Author: Aaron Gates

11 May Chase Davidson in Australia

Posted at 20:24h in archive by Aaron Gates

Chase Davidson spent some years down in Australia and put these clips together when we all got stuck at home. it’s a great mix of park riding and some spots, with cameos from a few of the Aussies that I always want to watch ride skateparks. I asked Chase to give a little background on where he’s from and how the video came together.

I’m from a small little town called Cottam out near Windsor, Ontario but have been travelling worldwide pretty steadily since 2013. Thes epast two years I spent down in Aus on a Working Holiday Visa. Most of the clips filmed for this had no real objective of being in an edit but then COVID-19 came in and I felt it was a good time to throw it all together.
Due in part to being on the road so often, most of the riding I do is usually solo in the early mornings so I’m looking forward to getting back to Canada in a few weeks and riding with all the homies in baconeggsbmx again.

04 May Embassy Decade in Review: The Rise of Hango

Posted at 14:53h in archive by Aaron Gates

Because Embassy started at the beginning of the decade, almost the entirety of the website has existed over this period. One of the great functions of the site has been to serve as an informal record of things that happened in Canadian BMX. In this series, we’ll attempt to bookend the decade and call back to some of our favorite things that happened over the last ten years.

The last Nelson contest took place in the winter of 2003. It was the end of a long and storied tradition in Canadian BMX, but it was also the beginning of something. Dustin Guenther won that contest, but right behind him was 16 year old Jordan Hango, riding his local indoor park. BMX media was pretty thin that year, and the only write-up I remember seeing was from Wade Nelson, who pronounced that “Jordan Hango is the future”. He was right – Jordan’s riding is so undeniably pure, gnarly, and effortless, that it was inevitable for people to take notice. And in a way, it kind of had to be.

I don’t claim to know Jordan well, but I have known him for a long time. The most obvious thing about his riding is that if he wasn’t in the spotlight, he would still be doing the exact same thing. I don’t get the sense that he ever put much into getting sponsors, and he’s where he’s at now because it’s impossible to see that guy ride and not be blown away by it.

Of all the guys putting out big video parts this decade, I don’t think more than a couple of dudes can touch the volume of full throttle wild sections that Jordan’s put together. It would be easy to wax eloquent about how great everything is, but better to just watch the parts, compiled below.

Blazeguard. John Thompson made some of the most epic web videos of last decade, so the anticipation for this one was high. I think if there was a videographer equivalent to Hango’s riding, it’s probably JT. Very talented, super dialed, and just a guy that executes well. The video only had three parts, but this was one of them, and it’s so good.

Holy Fit. Legend has it that Hango wasn’t supposed to have a part in this video, and a few Fit guys came to the Northwest on a filming trip not knowing much about him. After that trip, he was probably getting a section in this thing. The fastplant rail combos in this one are amazing, and at 2:40 he conquers a spot in Vancouver that everyone’s driven by a hundred times but nobody thought was possible to ride.

Fit web videos. These were web videos. (web videos!)

Atlantis – Battle of the Birds.

Atlantis videos. These parts are the best, because they have such a natural feel to them. It’s pretty clearly just Jordan out filming with Schubert and whoever else is around, and then throwing in some absolute deadman stuff for good measure.

Atlantis – Splyglass.

Fictional Finalism.

X-Games. And then, for at least a moment, a wider audience got a bit of a glimpse into just how good Jordan’s riding is. The behind the scenes descriptions from Moeller from the full episode are perfect (it’s out there if you search for it).

23 Dec Embassy Decade in Review: Bad 4 Life

Posted at 13:47h in archive by Aaron Gates

There’s a tendency in BMX to define large parts of the culture by its urban areas. So much of BMX is centered around what’s happening in LA, Austin, and New York. So much of Canadian BMX is centered around Vancouver, Toronto, and Montreal (and Calgary, and Edmonton, and Winnipeg, and Halifax, etc.). These cities are where the distros, the skateparks and the best street riding are. They’re where riders move to when they leave home for a bigger scene, and generally, they produce most of the content that we would want to post about on a website like this.

Canada isn’t quite that way though. Past the big cities, most of the riding scenes in the country are small. A group of friends that knows another group of friends an hour down the highway. A local skatepark that may be new, or may be 20 years old, ramps and jumps in somebody’s yard… this is how a lot of use grew up.

Brodie Gwilliam’s videos paint a picture of the extreme other side. Among the rise of urban street riding, Brodie and his group of (kind of) misfits seemed to explore every random town on the prairies, they rode waterslides, and literal rocks, and they did it all in super clear high definition on one of the first RED cameras to shoot bmx. The fact that all of this existed at all, in the form that it does, doesn’t make much sense. But it’s amazing.

