The Blues Brothers Wall

I'm continuing with my 25th anniversary look at my 1990 video, The Ultimate Weekend.  Today I'm talking about one of my favorite riding spots of all time, The Blues Brothers Wall in Huntington Beach, CA.  Go to 11:20 in the video above. 

This story starts with mid-80's BMX ramp legend, Josh White.  I was riding at the Huntington Beach pier one weekend, in 1988, I think.  Josh White rolled up and started talking.  He said he'd heard about some walls at the beach that were great for wall rides.  He asked if I knew where they were.  The funny thing was, I had no idea.  I'd ridden up and down the H.B. bike path nearly every weekend for a year, and I had no idea what Josh was talking about.  So we went looking for them.  We headed north from the pier on the bike path.  Once around the condo complex, we started up a hill on the bike path.  I rode that section every weekend.  But instead of following the bike path up, we took a sandy dirt trail I'd never taken.  Despite my nature of exploring every nook and cranny looking for things to ride, I'd never taken that lower road by the sand. 

A whole new world opened up to Josh and me.  Immediately, we saw one of the retaining walls he was talking about, but it was sandy at the bottom, not good for wall rides.  We kept riding north, and below the main bike path, but above the sand, there was this level, 40 foot wide ledge, with a bunch of painted retaining walls.  I'd ridden on the bike path just above those walls for a year, and never knew they were there.  Several of the walls had murals on them, the murals you see in this section of the video.  Finally, even with about 14th street, we found The Blues Brothers Wall.  It had two main murals, one of the Blues Brothers from Saturday Night Live and movie fame, and a big mural of the Three Stooges.  There was also a painting that said, "green eggs and ham, Sam I am."  That quote, of course, is from Dr.Seuss. 

That particular wall had fairly well packed dirt up to the base of the wall, perfect for getting speed to wall ride it.  In addition, someone had built up a good lip of dirt on the very left end of the wall, and a smaller lip farther down the wall.  Josh and I immediately started trying wall fakies, a trick I'd never done before (or since).  Perhaps the best aspect of that wall was that it was slightly under-vert.  It's maybe 80 or 85 degrees, steep enough to still be a wall, not a bank.  But it's just mellow enough to allow HUGE wall rides.  I loved that wall from the start.  Within a few minutes, I was rolling up and doing smooth wall fakies.  Josh on the other hand, was rolling straight up the wall, then pulling off and doing a lookdown out of the fakies.  Josh's riding amazed me many times over the years, and that was another instance.  I'd never even heard of anyone doing a lookdown out of a wall fakie at that time. 

Then we started doing wall rides.  Within minutes, I was hitting the small lip to the right, and riding three or four feet up the 11 foot high wall.  Up until that time, I only really did wall slides, where I'd bunnyhop off a bank and touch both tires to a wall, but not really grip the wall.  On the Blues Brothers Wall, I could totally ride the wall.  It was so much fun.  At least until Josh started doing wall rides.  Within a couple attempts, hitting the larger lip, he was riding about 7 feet up the wall, going twice as high as I did.  We had a blast that day, and I started riding that wall nearly every weekend on my way to the pier. 

That leads to the short clip in The Ultimate Weekend.  Riding the wall are myself (red shirt), Keith Treanor (black shirt), and Randy Lawrence (white tank top).  The quick over/under double wall ride is Randy up high, and me below.  I think that was the first over/under wall rides ever in a video.  In the clip, I do a fakie, and Randy and Keith both take their shots at no hand fakies, which were cutting edge riding at the time.  Then Keith and Randy to some big wall rides.  Also, there's a shot in the intro of the video of me wall riding over my sister's head while she's sitting.  That's also on this wall. 

Then we see Keith practicing a rail slide, just below the wall, with Randy holding him in position.  This looks really stupid today, but that's what we actually did back then, before anyone had actually done a handrail slide on a bike.  We had the idea, but no one had actually pulled it off yet.  In fact, the first handrail slide down steps ever in a BMX video, was Keith near the end of The Ultimate Weekend.  Double peg grinds on street were a brand new thing in 1990, and Keith was breaking new ground in this clip by climbing onto a rail and sliding down into the sand. 

Then Randy said, "Hey, how 'bout if I do a 360 into the sand next to that woman down there."  I thought he was nuts.  First, there was a lip about two inches high he had to bunnyhop over.  Second, doing a bunnyhop 360 down five feet was pretty rare in 1990.  Dennis Mccoy was the only person I knew who 360'd down stairs back then.  But I set up for the shot, and Randy did a perfect 360 first try, startling the hell out of that poor woman getting a tan. 

In the years that passed, I kept riding that wall.  I lived about three blocks from there in the late 90's, and rode the wall all the time.  I eventually did 6 to 7 foot high wall rides there.  The record belongs to Dave Clymer, who got a tiny photo doing a wall ride at the top of the 11 foot high wall, which is still crazy today in my book.  Dave said he even rolled in the top of the wall once, which was really hairy. 

Me, I learned a bunch of wall ride variations there.  I learned alley-oop wall rides, even to the point of back-pedaling and doing a rollback on the wall.  One day I started bunnyhopping from farther and farther away, trying to see how far of a bunnyhop I could do and still land in a wall ride.  I managed to do it from about 6 to 7 feet away.  I did a few rollback wall rides.  I'd do a 180 in the dirt, and hit the wall rolling backwards and get a tiny wall ride.  But there was one variation I never could get.  Several times I tried to do a framestand wall ride.  I would hit the wall at speed, and do a low, long wall ride.  Then I would move my feet off the pedals and onto the frame and stand up on the frame.  What I wanted to do was a fully upright framestand, no hands, while on the wall.  I always wussed out, and never could let go of the bars.  I still want to nail that trick if I ever get back in shape.  I've done long frame stands on on the 45 degree banks of the Santa Ana River Ditch, and on a steep bank of about 60 degrees.  But I could never get that trick on the Blue Brothers Wall.  I've never seen anyone else to that yet, but I'd really like to. 

Oh yeah... I just thought of one more thing I tried-and failed at-on the Blues Brothers Wall.  I don't have a name for it.  Basically, it was a fakie wall ride fakie.  I'd ride towards the wall, do a 180 bunnyhop at speed, and ride backwards into the wall, trying to ride straight up it rolling backwards, and then roll back down forwards.  Years later when I saw a photo of Ruben Alcantara doing a "realie," that's what I thought he did.  But he did a 180 into that nose down position.  As far as I know, no one's ever done a fakie wall ride fakie.