vinnie Sammon brew and beer bongs were on the menu for that night, I can’t remember what we were doing that night, probably going out in town as the NE6 massiv or something. God knows…

Buff House 2.0

Buff House 2.0

Around the time that this photo was taken Newrick and Carmine went about making the epic promo for NSF 3, check it out below: