Woody made a great video about the different aspects of what we all know today as the very broad definition of BMX. I jumped into his thread, and without concern for his hard work on his project unthinkingly hijacked it and blasted away (in a mx purist fashion) about how the other aspects of riding are not really true BMX and they cloud what BMX really was and should be... So I wanted to start this thread elsewhere to see how everyone defines BMX. (Not looking for a tshirt just starting a discussion)
My .02 is that the letters BMX are stapled onto too many aspects of bicycle activities, which confuses the general public as to what the initials BMX stand for. Freestlye, Street, Ramp, Flatland, etc all seem to get the name BMX attached. I went into my on-demand listing and I found lots of BMX title listings to watch on tv, but not a single Bicycle Moto Cross race. What happened to the Moto Cross? How does a rider on the street pulling tricks fall into the 'Moto Cross' catagory. How does a Freestlyler in a bicycle stunt show fall into the Moto Cross catagory. Moms across the country see countless BMX bloopers, on funniest home videos, usually a "BMX'er" racking the jewels on a stair rail grind.
I race Motocross, and I race BMX there are no stair cases and railings on any of the tracks I have ever ridden. I feel calling almost any aspect of 20" stunt riding "BMX" does a direct disservice to actual Bicycle Moto Cross. Yes sports evolve and change, even Motocross began as "scrambles", but it still has its very basic roots in place. BMX on the other hand, has much ambiguity. Read this article which mentions what bmx started out to be then it goes on to call street riding the meca of BMX. More confusion as to what BMX is...
http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/postglo...s_smoother.html

BMX is a mentality and an attitude. I see no confusion. It transcends styles of riding and is not confined to ramps or dirt.

I go way back to the early 70s when well know people like PK, JP, Thom Lund, Mel Stoutsemberger DC, Utterback (among others) and other lesser known riders like Andy Diaz, Mike Hardaway, Rex Thomas were shredding downhill runs in Simi, Nor Cal and ripping across abandoned pools in the Imperial valley. I seen the sport go from Pedal Cross, to BX to BMX to Freestyle to the modern version with paved tracks and asphalt berms. They were all "BMXing" even if not all were racers.

I had the honor of watching David Clinton at Saddleback, Fiola at the Pipe and Mike Day at the Olympic trials. the look in their eyes is the same. They all call it BMX. No way would I disagree

If bmx is a mentality and an attitude, then everything bicycle related that gives me a rad feeling deserves the label of Bicycle Moto Cross?Would I be BMXin if I got a radness feeling while riding a recumbant ?Ripping across abandoned pools, does not resemble motocross.
Fiola, no matter how talented, and simply awsome a rider, did not resemble motocross.

By that standard then this must be BMX too, its a stunt bike with 20" wheels and you could load of fun out of riding it but is it bmx?

http://www.metabike.com/product_360cc.html

if you see no confusion as to what bmx is, ask someone what they think it is. They will procede to tell you how many extra points a racer gets for pulling a cool trick during a race. When absolutely everything rad on wheels get the label of bmx, then ablsolutely nothing is really, truely bmx. Remember those scooters that were big in the 80's, they were in all the mags, kids pulling cool tricks on the half pipe on them. Were those bicycle moto cross too?
http://bmx.transworld.net/
"ride bmx" magazine, lots of stunt riders, not much bicycle moto cross.

You're looking for opinions or just want to argue semantics?

If we go by your standards, the paved smooth tracks of today are also not BMX, The indoor racing at Indy, Anaheim and other places in the late 70s and early 80s and even "stadium" MX Supercross would be questionable

How many times are you going to edit your second post?

I actually do want opinions. I totally agree with you, the paved smooth tracks of today dont resemble the MX part of bmx as much as they did when the sport first took off and there were mx style starts and downhill tracks etc. Today they look much more like supercross than moto cross. So in a way, there isnt any organized roots style BMX anymore. But the bmx racing we have is still a race, and not all the dirt has been paved over just yet. Indoor racing of years ago on wooden jumps etc still had the element of a race, and jumps and a start and finish. While not perfect reflections of motocross, its much more mx than stuntwork in a parking lot.

sorry I kept having to add stuff...

Just like any sport things evolve.. Car racing, MLB, NBA, NHL.. Things change.. Doesn't mean the name or idea of the sport has changed.. Sure BMX meant something specific at one time,, but all that followed derived from BMX and what it brought to the kids doing it.. IMO, love it for what it is, not what someone else thinks it is...

Sure, when BMX as a term was first coined - it was totally MX.

But it has evolved since and continues to evolve - Few people outside the scene even know what the acronym stands for - but they know what BMX is.

There's a clear link in the evolution between the 70's MX machines and today's freestyle, ramp & street bikes. Not so with recumbents.

i don't get hung up on the strict definition of BMX - that was a term that fitted for a while a long time ago. The sport has moved on.

Evolution. It all comes from the same roots.

If I'm not a BMXer, why do I have all these scars on my shins?

You know what's funny? I read your reply on Woody's video thread, and this one here, and it reminds me of me way back in 1986 when Rad came out. My friends and I all went to see it, and afterwards I told them that every kid who wants to race bmx and dragged their parents to go see this movie is screwed. All those parents are going to think that local races all have quarterpipes and 50 foot starting hills and you have to get a sponsor...not at all like real bmx.
It's true...todays "bmx" covers racing, freestyle, street, supercross tracks masquerading as bmx tracks, ghetto street contests...and all of it IS bmx and I'm glad.
Don't stress about the semantics...like Rick and Kurt and everyone else said bmx has evolved. Like any sport or hobby will.
Just grab your bmx bike and go ride.

Here's a thought worth total confusion...

