Meet Me in the Hills
It was 2019, mid-September, the long taper of a summer without demarcation. It was the evening. My phone rang. It was Jackson. He told me about a short trip he was taking mid-way between the two of us and invited me to come on short notice, no more notice than he had. I booked the flight to Denver to meet him, the FBM/Profile crews, and some of the extended ménage. We’d be riding spots in the Rockies for three short days.
Jackson and I became close friends when I lived in Sata Cruz. Garrett I’d known since he was a kid from living in Saint Louis. The rest of them I knew from the road. Steve Crandall, whose party I was crashing, became a friend and pen pal over the past 14 years because we crossed paths everywhere but where we lived enough times that it’s just what happened. Some of the others I met at Woodward, on other BMX trips, or previous meet-ups with FBM. A few, Jay from QBP, and Vic from Circuit were new. The road–we met there, we meet there, and if we see each other again, that’s where it’ll be.
I knew I’d only get a few airs at best before my arms felt like they were ripping off at the elbow like viscera velcro. I was a few months into some gnarly tendonitis, but I’d go anyway and take what I could get. That’s what I got. And these photos. And a nice time with perhaps the most down to earth BMX team I’ve met. That was good enough for me.
(None of us knew at the time, but this trip would mark the conclusion of FBM operating as a handmade BMX bike company, which Steve announced while everyone was taking a break at Frisco.)
*Click’em to make’em big and un-cropped.
