Last winter there was some rumblings on the internet of a “RAD” BMX movie reunion being planned to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the movie that was a hit to BMXers around the world when it hit the theatres back in 1986. I have had the movie poster in my office on the wall for 10 years and it is surprising how many people visit Norco that remember and love the movie. I did not realize that there was a “cult” style following for this movie.
A couple cool things about this movie are that “Rad” was filmed in Cochraine a small town about 20 minutes from Calgary and in some locations around Calgary so it made sense that the reunion be in the same town. I decided right away to book my summer holiday around this date once it was confirmed for the end of August. I wasn’t sure if my wife and kids would be stoked but they decided that it was a good reason to check out Alberta and wanted to check it out. Our kids have watched the movie many times and it was cool for them to see where the movie was filmed and meet the people in the movie.
One of the cool things about this movie was that two original Norco freestyle BMX team riders were in the movie Pat Lipovski and Kirk Bihun who are from Alberta and both were confirmed to come to the reunion. In the movie both these guys were shown as Norco factory riders and were outfitted in their Team Norco jerseys in different parts of the movie. There were many other famous riders in the movie and it was cool the Norco guys played a fairly big part in all the racing scenes. I have attached a couple photos of these guys signing autographs at the event (and sporting their Norco jerseys which are a little tighter fit these days after 25 years).
The event went awesome with lots of things going on throughout the three day weekend , a Canadian National BMX race as well as skatepark contest at the Cochraine skatepark were great to tie in with the old school BMX events. Both new BMX events were well attended with our local Maple Ridge BMX rider James Vandekamp making the trek to Alberta for this skatepark contest.
Other events included a ride to all the old film locations which was fun riding with about 100 other old school BMX riders through the town of Cochraine (with our kids on old school Norco bikes). There were a few great old Norco BMX’s in the mix and some famous riders such as Eddie Fiola and Martin Aparijo , a movie night in the theatre which was great to check out and hang out with a theatre full of guys yelling and getting rowdy to the funny 80’s scenes in the movie . As well there was a museum display of old bikes and a art gallery filled with “RAD” art. Our graphic artist at Norco Jeff Boyes is also an artist outside of his graphics position at Norco and he did a “RAD” screen print which tied in well for the event. One of these was being auctioned off in the poster contest for the event. These are still available in limited quantities through Jeff’s website www.visualtechnicians.com
Keep your eyes out for a Rad reunion documentary movie to be released before Christmas of this year which is exciting and should be filled with footage from the reunion.
http://espn.go.com/action/bmx/blog/_/post/6296500/rad-reunion-documentary-planned
There were tons of photos taken and lots of information about RAD at the following website.
http://www.25rad.com/p/kellys-recap-day-1.html
This was a shot with our daughter Elladee(on her Norco Starfire mini) in the middle front row and Elliot our son and me on the right side of the photo.
Kirk Bihun (80’s Norco freestyle factory team rider )
Pat Lipovski and Kirk Bihun ( sporting their Norco team jerseys worn in the movie)
And here is the full length original movie trailer
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