Original Bike Tricks from Tim Knoll

[jm]

Tim didn't make this edit for money, nor was it a publicity stunt. He's ridden like this for years. He's unique, and he's doing his own thing for his own progression and ideas. If you don't like the video, please don't insult Tim or other members because of your feelings.


It makes me sad to hear people publicly voicing these awful personal attacks on other riders just because they have a problem with an edit that falls outside the box. Is this a flatland edit? In my opinion it's not, exactly. I posted the video because it's enjoyable to watch and there are tricks and stunts in here that I've never seen before. In short, it's fun. It's a video that anyone can access and enjoy, and I think that's why it's gone viral.


If you don't like an edit, please do not bring down the forum with tangential flaming and personal attacks on other riders. It says nothing about the forum - it speaks volumes about the individuals.
Everyone is entitled to their opinion even if they dislike this video. That's fine, but let's be reasonable and respectful please.

This is a place for riders of all ages, backgrounds, and locations to come together to talk. Let's please make an effort to keep arguments and the like between individuals out of the public threads. They leave a bad taste in everyone's mouth who reads them, and are better handled privately.

Thanks.

[tod miller]

I showed this video to my brother and he said it reminded him of WILLIAM SPENCER


WILLIAM SPENCER-HOLLARADO!

i'm a big fan of the mile high sk8 ninja as well, tim can be the brew city flat ninja.  richie jackson is another sk8'er who doesnt give a f*ck, does what he wants and is uber creative
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Cb5U66T1m3o#!

A lot of good skate action here.  If I could ride a bike like anyone, it'd be Richie Jackson.  Wait?  What?  Yeah, I want to bite his skate tricks for my BMX. 

[jm]

I havent seen a single personal attack on Tim in this  thread.Your point works both ways can the ciritcal people stay respectful and can the positivity children please make arguments minus there silly emotions this way we can maybe have an actual discussion about this controversial video.

I found this to be a fairly scathing personal attack on Tim, and there's more - I just don't want to keep bringing it up.

I thoroughly agree with Gary.
 
Tim is making flatland look like a massive gimmick.  a one trick pony.
 
As soon as the novelty wears off to the masses, we'll be left back where we were, with nothing.
 
same as Matt Wilhelm and his Murica's got talent sh*t, having to wear a suit, making us look slightly cool to the dumb masses, but in reality when regular plebs try it for an hour, and realise how hard it is, they go back to their razor scooters and wood pushing.
 
I'm sorry but there's too much pussy footing and ego padding going on in this community, and as a veteran it makes me f*cking sick to my stomach.
 
1. Tim. you can ride, but ultimately you're making us look like a bunch of circus freaks.
2. there's nothing original or merit worthy in the video. all of the flip tricks can be done by anyone who can do a frontflip, which let's face it aren't hard. and the non flip tricks are circa 1980's plywood hoods material, and quite frankly are now borderline gay tricks.
 
We've got to stop making a f*cking mockery of our sport for the sake of consumerism. we're not f*cking prostitutes, we're supposted to be sportsmen, apparently.
 
you don't see f*cking Tiger woods doing trick shots on the putting green wearing disco pants doing throwbacks to f*cking Happy Gilmore do you? no.
 


stop f*cking debasing the community to the lowest denominator to f*cking serve your own means.
 

[D]

Intellectual pursuits seem alien to me?  I have a master's degree from one of the most difficult engineering schools in the country, and a degree in psychology, so no one would debate that I've spent plenty of time in school, might I add more than just about any bike rider you're likely to encounter.   Where did you go to school?

On top of that I've been riding since 1988.   

I am not making a judgment.  I'm making an observation.  The information came from medical doctors.  Any first year medical intern would be able to diagnose the behaviors of several big name pros as most definitely OCD.  It's a fact that the kind of obsessive focus that lets you repeat the same trick 10000 times for 12 hours a day every day is exactly the same thing as the people who have to count the ceiling tiles every time they leave the room.  That's not a judgment on the way someone lives their life, that's a medical fact.     

