The roving BMX Mania Interview microphone caught up with BMX visionary, Matt Hoffman at a recent bicycle trade show. The resulting conversation touches on...TV, just plain ridin' and the international riding scene. BMX Mania - We're here with Matt Hoffman, owner of Hoffman Bikes, Matt, you have been a pioneer in getting BMX involved with TV. What's up for the future? Matt Hoffman - I think a lot more opportunity is going to arise for the athletes and stuff, which is great for the people who want to embrace that. I also think that it's really nice that what ESPN is doing is to help legitimize the sport, as a sport, not just a fad or something that "little kids do". I really think that all of this TV exposure is going to enlighten people to the fact that this is an actual sport with athletes involved. BMXM - The word is out about an ESPN pro only BMX series for TV, do you know anything about that? MH - Uh, I, uh, myyyyy……...our legal department has advised me not to comment about that at this time……(laughter) Uh, actually, me, McGoo and others are working on that, it's actually just in the preliminary stages right now, but we are wanting to do it this year and it's something that we all….well, a lot of people think is a good idea. We're tryin' to do something where it's pro, it's Supercross, it's fast, it's speed and it's downhill and big, ya know. I think it will really kind of pull out a different style of racer, like a Brian Foster and that style, ya know. It won't be just someone who is strong and powerful, but they'll need to have all the skills, not just the power. We're just creating another platform for the finesse riders, and I think it will be very visually stimulating at the same time how big and fast these tracks are going to be. BMXM - Matt, I think that all BMXers whether they are racers or jumpers, appreciate what you've done to help with the X-Games and other TV events, and we know that that exposure is important to the recent growth of the sport. What's up for all of this at the international level? MH - I'm working with my team and others to put on international contests to feed into the X-Games, ya know. There's so much going on in Europe, Asia, South America, *Australia and all over that we need to see. There are so many great riders out there that it's great to get everybody together and give em a platform to show what they can do ya know.  BMXM - You've always done a lot overseas, haven't you As a participant in the sport? MH - Yea, I've always done a lot of shows and stuff overseas, it's huge, especially in Europe, ya know. It's growing all over the place and there are some exceptionally talented riders and it is really nice to be able to provide an opportunity to give them a place to shine.  BMXM - Did you ever think that you would be a visionary in a sport like you have become? You probably just wanted to ride your bike, right? MH - I don't know, the two  ideas just kind of grew off of each other. I'm ecstatic that I've had the opportunity to help direct the sport. And like I was saying earlier, it's been great to be able to help people make their talent a commodity. All of these guys do what they do because they love it, but it's also great that because of all the time and all the effort that they put into the sport that they now actually have an opportunity to turn that into a commodity if they wish. It's kind of cool seeing that manifest itself. Right now, it's kind of cool to see the riders who love to ride being able to be seen on TV. And the TV people are exploiting it in a way, but they are doing it right and I think that since this is such a unique sport that it offers a look at the "real" part of the sport. It's not really changed for TV, it's real, it's what you see when you go to where the guys are just hanging out. They need that raw kind of thing to keep them riding, and at the same time, when ESPN shoots a show, it brings that out.  We're still just guys who like to ride. This interview was posted on December 23, 1998

  Matt Hoffman with Evel Knifel
 

The Battering:

The Physical Abuse of Matt Hoffman

By Clint Holland

Matt Hoffman knows it's going to hurt. It's going to hurt when he slams 48 feet onto the handlebars of his bicycle. It's going to hurt on the way to the emergency room. And recovering from surgery. And waking up every morning after.

But his world of hurt is a world of vert, an ambition that is addictive exactly because it has no ceiling. He can't stop just because he's already the best bicycle stunt (BS) rider in the world. Matt Hoffman knows the only place it will stop hurting, will never hurt, is up in the air.

"It's easy to have an excuse to quit because you're injured," Hoffman muses in his Oklahoman drawl, "but I've been injured so many times that the excuse is only an excuse, you know? I'm already 26 and I've got a friend, Dennis McCoy, who's 31 now, and he's still a top pro. Football players get beat up and those guys go to 40. I guess it's just how much heart you have."

Now the host, director and producer of ESPN2 extreme lifestyle program "Kids in the Way," Hoffman has always been on a one-man mission to take it higher. The popularity of BS and vert ramp riding was waning before Hoffman arrived with moves like the worlds first 900--two-and-a-half revolutions spinning vertically in the air off the lip of a half-pipe--in 1989. Then came an insane 27-foot aerial backflip which was on the cover of every 'zine that had anything to do with skate culture and resonates still in the mind of anyone who's seen it.

Hoffman' really outrageous experiments, however, happened in his own backyard in Oklahoma City. "You know how a normal ramp's about 10 feet tall? I built a 21-foot one," Hoffman chuckles, "and had a friend tow me [behind a motor cycle] about 60 miles per hour at it. I got about 27 feet above it. People were into that, because it was kinda like the aerial thing, like, wow, you can really visually understand what's going on."

That's 48 feet in the air. How do you land something like that?

"Um, just hopefully on the wheels."

Hoffman rode the ramp for about a year, eventually building a half-pipe out of it. "I made a 48-foot roll-in and a bike [to ride it]. I got a Weed-Eater motor and reversed the points so the little engine would run backwards and attached it to the back wheel. It was kind of a fun little project. But I ended up getting' hurt pretty bad." He says.

"I could get 18 to 20 feet out of those ramps but it was really awkward because the engine was off-balance and stuff, so I ended up just slammin', and I had to get my spleen out. I got worked."

That time, he took a handlebar to the gut. But he doesn't consider that the worst kind of accident.

"The spleen took a month and a half. Whereas it took four months to recuperate from shoulder surgery."

This shoulder injury is the kind of thing that really bugs him, a nagging, recurring injury that Hoffman calls "chronic." He tore the rotator cuff two or three times, then his shoulder started dislocating. The surgery stabilized the shoulder socket by tightening ligaments and reattaching a wad of loose cartilage. All of this begs the obvious question: Is it hard to get insurance in Hoffman's line of work?

He laughs, "I got group insurance a long time ago. I think they look at Oklahoma as more of a territory than as individuals. So they must go, 'Wow, that's kind of risky territory.'"

But the real risks Hoffman undertakes often go unnoticed. Most people don't pay attention to the technical details of tricks. They just want to see how high he goes and how hard he lands, like at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. Though 85,000 people watched him perform at the closing ceremonies, few noticed the intricacies of a 900 or a No-Hands No-Feet 540-- tricks he insists are taking the sport forward.

So he just has to go bigger. In the debut segment of "Kids In The Way," he gets 3,200 feet of air off a cliff, flipping his bike and doing tricks over a pristine Norwegian fjord before parachuting to a beach. "You try to catch the wind and track away from the cliff face," he says sagely, "it's all rocks and you don't really want to come down on that."

As owner of Hoffman Bikes, head of pro Team Hoffman, and organizer of the BS Contest Series and the BS riding on ESPN2's X Games, Hoffman knows what the people want. That doesn't mean he has to like it.

"People are kind of morbid. They want to see crash and burn. When you get the rednecks who are there just to watch you fall, it gets kind of annoying." The word "daredevil," however, does imply that every so often the devil wins.