Why did I start this?
I spent the first 16 years of my life watching motocross videos hoping that one day I might get the chance to ride. Carrying my BMX down the stairs of the high rise council flats that I lived at.
When I was 16 I sold the BMX that I had been racing and bought a kx85 for £550 and started racing with my friend who lived about a mile away from me who I had been going to watch racing in the AMCA inter juniors. I broke my ankle that year in my fourth ever race at Foxhill jumping through the valley, my bike was too small for me and I landed hard off of a jump, bottomed out and it was game over.
Fast forward a year and I had a rm125 off of the insurance money I received. Work smart guys ;)... anyway, I had qualified for the BSMA semi finals, biggest race of my life at that point. Problem was my bike had broken, I was at college taking a public services course and using my EMA £30 for racing and my wages from 2 nights a week at Tesco to get there and fill my car with petrol to get to work. A now good friend of mine Chris Brown fixed my bike up cheap to help me get there after it broke the week before the race and I borrowed my grandads van and headed to Tiverton to smoke those fools with £30 for my race, a tent, my girlfriend at the time and a packed lunch to get us through the weekend. Sorted.
So I go to scrutineer my bike and I’m greeted by a slob of a man in a Yamaha jacket, fag hanging out of his mouth, ketchup on his cheek, barely literate... I’ll stop, but you get it. So he tells me I need blue backgrounds, I explained my story and asked if he could excuse it as I couldn’t afford to race AND buy backgrounds. He turned, called his friend, “this kid here’s come racing with no money, can’t afford the backgrounds, can’t ride can he” I butted in and tried to highlight the unimportance of the matter and that it didn’t change anything. He replied, “who comes racing with no money, if you can’t afford it you need to go and play football, this ain’t for you kid”
I pushed my bike back to the pits, sat in the van, cried a little bit. My friend jaspers dad Jeff came over, asked what was up, cut some spare off of what he bought and we bodged it up. Jaspers dad used to sign my parent form as I wasn’t old enough to take myself racing. I went out & tried way too hard to prove I belonged at motocross that day, got wild & crashed big!
I broke my thumb, my hand almost doubled in size, everyone packed my van up for me and I drove home, concussed, one handed with my girlfriend doing the gear changes all the way home. I had to have an operation to have my hand pinned. What’s crazy is that crash and my friends dad John who I was working with at the time after sacking Tesco off had lent me £1000 meant that I could afford this crf250 I had seen on Facebook for sale, she had a black back end and #111 with amca expert plates on, Brad Nixon. Proper bloke, he was cool he wanted the suspension back out of it. Don’t think his new bike handled as good as this one. Hahaaaaaaaa you’re mad. She’s mine now bro!
I wrote this because I want people to understand that some of the jokes you run on people that are less fortunate than you can cause a whole heap of things to happen. Nobody is better than anybody. I kept at it so I’m proud to say that I did go on to achieve some cool things with motocross and I’m not done yet so I have some more stories to tell and more obstacles to overcome. But some people just gotta try a little bit harder than you and they don’t want pitty, they just wanna enjoy what you enjoy without being laughed at and mocked for what they don’t know or have.
This brand is about real people doing real stuff and creating real opportunities for real people. It’s not for everybody but it is for everybody. Please don’t run it if you ain’t happy to see people doing well and having opportunities to do better in life. This isn’t for you. I don’t care if nobody else ever buys it. But if you see it know that person will help you If they can, with the simple things that you may not know if you are new to the sport. They won’t give you any ego and they do remember when they just started.
I've recently started working for myself which has give me some time to think and I have a lot of cool ideas to give people more chance to ride on the days that they can’t ride so hopefully more people get to do the sports that I know are expensive but can be done if you want it enough. The sports that kept me out of trouble. Even if you only get the taste to give you the drive to stay out of trouble and know there is more to life than fighting, stabbing, beef, stealing, all of that nonsense. Learn to share and you will find you have way more than if you didn’t. The most high only knows where this energy would have gone if it wasn’t for some cool people showing me the way and sharing with me, I wanna share what I know. What I was taught by the good people of this world. We grew up different in the city. We don’t run jokes like you. Be happy for yourself without putting a downer on others.
Summit Moto