I don't question the value or fun of our sport, Gary.  For 25 years I've spent just as many hours in lonely parking lots trying to learn stuff as anyone else here.  I've traveled the world, made friends, had a bit of success, won contests, lost contests, made a bit of money from shows here and there, overcame injuries and fear, angry pedestrians, security guards, etc.  I even got some coverage in Chad Johnston's vids and in a few issues of Ride and Ride UK.   My bike taught me patience, focus, creativity, balance, mechanics, and determination.  I wouldn't be the person I am today if it wasn't for bike riding.       

What bothers me as I approach middle age is seeing the devastation that undying focus bike riding has left in it's wake.  It's like all this creativity and positive energy can only be focused toward learning progressively more difficult bike tricks, and that leads to monumental unhappiness as we age.   

With no way to generate any real income from flatland, too many focused, talented and determined men spend their entire lives dedicated to a practically useless and strange adolescent skill at total expense of family, loved ones, careers, and every other positive aspect of their lives.  I've seen so many horrible divorces, joblessness, depression, addiction..... man children who are 40+ years old and totally unable handle the responsibility paying the electric bill, let alone all other aspects of being an adult.  Men with no practical skills in life.  Men who struggle to pay for food, clothing, shelter.... anything because of either unwillingness or inability to do anything other than bike tricks in a parking lot.   These people aren't balanced, because they either can't or won't take care of their own situation and needs apart from bike tricks.

I don't care how good you are at whiplashes, there's NO pride in that and if that's the purity that you're talking about, then I genuinely feel sorry for you.             

At any rate, let's get back to Knoll.  Why is being a crowd pleaser such a bad thing?  Doesn't a painter want to create a painting that people want to LOOK at?  Doesn't a band want to write a song that people want to hear?  Sure, some of creativity is creation for personal satisfaction, but creativity doesn't happen in a vacuum. 

Is difficulty the only measure of value in a bike trick?  Or creativity?  Or both?

Why shouldn't we be doing this, at least sometimes, to get claps and accolades and financial return?  If we did, we wouldn't have to work another, less fun, job, and could ride more.  Someone could always do the performance stuff for money and the hard, more progressive stuff other times.  I don't see why what would be such a bad thing. 

Can you explain specifically why what Knoll is doing is clownish but a grown man spinning on a tiny bicycle isn't? 

What is the "integrity of flatland"?

In the end Gary, the sport mainly consists of single men in their 20's hanging out in empty parking lots and garages, trying to impress each other.  Kinda weird, huh?

[EZChris]

I wrote something but I redacted it for the sake of saving time:

[EZChris]

Plus mentioning you have a degree in ANY conversation is kind of light starting a sentence with "I'm a Christian, but..." or saying "I have loads of black friends" after making a borderline racist remark.

[D]

I was called out as being uneducated, I took offense.   

[D]

No one like being called untrue things, Freddie.  But the the guy doesn't know me, so it's not worth getting upset about.


 

[indyBarber73]

Tims Rad!!! had the pleasure of seeing it in person at Milwaukee jams last 3 yrs.... keep being who you are bro!!!

[MICHELE]

 

This is EXACTLY why this stupid sport is going nowhere, and exactly why the rest of BMX is so much more successful than us.

We can't refuse to do things that people would like to see, then turn around and complain that no one wants to see what we are doing.     

One guy finally does something that the public likes to see, is wildly popular, and very first thing the purists do is say that it's not cool enough to be considered good.  Someone does something creative and different, and the first thing they do is say that it's not creative enough in the right way.   I've been in this sport for 25 years, and I've never seen as much mainstream appeal as this guy is able to generate.  That's worth paying attention to. 

How many views did your edit of front wheel spinning tricks get?

Define a "circus" trick vs. a "real" trick anyway.  A blender seems pretty circusy to me.           

Some of the stuff Tim was doing in the edit was a little tongue in cheek goofy, but there was definitely some creative stuff going on there for sure.  The darkside stuff was cool looking, quite creative, didn't involve any props, and had some difficulty there, and is a total departure from what most flatland looks like these days.  I would guess that less than 1% of you on this site could do most of those links.  How many of you under 30 can even do a barride?   

But here's a question, kids: 

Do you want flatland to be something that someone can make a living doing? 

Or do you want it to be a weird, super technical oddity that can't support a pro class, only performed and appreciated by a bunch of obsessed weirdos?             

