[Article] Why you shouldn't quit after starting...

[BlAcK_qUeEn]

I would like to tell all the discouraged riders on here why they
shouldn't quit riding if they SERIOUSLY started in the first place.
But first i'm going to tell why I am writing this....

Just today my friend,who has been riding for like 5-6 months, told me
that he is quiting because he "can't" get any better.I hope this is just
a faze that he is going through,but he could be serious.Also today he and
I had this fun session on this new bank I found yesterday,then out
of nowhere.......he's quiting.I,myself, have been riding seriously for about
4-5 months and my progress (though I wish it was faster) has been going
along nicely.I told him to keep at it and that nothing comes from quiting,
so I 'll see what happens.....


......anyway, For all of you (if any) who get discouraged at yourself for not getting better faster.......DON'T think about quiting just 'cause you can't
get a triple tailwhip backflip to icepick (possible?) after a couple months
or even years after starting to ride.Especially if you already went out and bought a new bike.I am,by no means,a very skilled rider,but I know
that you can't get anywhere by quiting.Also,if you do go through an"I'm quiting" faze,DO NOT sell your bike.You will hate yourself for it.That is,if
you ever really enjoyed the sport and doing it.

If your "friends" roll their eyes or something when you say "I'm never quiting" (happened to me ) then just ignore them.I really want
to "get good" or "get better" at riding,but I finally realized that things take
time.Set goals for yourself each day, I set a goal today to get a b-hop
360 on my driveway and I was a hair away from landing it.Yesterday,I was
determined to spin a 180 around (you know,while you fakie) and,guess what.....I DID! I was happy.Also,try not to learn moves around people
like other skaters/bikers that you don't know, because if you wreck they
(if they are idiots) will laugh at you and get you down.I like to learn a trick
then show it to my friends as if It was nothing.Well, I have to go.You all
can put in your thoughts if you want.

P.S. I made this topic for myself also,because I don't always (never) land a trick my first try either. Ride if you like the sport,and not if someone
tells you to,or if you just want to blend in.

[Louis K]

When the first time I went to my friends trails, it had some insane jumps. I thought I couldn't do it. But I did them anyway, and on the first jump it was a 10 foot long tabletop and 3 foot high. I went at it with full speed. And while I was in the air, my left foot slipped off. Then I landed it back on the pedals. Then the next jump is 3 1/2 foot high vert double with a 3 foot gap. I did a huge whip (not tailwhip the whip when you whip your bike to the side haha) and it looked nice as hell they said.

So do anything you don't think you can (not if its impossible) do like try a 360 here and their if you got enough air and its a tabletop or something. Because you never know what you can do until you try it. :)

My friends we're the ones teaching me the tricks though just by watching my friend do a 2 foot bunnyhop to a 100 foot manual on a ledge to a crankflip 180 rollout. It was sick as hell and soon ill be able to do it if I keep trying :)

[nrivas23]

hey, do you know where Arnold, MO is?

[BlAcK_qUeEn]

hey, do you know where Arnold, MO is?

no....And I couldn't find it on my map.Is it near hannibal,mo or St. louis,
if it is, I'm in hannibal just look north on a map from from St. louis to hannibal. You do mean MO as MOsouri right?

[nrivas23]

hey, do you know where Arnold, MO is?

no....And I couldn't find it on my map.Is it near hannibal,mo or St. louis,
if it is, I'm in hannibal just look north on a map from from St. louis to hannibal. You do mean MO as MOsouri right?

it's like 30 minutes west of st louis, my girlfriend went out of town couple weeks back and said she passed by Hannibal, MO. No i mean Mo as in Missouri

[BlAcK_qUeEn]

hey, do you know where Arnold, MO is?

no....And I couldn't find it on my map.Is it near hannibal,mo or St. louis,
if it is, I'm in hannibal just look north on a map from from St. louis to hannibal. You do mean MO as MOsouri right?

it's like 30 minutes west of st louis, my girlfriend went out of town couple weeks back and said she passed by Hannibal, MO. No i mean Mo as in Missouri

