Betty Frey, Jim Aguglia (R.I.P.), and Mr. Silloway were a huge part of the BMX scene in Rochester. Without them we wouldn't have had local tracks and places to race.
Who would have thought we could get a national by us. I know that without them my BMX career would not have been what it was. (Well without my dad, my brothers and them.)

Tim - the picture from Ransomville brings back some good memories. I think the first time I ever won a main against you was at that track.
That track was so tight........if you could win from gate 6 (outside lane) you were the man!! I remember Mark Foster and Chris Draggett would do it a lot.

My all time favorite races were the indoor races in Niagara Falls and Syracuse on the cement.

My all time favorite races were the indoor races in Niagara Falls

Mine too. I tripled at Niagara Falls!

Stadium tires

I have a bunch of embarassing Cool-Toll pictures. I'll post soon.

Tim,

Great pictures from Eagle with my bro and you jumping, good style. And me rockin' the Torker gear.....too funny! Those were some good times.

Still looking for more pictures of Cool-Tool. Here is a picture from the last indoor race in Niagara Falls. 17 & over expert main - I'm leading and Doni Hier is sitting in third waiting to make a move into 2nd.

C'mon guys lets keep this going!

Syracuse indoor...........

Can-Am Niagara Falls 1985.............

Great shots, Whitey.
I believe I made it to the Can-Am in 85, or it was 86.
Do you have any more shots of it?

Iceman

WHITEY!!!!!
Yo! This is Ed Ferri... it's been years man. I think the last time I saw you was around 91 or so. (Right when I started riding for Bonzai after I moved to Florida)
I was watching some old NY State Qualifier videos from the late 80's.. and you were in a bunch of them.
Good times for sure!
In all my years racing and riding in NY... I never made it to Cool Tool... bummer...
-Ed

Hey Ed, what's up bro!

Whitey, I just dug through some old trophies, and found the one I got from the Can-Am race. As it turns out, the one I was at was in 85.

That was the grands for the EBA, wasn't it?

Iceman

Yo Iceman!!!
How are ya bro!!!

Hey Ed,
Check it out... I finally got to race! 1st time in 16 years! I took the family to Fairbanks, which has the only track in Alaska, and won my cruiser class!
My boys have never raced before, and they kicked butt, too! What a great time we had. Those guys in Fairbanks were great.
A few friends of mine and I are going to have a meeting to get the ball rolling for a track here in Anchorage. I'm pretty excited!


Whitey, is that pic of the 85 Can-Am you put up the final in 18 and over expert? I think I see myself in the Gray helmet and white mesh shirt (My East Anchorage football jersey), trailing in about 4th. That would be pretty cool if it is.

Iceman

Hey Ed, how's Dennis been doing this year?
He having fun, and maybe kicking a little butt while he's at it?

Man, it was so good to race again, but let me tell you... I was hurting after each moto!! Where's the oxygen, man!!!


Iceman

Iceman,

Wow!! Crazy to hear from you. That is the 18 & Over expert main from Can-Am, and I think that it was the winter or '85. That was so much fun racing those indoors!

How have you been?? Sounds like after a 16 year lay off you can still fly on a bike. You must have had a blast racing and watching your boys do so well......congrats!

Whitey

Ed,

Hey what's up?? Ooooh.... the old NY State Qualifiers. Man those were some crazy races. Looking back we had some pretty stacked motos and mains. I actually have a couple of races that I was watching awhile back. There were alot of great riders that came from NY.

Are you still in Florida?? Let me know what ya been doing. (I see you are w/Skyway....thats cool)

Whitey

Whitey
Hey man!
I spent the last few years down in the Ft Lauderdale area working with Dennis Neubauer over at MCS. I just moved up to Jacksonville, bought a new place here close to the beach, and I am now an Independent Rep representing FMF BMX and Skyway. I get to work from home, which is cool. I have a 4 month old, (and a 13 year old - both girls)so I get to stay home with her, and work.
Do you remember the Groppi family from the Tri City / Jockey Hill tracks? They went to all the races (Dennis and I always traveled with them).
Anyways..... and there's a good story here..lol.... Alisha Groppi, who used to race the powder-puff class up there in NY, and I have been together for about 4 years now, and now we have a kid... all because of BMX!
Man.... New York was such a breeding ground in those days for great racers!!
I stopped by the old Jockey Hill BMX location last year.... it's still there, with 15 years of growth over it! pretty Erie.... Even the announcing tower and outhouses are still there!
It brought back some cool memories there!
Good times for sure...80's BMX in NY ruled!!
So .. what have you been up to!?
-Ed

oh!!
Iceman!! Congrats on hitting a track finally, and winning the race!
That is so cool man!
Dennis hit a few big races this year, and won a few of them. I got him on a new FMF now, and he rocks the old-school Graphite Tuffs sometimes!
I'll tell him that you asked about him!...
cya!

Awesome! Yeah, I really do miss those indoor races!


It sure did feel good to race, although I got tired way to easy, and I couldn't spend the energy to do all the things I should do.