Here's the deal kids:  Mainstream BMX wants mostly nothing to do with us.  Pro ramp riders live in posh custom houses and drive multiple imported sports cars, date hot Hollywood stars, make hundreds of thousands of dollars, and get flown to exotic destinations in luxury, to compete in world televised contests less than 5-10x a year for hundreds of thousands of dollars in prize money. 

On the other hand, 99% of OUR most successful pro riders make probably a tenth of that, and only do so by doing hundreds of school safety/drug awareness shows, circling the country in sh*tty panel vans with 300K miles on them dozens of times a year for 50 weeks a year.   

Some pro level flatlanders have their spouses be the main income earner.  Some work other jobs.  Some live in squalor with a bunch of other riders in a house.  Some move to the Emerald Triangle and start a grow op.  Some, sadly, still live with their parents well into adulthood, shirking responsibilities and life in favor of whiplashes in empty parking lots as 40 year old man children.  But out of every one I've ever met in this sport, there's only been TWO guys who made a decent adult life doing flatland tricks, and they do it by endlessly touring either elementary school safety shows to do blenders in carpeted gymnasiums, or college tours to do hitchhikers in front of confused frat boys.       

Flatland as a profession has been on life support since Hoffman pulled the plug on the X Games 10 years ago.  Sure, someone might win $500 at this contest or that contest, usually not even enough money to pay for travel expenses to even BE there, and anyone not living with their mom would know that.  Flatland as profession, at least in the United States, is DEAD unless you're talking about a carnival attraction or a school safety show feature.

And we have no one to blame but ourselves.  People are so focused on doing something difficult that they're totally contemptuous of something that LOOKS GOOD and is FUN TO WATCH.  IF we want flatland to be something that someone can do as a profession and make a decent living doing, we're going to HAVE to start showing people things THAT THEY WANT TO SEE.  That doesn't mean doing something that's intentionally goofy or stupid, but it does mean that people don't really appreciate flatland in it's current form.  People don't care, and they don't really want to see it.

We're like comedians who blame their audience for not laughing at their jokes.   

It would be nice to see flatland become a real professional sport again, but in fifteen years flatland will be in the same place it's always been, a bunch of pissy, angry, antisocial weirdos mad at the world because no one can understand how much harder the full barflip kickflip is than the half barflip kickflip, wondering why their new barflip combo won't earn them the $200 they owe for rent, when Jaime Bestwick just bought another house with the winnings from another Dew Tour stop.       

in my opinion the fact that flatland don't make money is a good thing.
like others said, for me it should remain the purest possible and i actually couldnt care less if people don't like it .i don't want it to grow just in number of riders but in a wrong way i don't undestand why a lot of people seem to be wanting for flatland to became popular.
you say that if you dont get income from something but put lots of efforts in it you are crazy,
i think that by your logic i prefer to be crazy than to be completely absorbed by the sh*tty  world predominat system.

[thestraw]

Still doesnt attact Tim he attacks his riding etc but doesnt attack tim the individual anyways i have a question for anyone who can answer me..... How does a video go viral? It doesnt happen solely by word of mouth anymore there must be investment somewhere along the line can anyone shed light?

it made the front page of reddit. he didnt set out to make money it just happened by accident.

[locky]

Theres not a single peanut in these trolls sh*ts.

[ride_flat43]

Truth be told, many people think that spending thousands of hours at the cost of every other aspect of one's life in order to master an activity that gets little to no rewards is more in line with severe mental illness. 
 

Average person spends 34 hours a week watching tv. Average pro level rider rides 25 hrs a week or less. Who's the real mental case?
 

[ride_flat43]

It's a fact that the kind of obsessive focus that lets you repeat the same trick 10000 times for 12 hours a day every day is exactly the same thing as the people who have to count the ceiling tiles every time they leave the room.  That's not a judgment on the way someone lives their life, that's a medical fact.     

Doing whatever it takes to reach a goal is the same as pointlessly counting tiles?

[Flatgod]

It's a fact that the kind of obsessive focus that lets you repeat the same trick 10000 times for 12 hours a day every day is exactly the same thing as the people who have to count the ceiling tiles every time they leave the room.  That's not a judgment on the way someone lives their life, that's a medical fact.     

Doing whatever it takes to reach a goal is the same as pointlessly counting tiles?

Yeah, its not as if people doing other sports or arts don't spend this much time or more with their activity, but for some reason when we do it, we're "crazy".