BMX is the abbreviation for Bicycle MotoCross. The X stands on the one hand for the English word cross, on the other hand also the verb is meant to cross, which means in German durchfahren/überqueren. BMX refers to a sport that originated in the late 1960s in the U.S. That allows athletes to perform many different tricks or stunts on a 20″ bicycle (20-inch wheels). The forerunner of BMX was the so called "bobsleigh" in the early 1960s. "Sting-Ray" (stingray) bike, which came to Europe in a more advanced form in the 1970s as the Bonanza bike. Already with these "Sting-Rays" the young people in the USA, a with jumps and steep curves provided, about 400 meters long sand course in the head-to-head race against seven opponents carried out. Since the bikes were not actually designed for this tough use, they developed more statically stable frames, but kept the high handlebars and 20-inch rim size: The first "real" BMX was born. In the 1980s, the Steven Spielberg film "E.T." Worldwide a BMX boom triggered..
The various disciplines:
BMX Race
BMX racing probably started all over the world, where children and teenagers had their first off-road races on their bikes, jumping over hills and trying to match the motocross riders on their motorcycles. The first tracks were probably built in California in the early seventies, and this is how BMX racing continued to develop from its beginnings to the present day. The tracks became more demanding, with larger and technically more difficult obstacles, concrete curves and starting hills, and even floodlights and grandstands.
In Germany, the first BMX tracks were built in Bremen, Remagen, Magstadt, Schweinfurt, Sand Erlangen and Peißenberg. The tracks in Bremen and Erlangen still exist today and are still among the best in Germany. Today, the number of tracks in Germany is not as high as in the heyday of BMX sports in the mid-1980s, but the existing facilities such as z. B. Kolbermoor, Betzingen, Königsbrunn, Weilheim, Weiterstadt, Bremen, Bispingen, Cottbus and Plessa are characterized by high standards and constant development. In some cities and municipalities, including Ahnatal, new facilities are currently being built, resp. Planned. German racers were among the best in Europe in the mid-eighties, and names such as Uwe Sturm, Ralf Früchtel, Andreas Tittmann, Ivi Vidakovic, Uli Maurer, Bert Rückert and Rainer Schadowski achieved top places in the professional class in international competitions. But also the new generation distinguished itself by international successes. Alexander Bonenstengel from Munich won the world championship title for 12-year-olds in 1986, and Oliver Kienzle, Andreas Buck, Heiko Hirzbruch, Markus Blau and Fabian Muliwan also achieved international success in the youth classes.
In the 1990s, the success of the German men and women in the professional field declined. The performance of Kerstin Fritscher from Bremen, who has achieved top international rankings in the elite women's category for many years, is all the more impressive. In the German elite men's (ex. Superclass) there were some talents with Frank Brix 2x world champion, Jens Martin, Tibor Simai, Tarek Rasouli, Christian Schaller and Karsten Pfau, but they did not manage the international breakthrough with constantly successful competitions in the professional class of elite riders.
BMX has become an integral part of the Bund Deutscher Radfahrer since the first official competition in Germany in 1982. The racing events are unique in its form, but athletes of all ages from 5-year-old girls to elite riders to seniors over 45 take part in a competition, which makes BMX a family-friendly and colorful sport.
But also the BMX high-performance sport has developed in recent years into a competition of the highest standard with a World Cup series on demanding, spectacular tracks with live broadcasts on the Internet and high prize money up to the highlight of 2008, the Olympic Games in China for the first time with BMX Race.
Freestyle
Later arose the somewhat freer driving with the BMX bike, where it was only about the tricks, the courage and skill required for this, and no longer only about the speed as in the Race. The discipline Freestyle, which became known mainly through the X-Games, is divided into the following sub-disciplines:
Vert: It is ridden in a half pipe known from skateboarding. Flatland: This type is reminiscent of modern artistic cycling with the aim of an aesthetic sequence of various special trick combinations on the flat surface. Street: The probably most popular discipline, in which one drives on everything, which one finds on the road. These include stair railings, artwork and house walls. Dirtjump/Trails: In this case the riders jump over mounds and do tricks in the air. The riders ride without pegs. Park: racing takes place in a confined area where ramps, jumps and other obstacles are set up. The order in which obstacles are used is not fixed. The park is an organized form of street driving. – "Miniramp": riders compete in a halfpipe-like structure that is only smaller (approx. 1,5-3 m)
The individual disciplines sometimes strongly merge into each other, d. H. One can z. B. Making tricks out of dirt even while riding in the park, although for flatland it would be advantageous to ride a special BMX bike whose frame has a shorter wheelbase.