OOOOOHHHH...........Now I found it on the map,and it's suoth of st. louis.
My mom said that we will be going there in january for some meeting,but
unfortunately I wouldn'y be able to ride.How's the streets there?Any good
spots for a beginner?If you ever are coming towards hannibal give me a call,that is,if you don't mind riding with me (i'm not very good :oops: ).
There are some really good locals here.....i've met a couple.The streets here aren't very good,but I'd show you some spots.How good are you?
You could be good or bad. If your good i'd look up to you,and if your
not so good then I'd feel more comfortable :lol: :wink: .

[Trimix]

I think your post is thoughtful, and let's face it this sport has TONS of 15 year olds getting into it for the wrong reasons (fashion victims, peer pressure) and then getting out. Every sport has 'attrition'.

What's inside is what matters. Personally challenging and pushing yourself, and every rider develops differently. Riding and learning tricks is exponential, as you learn more you can layer things you have learned on top of one another.

It takes time to learn ANY Trick. There may be people out there I see say things like "yep, got nosepick tailwhips in a day"....which I fail to believe, cuz I KNOW it takes hundreds of attempts to figure out how to land something, then another 100 or so to perfect it. THAT is usually on one ramp, then you have to learn the nuances of doing that same trick other places.

Riding well, flowing, airing, and doing tech tricks takes a lot of time and patience. I kind of like that is a natural selection....

[Louis K]

Riding well, flowing, airing, and doing tech tricks takes a lot of time and patience. I kind of like that is a natural selection....

If it was too easy it would get boring really fast.

[FOL]

No it can't be a sticky. No reason for it.

You shouldn't push people to continue, only encourage them. If they want to quit, they should. There is no reason for someone to ride bmx if they don't like to.

[Wynex]

No it can't be a sticky. No reason for it.

You shouldn't push people to continue, only encourage them. If they want to quit, they should. There is no reason for someone to ride bmx if they don't like to.
This thread is an article now - I like it!

[BlAcK_qUeEn]

no more replies? I thought that there would be a bunch,especially since
wynex thought it was good. :wink:

[Lunchbox]

EVERYBODY POST. WYNEX LIKED IT SO WE MUST DEFINETILY POST! Although it is a good article I must admit I saw no reason as others had already said what I thought.

think your post is thoughtful, and let's face it this sport has TONS of 15 year olds getting into it for the wrong reasons (fashion victims, peer pressure) and then getting out. Every sport has 'attrition'.


Thank god I'm turning 16 in 8 days so I'm no longer in that dumbwad 15 year old class. And I'm glad I started cuz I didn't feel like sitting around all summer, now it's constantly on my mind. BMX is retarded, I love it!

[Davynation]

Well the one thing i kno is that i didnt do it because of peer presure you wanna kno y? because all my friends are skaters like i mean all of them none of them even watch bmx. But first thing after i got my bmx i showed them a simple bar hop and there all like damn that was awesome and now bmx has just stuck its fun, it gets you out of the house, away from parents the only thing bmx dosent do for you is cook you breakfast and for these reasons i agree that you shouldnt quit unless you really hate the sport

[333foto]

my .02

i ride solo all the time. none of my friends are into riding or any street sport in general, so that eliminates that. i hate having to feel anxiety because if i get hurt, there wont be anyone around to help me.

but that hasnt discouraged me just yet. i am taking baby steps to learn the basics and build upon them, just as with anything else in life. i would love to ride with other people that are like me, but for now i will do my own thing and have as much fun as i have been having.

i tattoo as well, and its been very discouraging since i have no one to learn from. learning on your own without much guidance is hard but very rewarding. i pick up what i can from whats available.

good luck to everyone from "noobs" to "pros."

in the end both had to start somewhere.

[Shane472]

I don't have anyone to ride with either and I don't like riding by myself. I dunno why. Maybe once I try it more it won't be so bad but I find I'm not as motivated to go out and ride when I'm alone.

