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news
Matt Olson rides Fort Worth Seventh Street Bridge 02Video: BMXer Matt Olson nails crazy sky-high ride over bridge arches
Here’s a great piece of stunt-riding madness from Texas as BMXer Matt Olson rides over the newly-completed Seventh Street bridge in Forth Worth on Saturday.
If there’s such a thing as a perfect day to ride a five-feet-wide concrete arch 24 feet high, this was it - sunshine, not too much wind, not too much traffic.
“When I was going up and over the top of those things, it was really a judgment call over how much and when to use my brakes and really hit that bottom piece of the slant and be able to get up the other side,” Olson told NBCDFW News.
“But the scariest part was pedaling up it. If you start slowing down you get the tip factor and you don’t have much room to fall there.”
Olson is rather familiar with falling. The 25-year-old BMX stunt rider has sustained 13 concussions, had three knee surgeries, a ruptured spleen and had his front teeth (and replacement front teeth) knocked out seven times.
Waiting Fort Worth police said there were a number of offences Olson could be charged with, but they were glad he was alive and let him off with a stern talking-to.
John has been writing about bikes and cycling for over 30 years since discovering that people were mug enough to pay him for it rather than expecting him to do an honest day's work.
He was heavily involved in the mountain bike boom of the late 1980s as a racer, team manager and race promoter, and that led to writing for Mountain Biking UK magazine shortly after its inception. He got the gig by phoning up the editor and telling him the magazine was rubbish and he could do better. Rather than telling him to get lost, MBUK editor Tym Manley called John’s bluff and the rest is history.
Since then he has worked on MTB Pro magazine and was editor of Maximum Mountain Bike and Australian Mountain Bike magazines, before switching to the web in 2000 to work for CyclingNews.com. Along with road.cc founder Tony Farrelly, John was on the launch team for BikeRadar.com and subsequently became editor in chief of Future Publishing’s group of cycling magazines and websites, including Cycling Plus, MBUK, What Mountain Bike and Procycling.
John has also written for Cyclist magazine, edited the BikeMagic website and was founding editor of TotalWomensCycling.com before handing over to someone far more representative of the site's main audience.
He joined road.cc in 2013. He lives in Cambridge where the lack of hills is more than made up for by the headwinds.
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17 comments
Slightly off-topic, but as a self-confessed bridge geek, after cringing to see Martyn Ashton riding the edges of a very handsome river bridge in his 2nd road bike party video I emailed him asking for its location.
This was quite some months back but unfortunately Martyn did not favour me with a reply.
Perhaps now he has been laid low with injury he may have time to work his way through his old messages, but I won't hold my breath.
Hangers the size of bowling balls. Respect due.
Sick
One to not show my son who's just getting into BMXing
Nice to see some responsible parenting.
Unlike me, who emailed the link to his son!!
I'll show my son. We go BMX racing together, though in different age categories.
Cool. My son is more into MTB (likes 4x particularly) but we have just 'inherited' a bmx from a neighbour that moved out. Their son barely rode it but its scratched etc from being moved in and out the way of the table tennis table they had.
When they moved out they said 'you like bikes, have this' and so it now has been cleaned up, now brakeless (it was before really as they didn't work before I took them off!) and just needs a bmx saddle (its got one off a Carrera road bike ATM as the old one was ripped and mouldy).
Don't know its brand but its nothing special. Great for those pop out to post a letter runs though
Sounds good - I'd put a back brake on again at least. If it has a gyro so the bars can spin 360, ditch it as those things reduce braking effect and you don't need a gyro anyway.
Keep the seat really low down and only use it when you need to. Scruffy skatepark BMXs are considered cool, especially if they've whitewall tyres and are brakeless but that last is a bit stupid if you ask me. Get some nice wide steel bars.
I was just thinking this, I have nightmares about him trying something like this!
The most awesome thing about this is the group of Segway-ers underneath the bridge hootin' and hollerin'. Segway - the new rock and roll.
Compared to Danny MacAskill in Road Bike Party 2, its a walk in the park.
I fail to see how this is any more 'dangerous' than using CS2. Same width, same consequences for error.
I was going to say similar - 5ft wide?!
BMX riding can result in injuries alas, as my broken wrist, sprained shoulder and frequently bruised hip can attest. This guy pushes the boundaries.
I like the bit at the end where he rides past a police car in the car park on the right
That was what I was thinking also
Love the guy who totally ignores/doesn't see the biker going over the last arch!