BMX is distinguished from other extreme sports in Turkey with one tiny difference. People who was into BMX 30 years ago are still attached to each other with a strong friendship and are still riding. Today a 15 year old rider has the chance to share the same skatepark with a 40+rider. The BMX cultural inheritance coming from 30 years ago is now passing to the younger generation. As BMX TR we would only be happy if we have the slightest contribution in this. We will be showing out utmost effort to convey this inheritance to the young riders...
With this goal we realized that Turkey needed a BMX day. Old riders should come together more with younger generation, riders all over Turkey should come together at least once in the same skatepark. It should be such a day that would re-unite brothers who haven't seen each other for a long years and create new brotherhoods. Forgetting the mother's day we announced second Sunday of May as Turkish BMX day!?! We assure Turkish BMX'ers that we will be more careful in 2017 to pick a more convenient day!
Our call for 8th May had many positive reactions. Murat Başkan (Angel) came from Germany,
Kaya Yalçın came from England,
Cenk Bilgin (Cangabi) and Hakan Karka (Negro) came from Göcek. So we decided we would organize a dinner with old school guys in Istanbul one day before the Turkish BMX Day. It was a nice Saturday evening and we met in Ataköy Marina’da-Benzin Cafe. Unfortunately Hakan couldn't make it due to a health problem he had.
First (Left to right) Öge, Cenk (Cangabi), Boğaç, Ediz, Angel, Ahmet(Löpçük), Mutlu and Kaya came to the place.
Later Akman(Haro) and Ertan (Soft foot) showed up.
After Oğuz (Facik) arrived most of us were together again after long years.
Our grandfather Kemal-the oldest rider in Istanbul joined us too late at night..
Ediz's 86 GT Performer and Akman’a 88 Haro Master were the color of the night.
It was a fun night with our old friends. We once again witnessed that BMX was something more than two-wheels. It is also a binder holding friendships together. Teenegers of 25-30 years ago were now grown-ups, most of them married with children but when we came together again the spirit of 80ies was there again...
Later that night Bahadır from Büyükada joined us and with this pose he became the symbol of the night!.
We left the place at a very late time. It was time for bed as the next day would be the Turkish BMX Day...
And the expected day had come. Young and old riders started coming to Avcılar skatepark. As a result of our call from social media many BMX'ers came from different cities, like Gaziantep, Samsun, Tekirdağ, Kayseri, Adana, İzmir, Bilecik, Muğla, and Antalya and other cities.
A reasonable competition is a must in BMX to progress in the sport. After a warm up of a few hours it was time for the contests we had planned in advance. It was first the Big Air Competition. Thanks to our dear friend Boğaç he had the Big Air level and Bunny Hop measure manufactured.and he even got them transported to Avcılar Skatepark.
Later we had the flatland contest. Only for this contest riders from Adana and Gaziantep had come all the way to Istanbul.
While the contests were going on the prizes those were provided by Vans were waiting for their new owners.
After a fun Flatland contest, Bunny Hop contest started.
Melih and Ediz's experience in the contest organization helped the contests a lot the to be smooth and non-problematic. Our jury members were Kemal, Murat, Celal, Akman, Cenk, Ertan and Bülent during the contests. Our friend Cemil and his partner from Başka İşler Company were also there whole day with their drone and cameras. That's a support we can never pay back...
Our youngest rider İsmail Emre Dalgıç participated the event with his family from İzmir and got the love of everyone. At the age of 12 he even got the 3rd place in Big Air contest. .
After the long contests it was for the awards ceremony. In Big Air İbrahim ŞİMŞEK got te 1st prize, Abdullah GÖKTAŞ got the 2nd prize and İsmail Emre DALGIÇ got the 3rd prize..
Murat ÖZDEMİR, Hüseyin TOK and Samet KESKİN were the winners of flatland contest respectively.
Ahmet BUYURAN, Talha TÜRKASLAN, and Ahmet Samet ERDEM were the winners of Bunny Hop Contest.
And it was time to call it a day. We had a family photograph taken to make this day unforgottable…
And another one for the Old School only...
That was the first of an event that we would repeat traditionally. It was made totally with an amateur spirit without music, loud speakers and megaphones, a day full of pure BMX. We hope all our brothers and friends had unforgottable memories. LONG LIVE BMX!