[rait1]

well im 16 in like 15 days but i didnt enter bmx world for quitting:D
i have invested alot in my bike and it really keeps me in bmx if i have these times that i really wouldnt wish i got into bmx.
i think that the people who are here in bmx forum arent (most at least) pozers. They dont care about it they only like to be clean and nice.

[Jackson]

i quit for all this winter but i didnt sell my bike just & case. and i started back up when the weather got nice again and im better now than i was then 8) but i sure am glad i couldnt sell my bike.

believe me, if you think you can quit and not start back up you are wrong eventually you'll start back up. i just could'nt stand not riding!

[turndown]

yea i started cuz my friends skated and i ALMOST bought a board and my one friend bmxed and i saw a video or something and i was instantly hooked. i rode my redline every chance i had and tore the shit outta that thing. now ivemoved up to a better bike and keep getting better everyday.
sometimes i think i will quit when im 16 and i wonder why am i doing this. but then i realize i can drive places when im 16 and i can go to better places. and then when im in college i can go to even better places. plus my two friends that bmxed (one is a total douchebag and is better than anyone if you dont believe him just ask him) well im better than both of them now and it feels really good when your skater friends are telling you your geting really good and your bmx friends cant even attempt what you just did.

[cRaZy_mAnIaCz]

to be honest, i dont know why people want to do really technical tricks immaediately, if you werre able to, wats the point of it? besides, im happy on just working on my bunnyhop hight and maybe a couple of flatland tricks, to be honest i enjoy all types of riding, street, vert, dirt and flatland are all great and if you can do a trick with one type of riding you can try it with a different type, such as flatland Decades and vert Decade airs, unlimited possibilitys, just keep practicing

[Scotty33]

Brian Cochran said this on pedalbmx and i thought it was pretty good.

Don't think about the tricks you can do now... just think about the tricks your gonna be able to do years from now if you work hard today... thats all I did to keep myself motivated... it pushes you...

[DannyLee]

I ride on the thought that If I stick at this, I will get better.

Only last week I dropped into a 4ft quarter and did my very first spine (3ft) in one day. A few days after I went up the deathbox in the park for the first time (not getting much air at all but it was windy). It was hardly anything to the other riders there but for me that's a lot of progression in such short time.

And I also discovered that whilst they could do no-footers and X-ups off the box, none of them could 180 on the flat box. We all had a good time and everyone has their place in the invisible brotherhood, so to speak.

[on.training.wheels]

the one friend that got me into it, and that i usually ride with all the time now hardly ever rides anymore. Hes been a real douchebag lately too. ive been riding most of the time now by myself or sometimes with some other kids. Its alot more fun for me to ride with other people.
im probably never gonna quit just because the adrenaline is addicting and its fun as hell to progress and learn new stuff.

[oldstreetthrasher]