I am one proud pappa!! Those boys looked good, and they had the time of their lives! I'm so glad they finally got a taste of it. Wifie, too!

Is that you leading in that Can-Am shot? Lookin good, Whitey!
Have you been riding at all?



You bet those State Qualifiers were good times.


Iceman

Ed, thanx a lot!

You have the coolest job!

Awesome deal for Dennis! I've gotta get me a set of those Graphites!! That would just be so cool!
I got the hubcaps already. Mwahahaha!

Yeah, I gotta write Dennis. I suck.

Iceman

This was at Cool-Tool:

I raced at Onondaga BMX back in the early 80s and did some of the EBA circuit (Challenge Cups) The Niagara Falls convention center race ("Can Am BMX Classic") was the final of the year and had a B Pro purse. Those were so much fun. They had the indoor races at the State fairgrounds too in the center of progress building. One year they had it at the Onondaga War memorial, the starting gate was on the stage. All those races were huge. So many fond memories... I'll have to dig up some pics and post them here.

Mark

Hey Mark.

I raced at all of the following EBA events, several times between 1983 and 1985:

Niagara Can-Am indoors, Syracuse indoors (both at the Fairgrounds and at the downtown place with the gate on the stage), Toronto indoors (near the airport), Stoney Creek (Ontario) outdoors, Amhearst (NY) outdoors.

Buddies of mine did a few more in 1986 (Hamilton indoors and Niagara Falls indoors) but I missed them as I was a full time engineering student. One of them even won the B pro class in Niagara Falls.

The French-speaking Canadian posse I was part of was easy to spot, lol.

I was behind the lens for several of Whitey's pictures in this thread. I showed them to him last year in a different thread.

Oh yeah: We raced NBL War of the Stars Nats at Rochester's Cool Tool raceway two or three times as well.

[ September 01, 2006, 01:34 PM: Message edited by: Marc Tardif ]

I never raced at cool tool. Boy that name sounds so familiar.

Can-Am was highlight at the end of the season. Those were some great events. Speaking of Whitey I found of pic of me and Whitey on the same gate in Southtown. I never really knew him, but I think we both kind of knew the same people. I stopped racing in '86. I had turned expert the year before... At first I did OK but I'm on the small side and just couldn't hang with the big guys. After a season of near continuous losing I lost interest and plus just graduating high school I had a lot of other distractions like cars, girlfriends and college on the horizon. I started riding a lot more street and ramps instead of racing with Jeff Beck AKA Jones who is in Dracula Jones (if you were near Syracuse you may have heard of the band)

Don't know if you remember a few guys riding the 1/4 pipe before mains at Syracuse War Memorial... one of them was me:



The other was guy from Canada was came down to Onondaga occasionally. He was a great freestyler. I think he was from Kingston though I'm not positive. He was riding the ramp with me.

OK, this is going to go make me go through all my pics. It's supposed to rain all weekend anyway, right???!!!

Good shots! Is that a cruiser you're riding?
Frankie Klocek and Chris Mueller both rode for Cool-Tool, and they were from Syracuse. This pic is from a Syracuse paper....'83-84?

And this one makes me laugh....old-school BMX filming, that aired on Cable three days after each race. In '83!

Nah that wasn't a cruiser, it was 20" Robinson. I loved that bike. This winter I'm going to build a dream bike, I'm debating cruiser or 20".

I believe this pic is from the Syracuse Winter Classic on Feb 2, 1986. <EDIT: there are a bunch of obituaries on the back dated March 28-29, must have been another race> The only reason I know that is I mysteriously found a notebook that had my finishes for that year. Looks like I raced 5 times and that's about 4 more than I remember. I did slightly better in 17X than I remembered too.



Gate from that same race... I'm in slot 1. Whitey maybe in 3?


[ September 05, 2006, 11:53 PM: Message edited by: mdurg ]

Mark,

#4 in lane 3 is not me. He was a fast dude from Canada. Can't think of his name though.

This is a picture of me from that race.............



#12 with the Carrera mask

[ September 14, 2006, 07:08 PM: Message edited by: whitey ]

I can't remember the kids nake but he lived 1 block up from me.He rode a red/blue/chrome Kuwahara with a Stingray shifter on it.Anyone remember him,i loved that bike BITD.

BUMP!



CanAm I think Nov 85. Some scanner tricks and Photoshop magic to make this one.

Mark,

Awesome job with the photoshop!!

Here is another Cool-Tool local. Superfast and smooth as silk.............




Also a member of the James gang.

[ September 28, 2006, 05:24 PM: Message edited by: whitey ]

OK folks, here are some more:

Syracuse Fairgrounds, I'm on the left and in the process of schooling everyone on the inside in the next hairpin.




Niagara Falls Convention Center, massive holeshot by yours truly (my scanner is quite bad, sorry).

Marc,

Nice pictures. The first shot has Dave Marchal, Jeff Weber and Marty K in it. Nice and stacked swooping those guys must have felt pretty good. Second pic has Andy Weir refusing to move over from gate 8, serious holeshot on your end.