Justin Schwanke interviewed him for Embassy here. Jeremy interviewed him about their full-length Let’s Get Fistical here.

The B4L video that I’ve watched back the most was the “Van Life” edit, from a two week trip Brodie took to Vancouver. Peak Ridgeway, Andy, and Dave Laliberte while travelling around in Mat’s $300 van.

Amidst all of that exploring, the Pinnacle of Brodie’s filmmaking this decade was the “Bush League” series. Filmed mostly (entirely?) on his own farm, he rides the most ridiculous obstacles. Modified ramp setups, tractors, hay bales, farm equipment, and so much more. Brodie’s riding really holds its own as well. It’s one of the most well-executed and unique projects I’ve seen in BMX, and he put together three (!) amazing versions of this concept.

While Bush League 1 exists, and is a pretty fun collection of Sask locals riding nothing, the second through fourth episodes are where Brodie really found the style that defines the series. And they’re unreal.

14 Apr No Bikes 2017

Posted at 01:45h in archive by Aaron Gates

For this past year’s no bikes trip we hit some old haunts and a couple of spectacular new ones. Our group of riders spans across a ton of different areas – multiple states and provinces, but it was basically birthed in Kelowna and Nelson. There are a couple of new parks in that area and I just like going to the Kootenays, so we took a trip.
(more…)

29 Jan BC Interior Trip

Posted at 00:12h in archive by Aaron Gates

Slade sent this one through, featuring himself, Kostya Chimkovitch, Jon Fredlund and John Thompson. I’m assuming that Kostya put the video together, since he’s been rolling around with a camera lately. It’s a pretty nice little tour of the parks around the Okanagan these days, with some killer riding. The parks get AMAZING near the end of the trip, so you’ll want to hang on for that.

Bonus trivia – the rail that Kostya crashes on in the first clip (and later pulls) was first done by pro skater Ryan Smith as the ender in his Nobodys part, in 1997. That video also featured this classic part from Simon Barry (that you should watch).

24 Apr No Bikes 2016: Orcas Island Boat Trip

Posted at 00:46h in archive by Aaron Gates

Words: Aaron Gates Photos: Cary Lorenz (film), Aaron Gates (digital), Brandon Sakelerides (fisheye)

In about June, my wife and I learned that we had kid number 3 on the way. If you’re thinking this is the weirdest way to start a bmx article, well yeah. It was also a weird way to start a bmx trip. I mean, it was a little while before a dozen guys would come to town and rip apart a bunch of parks around Puget Sound, but it was a defining thing for this trip for me. The weird part, of course, was that nobody on the trip really knew what was going on.

Cary Lorenz – Orcas Deep End [Gates]

I tell this story as a strange window into adult life, knowing that most people reading it won’t have been through this and some never will. But you’ll all experience weird life things at some point. As you get older, lots of things will come along that take up a lot of time and make bmx seem less important. You’ll either find a way to keep integrating bmx into your life as these changes happen, or you won’t. And either option is just fine. I’m lucky enough to have a half dozen skateparks and a bmx track within ten minutes of my house, and my first two kids have taken to riding pretty easily. I still manage to get out and ride – not enough to feel like I’m accomplishing anything, but enough that it’s still fun.

[Lorenz]

We’ve done no bikes trips every year since 2009 or so and most of them have involved lining up a bit of help at home while I took off to some other state for an extended long weekend. This trip was (thankfully) close to home. One thing about having a kid – the first three months after you find out it’s happening are the worst. You can’t really tell anyone about it for various reasons, but it’s also the time you need the most help. Things were a little challenging, but we wrangled the help that we could get and just went for it.

Cary Lorenz – Port Townsend [Sakelarides]

I felt a little weird about just going on like things were normal, but one thing I’ve learned about growing up is that if you don’t make habits and stick to them, things you enjoy will fall by the wayside and you end up doing a lot of nothing (and that my wife is amazingly patient with my hobbies). This trip is a habit at this point.

Don Delp – Oak Harbor [Sakelarides]

One great part of this was having my kids around – they hung out at the campfire a little bit and came out riding on one of the days. Now, don’t get me wrong, bringing a four year old and a five year old to a skatepark is a real pain. They’re not very good at paying attention and you spend most of your time making sure they don’t get run over, but I think it’s something cool that they’ll remember and I look forward to doing road trips with them when they get older and more aware of their surroundings.

James Van De Kamp – Port Townsend [Sakelarides]

It’s not just me either. We always have a huge range of ages on our trips. The first time I met Butler, I was about 16 and Dave had a baby girl. Now, we always bring a young guy or two that’s only a few years older than Butler’s kid. I see other guys going through big life stuff too, and the complexion of the trip changes as guys get married, start families, and move around.