Hmmm... how about some wisdom from someone who has seen it all and done it all? I was 12 years old in 1987 standing outside of a bank watching a group of guys bunnyhop their crazy dayglo GT's up a foot and a half high wall. I stood there for like 15 minutes in awe. I was amazed that ANYONE could pick a bike up off the ground that high while they were on it. I wanted to learn how to do it, but those guys were a LOT older than I and I never had the courage to ask. So I went to the local drugstore and started reading freestyle magazines as much as I could. All winter long I read them and read them, so hyped up on riding that I convinced my grandfather to fix up this POS Kent bike I had. He took it in to have it repaired and that was my first bike I ever tried a trick on. Took it out in a parking lot and learned footjam endos in the snow, then variations... by the end of winter I could do one footer one handers, no handers, all sorts of crap in just an endo. It was the only trick I knew, but I loved it. I ended up wearing that bike out by spring and needed a new one and of course with all my magazine reading, I had to have a REAL freestyle bike. During the time before I got anything, I saw that first group of guys again and a few others. I was excited, I was going to be able to learn more stuff when I got a real freestyle bike. Finally, around my birthday, I begged for a bike and my mom and grandfather chipped in on one for me. I was going to get a GT performer, but the local bike shop had a bike called a Concord freestyle and the specs on it were way better than a performer (full chromoly frame for one thing) so I got it. Didn't have to wait for it to be shipped either. I started out doing the same footjam endos as I did before and tried things I saw in magazines, but I still sucked. Finally I had the luck to meet some of the guys I had seen riding before and they saw I had potential, so they took me under their wing and taught me some basic flatland tricks, then moved up to learning how to ride a quarterpipe. I learned a lot that summer and my skills grew out of an entry level bike, so lucky for me my mom was awesome and got me a Redline RL-20II ( I wish I still had that thing) the next spring. It was too long though so I sold the frame and built my first custom ride out of an '88 GT Pro Freestyle tour frameset. That bike was awesome. I rode that for awhile and then... I defected from bikes. The H-Street skate team came up to the local college to do a demo and I already had a lot of friends who skated, so when the bottom bracket broke on my bike, I sold it to a friend of mine and started skating. I got fairly good at it too, but something was missing from my life. I skated the rest of '89 and through '90, but I started to get sick of breaking boards at $70 a pop and said screw it and quit. Now I had nothing. It didn't take long for me to pick up some BMX mags again and get hyped up on riding, but I had nothing to ride. Enter my friend John - he had an ass ugly 86 dyno in pink with yellow mags and green bars. Mine for $50 he said. I scrounged up the cash and bought it. You have no idea how good it felt to be back on a bike again. I went out in 3 inches of snow and learned 360's on the street in front of my friends house. I was riding pegless and brakeless too, unless you count the coaster brake. That lasted me through winter and I wanted a new bike again. Once again my mom came through and bought me a top of the line 1991 Haro Master and this time, I was hooked for life. I never quit riding again, I hooked back up with my buddies from before and progressed with them. Even after they left and I had no one to ride with, I kept riding. I went from flatland for the first 6 years to street, which was just starting to become popular in the early 90's. I went from bike to bike, custom building everything. I no longer bought completes. I met new friends to ride with and they came and went, but I stayed on riding. It's my lifeblood, it means everything to me. I am 30 years old now, a far cry from the 12 year old punk that was amazed at a simple bunnyhop, but my passion for riding is the same. I love it and I always will. Long after I am unable to ride anymore, I will appreciate and support the sport. Riding may mean many things to many people, but to me it is life. It's what drives me. I may not progress as much as I used to, I may not have a lot of years ahead of me to ride, but I still feel young when I drop in on a mini or gap a nice set of stairs. I love BMX! (sorry for the long winded post)

[DannyLee]

That post was admirable.

I don't see myself even coming close to quitting BMX for a long, long time.

[Van]

hey, do you know where Arnold, MO is?

i live in st.charles wich is like acouple miles away from arnold

[BMX4lyfe]

oldstreetthrasher that was a nice read

No it can't be a sticky. No reason for it.

You shouldn't push people to continue, only encourage them. If they want to quit, they should. There is no reason for someone to ride bmx if they don't like to.

[Snake Lizard]

Levi STOP QUOTING OTHER PEOPLE!!! Don't raise your rank, it won't make you smarter :x

[dirkadirka]

oldstreetthrasher, thats why i ride.

Its when you go out at 10 o'clock at night to practice your 360s because you cant help but say,"I know I can land this shit."

I do this almost every other night. BMx isnt something you just do because its cool. Those people just end up buying a nice bike, learn to b-hop and then they never do shit.
Oldstreetthrasher is why I ride, These guys that have been riding 10, 15, even 20 years and are still thrashing the ****ing shit out this young kids is amazing to me.

I ride because Its what i love


peace

[Vex]

Riding is good fun but ill get the occasional day where its boing but u just gotta keep going like dont give up if you get hurt just keep trying.

[moes]

i've thought of quitting w/ my friends, but i stayed determined and kept riding and guess what those posers are riding again. (i'm not talking about all of my friends, just most of them.)