Is Candiac outside Montreal??

Picture of the classic inside swoop on concrete......



[ October 01, 2006, 11:54 AM: Message edited by: whitey ]

Hey Whitey,

I was using a front brake for those indoor races. Kept the back wheel from sliding and allowed for inside swoops. Block-Pass !!

Candiac is 10 minutes away from downtown Montreal, to the south, right on the St-Lawrence river. If you come up I-87 in NY state, you travel through it when on Quebec Hwy 15. Be sure to let me know if you pass by.

Marc,

Every spring we go up to Montreal to play in a hockey tournament. One of the rinks we play at is in Candiac. I will definately get in touch with you when go again. I love Montreal, such a great city and great people.

I tried the front brake a couple times. I found that I never grabbed it in Niagara falls. I think the only place I used it was for the hairpin at Syracuse. My plan was always to get out front and hold on.

Whitey

Picture of the classic inside swoop on concrete......

That's an awesome shot!!

hey yall,i was cooltool local andy lee..i still am i suppose..haha whats up whitey! i remember you too marc...i have some flicks...and i'm trying to upload video as we speak.. ...i'm on the jmc cruiser...whitey,isnt 46b mr billy boueya(spelling sorry)...he was soooooooooo fast...

ok...i havent edited these yet,so filmed them off my screen...
whitey you remember this crash as well as i do i bet..

http://youtube.com/watch?v=jHfrA7EE7hw

you and dave made me sick speed jumping the 2nd..

http://youtube.com/watch?v=zuJ3N_FatTI

heres another...

http://youtube.com/watch?v=zzuDsOCbDFU

ok...schwinn national team..Rory Thorpe,Danny Vendetti(his dad owned waynes bike shop in syr,and ran the onandoga track) little Gil Odjeck,Me wondering if i can pull my leathers up any higher..andy vendetti,and dave uhhh i forget..this was can-am...85?

ooooh yeah.

sorry the vid's are super ghetto---i'm workin' on them now!

This is the kind of stuff I wanted when I started this post. Just to let everyone know Guy is working on getting the Pines videos on a DVD so they can be posted to here.

man,i wondered what happened to everyone,eba crew...we all had so much fun...then when cool tool opened it was ON!
i never stopped riding trails,sheephills and fairview park out here...
..man soooo glad you started this post!!

invisibleman, great pics!!

I was an Onondaga local (from Utica) ...

The last guy on the Schwinn team was named Bauer. Good to see a pic of Rory Thorpe. I used to hang out and race against his older brother Ricky. After Rory broke his collarbone in the first turn at Onondaga I don't remember him racing after that.

The EBA is looking to do a reunion next summer. PM me and I can forward you the contact info. I stumbled upon this as I'm posting old EBA stuff to www.bmxundergound.com.

Mark

[ November 24, 2006, 01:28 AM: Message edited by: mdurg ]

yeah-dave bauer right...thats me starring at my hand..hahahaah...i remember brian "crash" cardeil...always ate sheeeeeit on that step..i raced onandoga solid the year or so i was on that schwinn team..i did get the info about the eba-the one in niagra yeah? i think billy robbins getting people together?...i tried your link,its dead...how about a url?...i have a load more flicks,,..i will post asap!
take it easy..
andy

oh it's dead because of the period at the end of the link, it's:

www.bmxunderground.com hit the forums, it's under the racing topic.

I also have some old pics on myspace - www.myspace.com/mdurg

One thing I wish I did was to take more pictures.

[ November 25, 2006, 10:40 AM: Message edited by: mdurg ]

c'mon dirtbags feel free to chime in...

Jeff Crolick posted a bunch of pics of Onondaga here:

URL=http://www.freepowerboards.com/bmxunderground/bmxunderground-about22.html]BMX Underground - old school[/URL]

There are some pics of the track in there, also a newpaper article for the April '86 indoor race at the fairgrounds.

man...i remember that war memorial indoor,with the gate off the stage.....i somehow holeshotted every moto and never made it to the first turn...i swear every time i lifted the first jump,i caught the top..and swept the floor...but it was worth seeing scottie (madonna's?) sister..dont catch felings,cause you know who i'm talking about..what was that one cat that worked for waynes...the captian.....get those vendetti's on here...i was a rochester cat,but rode syr alot...sundays at onandoga,until cool tool opened. holla.

That race in Syracuse off the stage was terrible....they had some problem with the floor and everyone was sliding out. I remember crashing every lap and still getting second in cruiser.

Andy-those videos are awesome. DJ and I were dying laughing (at least I was) over his digger over the first jump. That was one of the worst crashes I ever saw. It doesn't look like it but we were going FAST down that straightaway. Picking up for that jump was one of the scariest (& funnest) things I ever did.

I remember getting psyched for wednesday night practices. We were on the first gate and the last of the night with no breaks. It was so much fun hanging out there.

Onondaga outdoor was cool with the big double on the 3rd straight. Loved that place too.