I left Denver around 9:00 AM and flew direct to Calgary, landing around 11:30 AM.  I said this in another post but Calgary is a beautiful city and the people I met while there were friendly, helpful and just downright good people.  Oddly enough the city looks just like where I live, only a little greener this time of year.  The weather was perfect the entire three days.

I got to my hotel and assembled my bike and was ready to go by 2:30PM.  I had gotten in touch with franticbmx and was going to ride downtown to Millennium skatepark around 5:00 PM with him but when I got a couple texts that others were already there, I decided to cab it over.  Rod, I should have waited for you cause it cost me $70 in cabs by the end of the day for the ride over and back.   Thanks again for your generous offer!

Once at Mills I met several Museumers that made me feel really welcome.  Axle10 and tk4130 are the two on the right and Wes is in the red shirt.  Not only were they all cool to hang with their riding talent was awesome for the 35+ crowd - way better than me for sure.

The only disappointment of the day was the water in the full pipe.  I was really looking forward to riding this!

After about an hour of riding and hanging out Axle10 led me down to the BMX Gallery 4130 bike shop.  A BMX only shop open seven days a week.  How cool is that!

This is Brad Hanneford, one of the three owners.  They opened their shop to everyone the whole weekend and hosted the Rad 25 poster and art contest along with Jeremy Moser's Rad movie memorabilia which was driven up from Southern California by motorhome!

It's an awesome shop with a small selection of new school bikes and parts.  I'm just realizing now that I didn't get enough shots of the shop...

Axle10 and I had our own personal bike rack inside the shop when we arrived.

Here are a few of the things brought up by Jeremy.  Mike Miranda's actual Hutch restored by BMX Museum's Harossa.

Bart's Blue Max.

Cru's outfit.

A scale model of the track.

This was on top of the scale model.

This poster came up with the crew shooting the Rad documentary (http://araddocumentary.com).  These posters were also being given away on day 2 in Cochrane at the Mongoose booth.

Not part of the art contest, I think this is a repop movie poster.

I'm not sure if this is Jeremy's or not but it was tacked to the wall in the back...

Here are all of the entries in the poster and art contest that were hanging in the shop.  These people put some time into their work so I hope you enjoy checking them out as much as I did.

About 30 minutes after we arrived at the shop, in came Eddie Fiola, Martin Aparijo, Beatle and Everett Rosecrans.  Ev was trying to help Martin get rid of a headache with a little acupressure.

The blue and white Redline is Martin's and the raw and red Redline is Eddie's.

One of the coolest things done for the real VIP's was their personalized VIP pass.

Actual pictures from the movie!

I met several new people on this trip including Alexander and Tonya from Serbia!  They traveled for two days to get to Calgary and camped (no hotel) when they got there!

They've been running a BMX shop in Serbia for ten years now.

If you're ever in Serbia, check 'em out, or click here: http://www.freestylepancevo.co.rs

We hung out at the shop until Eddie, Martin and the Rosecran's said they were heading up to the theater.  I asked if I could tag along and they said sure.  It felt like one of those classic old school video moments you see where the pros are just ripping it up through some city downtown area.  Little attention was paid to stoplights, crosswalks or other cars.  I shot some video of this ride from my GoPro mounted on my forks (which I'll get posted shortly).

At the Uptown were the Vans tour bus and the Rad Documentary motor home.

Several bikes were already being added to the racks outside (which were being watched by security guards).

Axle10 volunteered the whole weekend working inside the theater and driving the VIP bike van.  An awesome Museum member and downright cool guy.

At his table were the Rad Racing shirts and these replica number plates.

Before the first screening at 7:00 PM several of us spotted Hal Needham and couldn't pass up a chance to get a photo with him.

Shortly before the first showing inside the VIP room.

Just a couple shots as the 7:00 PM show was filling up.

During the first screening the crowd participation was awesome.  Funny comments and pieces of trivia were spouted throughout.  After it ended Martin, Eddie, Sam Bernard, Jamie Clarke (Luke), Hal Needham and Bill Allen came up to the stage for a Q&A session.

I had nothing better to do so I stuck around and sat through the 9:00 PM screening as well.  A little more heckling during this one but it was all good to make it to the end for the 2nd Q&A, which was a little shorter.  The Q&A turned into a freestyle demo by Martin and Eddie, performing a lot of the tricks they did in the movie.  What a treat to see them ride in person!

If you've never seen Eddie's famous moonwalk, it is really cool.  Here is a YouTube video with he and Martin riding where he does it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D0Fr7ZRkT1U

Link to Day 2: http://bmxmuseum.com/forums/viewtopic.php?id=349501

Last edited by wired (2011-08-22 2:41pm)