Portrait of Scotty Cranmer in his bike shop.

Scotty, how did you get into BMX riding?

My friend Pauli, I just saw him recently, was the one that we all looked up to.  He had the cool bike, he had dirt bikes, and he had a quad.  He had all of the cool stuff.  He was two years older than I was and I wanted to do all of the things that he was doing. He was a BMX racer and he played football.  I always wanted to ride dirt bikes and race like he did. He was the cool guy.

I wanted a dirt bike, but my family didn’t have the money to buy one.  So I got a [pedal] bike for Christmas of 1994. It was a Mongoose Menace. I could not have been happier, let me tell you.  I came out to the living room and I could tell it was a bike.  There was a blanket over it. They were trying to hide it.  Man I was psyched. So I started riding that thing every day. I built jumps in the backyard out of plywood and tires and I came back to this store to start racing on April 23, 1995.  It was my first race.  I raced Pauli’s cousin Dan.  He was a friend of mine also.

I was a rookie when I started. I was eight years old and there were not enough kids in my race class so I was racing nine year olds who were novices.  My friend Dan was a novice.  They were way better.  I ended up getting third place because my friend Dan and I collided and crashed in the last race.  I got a first place trophy because I was the only one in my age class.  It was pretty cool.  That day changed everything.  I didn’t want to do anything else beside ride my bike after that.

Do you still have the trophy?  

Yea, I’m sure that I do.  It’s in a bag somewhere.  I think I gave it to my little brother. 

Tell me about your first jump.  You’re in the air, there is clear space between you and the ground.  What were you thinking?

It was great.  The first time I did jumps when I was younger, I fell in love right there and then.  I always wanted to go further and bigger. 

Did you have any fear?

There is fear, but this is a calculated risk.  When I first started, I was rolling the dice.  Now though, I’m not that guy who just gets on the bike and goes for something.   I know what I am capable of and I know what I can do.  It is all calculated.  I am not just a crazy thrill seeker jumping off of things looking for an adrenalin rush.  That’s not me.  I just have fun doing this and I enjoy trying to do new things.

How do you practice?

There are certain things that you can’t practice.  But for the things that you can practice we have a foam pit. It is 20 feet long and 16 feet wide and it is filled with foam cubes.  The pit has paid off over and over again in avoiding doctor bills.  You can actually fall in it and you’re fine.  The pit, when it came out, changed everything for everyone in the whole entire sport. So I am lucky enough to have one at our skate park which is pretty amazing.  Also, in the back of this store, I have a ResiRamp with padding.  If you crash on it you slide and it’s stiff enough to ride on.    It used to be that I said, all right, I can do it in the foam pit; I landed it every time, so let’s try in on the real road.  I have only had the Resi since last year so there were plenty of years before that where I felt like I could do it and just went for it on a regular ramp.  There were some sore nights, let me tell you, but they usually worked out.

(Click the picture to see a larger version.)

(This is part one of a four part interview with Scotty Cranmer.  In part two of the interview, Scotty will talk about how he started on the racing circuit and the half time shows. 

If you are looking for a bike, you may want to stop by Scotty’s shop, SC Action Sports,  in Howell, NJ on Route 9 North.  They carry a wide variety of name brand bicycles, skateboards, accessories, clothing and much more!)