[traildigger]

well once you try new tricks around people and they are worse then you then you get self esteem lol well any way i was ridin today with my friends and before we try something new we are like watch this this is going to be retarded so we watch and if they land it or not we always go ahhhhhh that was go even though its really awesome so i did a one hander one footer over a dirt jump and we were like ahhh so my friend was like watch this... and he landed it and he was like its okay parker once blake gets hear you will have better self esteem so just like joke around a lot with your friends and make it fun and they wont quit ohh and you have to make fun of them so they will try to get better than you to prove that they dont suck

[traildigger]

oh my computer left out some words my friend did a no footer and i dont know why go is in there but this has been happening to me like all day and i think lots of my posts are jumbled up

[BikesFly]

Why quit...Anyone who starts falls in love anyways

[harorider]

i started on the 12th of december and i can only bunny-hop but by spring i will at LEAST bunny hop 180 and be able to do a drop-in even though i just started

[Coldow91]

i started on the 12th of december and i can only bunny-hop but by spring i will at LEAST bunny hop 180 and be able to do a drop-in even though i just started

you'll be doing more than that with that atitude

[Hobbitwich]

as if quite, as if quite after you just bought a 1200 buck bike

[jacobias]

Thats nice. I wish i could do that lol

[Air-Ox]

Well this is my story , im new to BMXing but i have always been interested in it. My friends bro BMXed so me and two friends started practising on the one bike LOL. Ok so last December i bought my first bike a Fit team '06 and my two friends also got BMXs. Then in december a skate / BMX park opened and we loved it. We went up everyday and we were known as the "regulars". But now its all changing. My friends brother who already BMXs is teaching him loadsa stuff so know he can bunny-hop higher, manual longer and just is better then me and the other friend. We ask him for advice and he just says "No learn yourself , your both shit" and all this stuff. so now im just fuking annoyed cause if i go to the skatepark and hes there he will just laff at us if we try anything. I dont know wat to do and my friend has basicly given up. so its me and the good guy and it just feels like hes improving so much and i cant do shit!! im so annoyed. For instance , i went over to the good guys house to show him i learnt a half-barspin and when he saw it he said " OMG ok lets have a competition who can do it the most". He takes everything so seriously and always want to be better then me. I thoguht about quitting but have decided im not going to. Im just gona keep practising.

[azman]

Y'know i couldnt agree more i thought of quitting tht phase lasted about and hour becoz within that hour i got a new trick down and besides the best part about bmx is the challenge

[azman]

No learn yourself , your both shit" and all this stuff. so now im just fuking annoyed cause if i go to the skatepark and hes there he will just laff at us if we try anything oh and one more thing if that guy laughs at you any more just for trying smack him in the mouth and tell him to shut right up!

[SouthernFreeride]

who cares if you dont improve, the best rider in the world isn't the one that could do a "triple tailwhip backflip to icepick", but the one that has the most fun.

[fluorescent]

Encouraging, but also discouraging because you say you can 360 hop after riding 4-5 months, I have been riding 5 months and I can't even 180 out of a small qp, I can't fakie very well and have only ever managed to turn out about 5 times in my life after practicing for hours on end every time I get a chance to go to the park. I have just come in after riding in my drive, trying to hop higher and learn footjam whips. I can get the bike 3/4 of the way around in whips and hop only 13". I got pissed off with falling so I came in. I am not 'giving up' because I have fun bmxing and I love repairing and upgrading my bike. I just hate it when I get angry because I feel like shit.

[Ross]

All i can say is, just ride, be happy, try to mix in with better rides and become friends with them, i can garuntee you majority of them will help you learn something, it's how i learnt.


Also don't limit yourself. Fancy trying whips after learning to hop, try them commit to them and hopefully land them.

[kyoungxlee]

almost everyone starts to ride as a social rider or to show off(planning to learn a bunch of tricks and impress people). but after they start they either develop a passion and never stop or just quit when it seems pointless. ask your friend/yourself why you ride, if its something like "because my friends bmx" or "to impress people" your better off quiting and maybe getting back to it another time.