1958
BMX-cycling didn't start in the USA but in the Netherlands where kids imitated their favourite motorcross drivers. One of the first BMX-riders was Ton van Heugten. Later he became world champion motorcross with side car. Ton died at the age of 62, let's all make a wheeley out of respect for this old school BMX-rider.
1969 to 1984
Ron Mackler (the park administrator of "Palms Park" BMX-cycling park in Santa Monica, California (USA), was the first man that organised a BMX race contest vor local kids on their Swinn Stingray bikes. Because of the organisation of these contests Ron Mackler became "The Godfather of BMX" in the USA.
B.U.M.S. track, Long Beach California (USA)
13 year old motorcross-rider Scott Breithaupt took some old trophies out of his closet and organised the first BMX race contest with prices. The registration fee was one quarter. 30 kids competed in this race. The next day, 150 kids showed up to join the race.
1978
In February 1978 BMX-cycling was officially introduced in our country at an international motorcross event in Valkenswaard. Gerrit Does was the man that introduced the BMX-cycling sport in the Netherlands during this event. Around this time he contacted the city of Eindhoven for a peace of land where he could set up a BMX-race track. He got this peace of land so the first BMX-race track in the Netherlands was built on the Welschapsedijk in Eindhoven for the amount of 7000 gulden (Dutch currency at that time). Later that year the Association S.F.N. was founded. S.F.N. stand for "Stichting Fietscross Nederland" which means "Association for Cycling the Netherlands". On July 7th of 1978, the first international BMX-race contest of the Netherlands was held.
The BMX-bike orginally is some sort of copy of the motorcross motorcycle, but of course without the engine. BMX stands for: Bicycle Motor Cross. In the Netherlands this was changed into Bicycle Cross and it has kept this name ever since. The wheels BMX-bicycle measure 20 inch. Later the "Cruiser Division" was added with bicycles with 26 inch wheels. The S.F.N. was founded by Gerrit Does and Louis Vrijdag with a total of 22 subscriptions . The first club in the Netherlands had the name F.C.V. D'n Urste (Whicht means The First Bicycle Cycling Club). Later the S.F.N. merged with the K.N.W.U. (Royal Dutch Cycling Union).
Nowadays the K.N.W.U. has full responsibility for BMX-cycling in the Netherlands. To be exact since 1981. It started with a group of boys. Later girls entered the sport as well. The kids were divided by age: 6 years and younger, 7 years old, 8 years old, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, and 16 years or older. Besides this there was a Junior and an Expert division. The Juniors were riding with a green license plate and the Experts were riding with a with license plate. There also was an "Open Division". In this division Juniors could compete with experts. After 1982 the Cruiser Division was introduced. With this division the BMX cycling sport became accessable for people of all ages. Even fathers and mothers, 40 years of age or older, joined the sport. BMX-cycling got more exposure and attention during the eighties. It was even shown on tv quite alot in the Netherlands at a show called "AVRO's BMX-Cycling" with Karel van de Graaf as the tv host.
During the period of 1990 to 2000, BMX activities where rather slow and low profile world wide. Bart and Paul de Jong of FatBMX were quite exceptional during this period because they kept on promoting BMX-Freestyle with full force. .
In 2003 the word in the media was that BMX-Race was nominated to become an Olympic sport. In 2004 Erica Terpstra announced that by the acceptance of BMX-Race by the IOC (International Olympic Commity) as a new Olympic discipline, the BMX-sport would develop rapidly. In 2008, BMX-Race was an Olympic sport for the first time. For the Netherlands Rob van den Wildenberg, Robert de Wilde and Raymond van de Biezen were competing. Coach of the Dutch National Team was Bas de Bever. Rob van den Wildenberg made it to the finals and ended 5th.