Slade Scherer – Port Townsend [Sakelarides]

All that said, this was a banger of a trip. Orcas Island is a real adventure – it has one of the best skateparks anywhere and a gnarly hill bomb that roasted through a brand new pair of shoes for me. I made a point of putting a trip together where we’d travel mostly by ferry, and that worked out really well. There were a few good parking lot hangouts and riding the ferry lets you see Puget Sound from a very cool and different perspective. We swam in lakes and the ocean, stopped by Seattle BMX, rode all sorts of bowls and calmed any tension with Four Lokos (this was also a bad idea and those things are awful!).

Mat Ridgeway – Surfin’ Orcas [Gates]

With that as an introduction – enjoy this giant pile of photos! They’re in no particular order and all of them are from somewhere around Puget Sound in Washington.

Slade Scherer – Orcas Wall [Gates]

Post Script: Strangely, I wrote all of the above before I learned (along with the rest of you) that Embassy was soon to be finished. Like most of us who started out posting here, my posts became less and less frequent up to the point where I was just hanging around to write about this trip each year and maybe interview someone interesting every once in a while. I always appreciated the ability to just drop in when I had something really good to share. Not having to worry about running a site and maintaining regular content was a very wonderful thing to me, and I can’t thank Jeremy, Prashant and Cory enough for keeping things running so well for so long.

Embassy was especially important to me as an ex-pat; I haven’t really lived in Canada in almost 15 years but have been able to connect with my friends, my scene, and my roots through this site in a way that helped me feel like I still had a place there.

I (Aaron) will still be around and will probably put together similar stuff. Since I don’t have anywhere to put it anymore, I set up an Instagram account up for bike stuff (@nobikes_). Check it out if you want to see photos of adventures like this one. More importantly though, follow @presencebmx to get the latest on Jeremy’s new video. Jeremy’s made some of my all time favorite videos over the years and I can’t wait to see Last Stand.

Portland Dudes – Caleb and Tony [Lorenz]

James Van De Kamp – Orcas Transfer [Gates]

Andy McGrath in the bobsled track [Sakelarides]

Caleb Reucker – Super Tech Ramp Rider [Sakelarides]

Don Delp Tree Excursion [Gates]

Orcas Ferry [Gates]

The Top of Mt. Constitution – Orcas Island. Starting front left: Ty Scott, Mat Ridgeway, Cary Lorenz, James Van De Kamp, Caleb Reucker, (middle): Slade Scherer, Dave Butler, Tom Arden, (back): Don Delp, Loren Lyftogt, Tony Piff, Brandon Sakelarides, Andy McGrath, Aaron Gates.

James Van De Kamp – Oak Harbor [Gates]

Tom Arden [Lorenz]

Greenake [Lorenz]

First Stop – Tacos and Coffee [Lorenz]

Mukilteo Train [Gates]

Whidby Island Ferry [Gates]

Cary Lorenz – Pocket air at Port Townsend [Gates]

James Van De Kamp – Mukilteo lines [Gates]

Slade Scherer in the Mukilteo clam shell [Gates]

Rained out of South Park 🙁 [Gates]

Another ferry line [Lorenz]

But there’s sandwiches! [Lorenz]

Deception Pass [Lorenz]

We found lakes everywhere. This one was the best. [Lorenz]

12 Mar No Bikes 2015 – Odds, Ends and Other Stuff

Posted at 09:41h in archive by Aaron Gates

Left to Right: Andy McGrath, Greg Rooke, Seth Bernard, Matt Horak, David Clay, James Nelson, Aaron Gates, Mat Ridgeway, Tony Piff, Slade Scherer, Nick Lindstrom, Colby Brouilliard, Wayne Anasogak, Cary Lorenz, Ty Scott, Duke Hardcastle, Dave Butler.

Vans, lakes, salt flats, temples, hot springs, dams, bike piles, twins. This is the good stuff.

PART I: PHOTOS BY AARON GATES

PART II: PHOTOS BY TONY PIFF

12 Mar No Bikes 2015 – Idaho/Utah Edit by Andy McGrath

Posted at 09:37h in archive by Aaron Gates

26 Feb No Bikes 2015: Gallery by Aaron Gates

Posted at 01:48h in archive by Aaron Gates

Seth Bernard – Layton, UT

I’ve been fotunate to grow up around a lot of awesome bike riders, many of whom were on this trip. We had lots of different styles – street guys, trails, concrete shredders. We rode a lot of stuff. Mostly parks, but a lot of stuff.