To me, MOTO = Racing and is used in Bicycle "MOTO" Cross or BMX for short...other bicycle sports which still use the word MOTO but don't have any racing are much different and might get even more confusing as it evolves....Just as Badmittan is not Tennis there might be a reason why it is still kept that way.

Baseball is Baseball, Cricket is Cricket...if it evolved into something else or a variant the name would probably have to change to eliminate any confusion of the sport and specifics....is there a variant right now that spawned from the original game of Baseball that is still called Baseball?

Am I missing something here?

This discussion has many valid responses. The racing has definitely evolved since I walked away in 79, but the 'racing' is still racing with a start line and a finish line.

The X Games has put the term 'BMX' out there to the masses. So the 'masses' associate dirt jumping, ramp riding, and everything done on a bicycle on the X Games with BMX. Not really a bad thing, it is exposure. Sure some of the more outrageous stunts might scare away a parent from letting little Johnny race at the local track but that won't stop little Johnny from jumping and trying to emulate hid favorite X Game star. That is what it is.

When I tell people who don't know my background that I used to race BMX, most respond with a comment about the X Games. It only takes a few lines to explain that what I did was a pre-curser to what those guys do on the X Games. Pretty simple. I can laugh and tell them I even have movies of me doing a 360 on my bike off a jump back in 1976. Sure I was only 2 feet off the ground but the evolution had to start somewhere. LOL

BMX is a alot things to alot of people in this day and age. I guess we just have to deal with it.

If you do want to cut it down one letter at a time, even "real" BMX does not apply. Originally it was "Pedal Cross" then it became Bicycle Cross (BX) (or the other way around--getting old here) , not until the sport was somewhat established did it become BMX and i ifirst read it in print when Elaine Holt called it that. As fas as I know, the M in MX stands for motor and there is no motor in BMX.

As Red pointed out, he was doing 360s in 76. So was Stu; JP was riding pools, Thom was doing no handed wheelies, Mike Rush was doing backwards bar rides in Nor-Cal. Ask them if they were not BMXers

Here is the deal for me, just my opinion. Motocross has its routes in going cross country on a motorcycle. Sort of like a steeple chase on a motorized horse. Sort of trail riding, whereas a tree limb might find itself in the path: it must be jumped over. On either a horse or a motorcycle, you are jumping that sucker. Racing a horse or a motorcycle or a bicycle, it's bound to evolve.

When I first realized people raced bikes over jumps, I had already been making little wooden jumps and jumping them with my street bike, so I was game. I painted it black, took the banana seat off, put on a ten speed seat with no sissy bar, and started racing. I trashed that Western Flyer buzz bike, and got a mongoose. I had raced a street bike. Then raced a bmx bike. Two different genres that melded together.

We were already doing tricks, jumps, so freestyle was a natural thing for racers. We rode the skateboard half pipes with our number plates on. Why freestyle ever broke free of racing and became the genre that it is, I shall never know. It used to be all of us same kids, street or ramp or racing. But, now it is all called "bmx". There are litterally about 15 different bmx things to do, in 2008. Some are way different than others, some are similar. It's sort of like the music genre of "rythm and blues", it means something totally different now- than it did in 1973. And metal music. Metal can be 15 different things. The point is, we try to differentiate music, cars, life, football, etc. All into different categories. We name the category, we know what it is. It is very recognizeable. A brand.

But bmx has one name for 15 things. That has to be confusing to people on the outside.

The latest branding that has taken place is the x-games or dew action tour contests. Everyone seems to know what that is. BMX on ramps. They have grabbed the name of bmx, and made it a brand on TV. Good job, but racing is kind of left in the dust. But the x-games stuff is way better for TV. So there you go. A made for TV world.

To totaly simplify it, it is MX done on a bicycle. The sport itself for me is a short sprint race, on a obstacle course made of dirt. While I accept the evolution of the sport, I can see how us old timers have issues with many changes as it grows farther from it roots. I rather have all turns made of dirt, but do not hate paved turns. Jumping a double should take some bawls and thus be rewarded for doing it well, IE being faster. But that is not the case today. We accept them just as we took in racing on concrete with wooden jumps. It was just the best way at the time to make the race happen indoors. I think the changes of today is done with the same thinking, it is the best way we know how to make it work better. So while we may have many good reasons for all the changes, many may feel it is not a good enough reason for the change. So our choice is to deal with the changes and race, or not race at all. But in most cases I think we are out to prove ourselves and be able to be fast no matter what they throw at us.

Changstar

Lots of good insight. Bitd I used to have a freestlye bike and a bmx bike. I never really felt like I was bmx'in on my freestlye rig. I was freestlyin, poorly. But it was fun anyhow. Even though it will be a tough sell to convince me that every new evolution of bicycle radness should be called BMX, I will admit, I like that the kids out there have options. Not every kid has a track in their backyard., but they're out there riding doing stuff I never imagined, and hopefully keeping themselves out of trouble. Bmx is big right now which is good, just not motocross part of bmx I guess, which is kinda sad for the nostalgic old guys like myself..

Buncha Money on Xrays

Click to view attachment

saw this line from the LA news,
" X games have added two more disiplines in Bicycle Motocross. BMX Superpark and BMX Street."

Maybe if we all write in to espn we could get X games to offer another disipline next year BMX-BMX.

live to ride,ride to live...I love my bmx bikes even after 30years!! BMX is in your blood you love it or you dont...dirt vert even gettin skirt..it dont matter what you ride when or whare as long as im on my BMX im happy! So many experiences and opertuneities happend with my bmx nothing but fun and excitement and friends!
BMX one letter at a tme Best Moments Xeva!