Are you an adrenaline junkie and all about adventure and stunts? At Ivanhoe Cycles, we are passionate about bikes and bring you an amazing BMX bike range at great prices. MADISON, Wis. (BRAIN) — Dick’s Sporting Goods will begin carrying Mongoose bikes this month, supplanting GT Bicycles, which ended its agreement with the box-store giant at the end of 2023. The Mongoose Legion L60 Bike is a good entry level BMX bike for someone on the slightly taller side. RECO (Racer Engineering Company) was a wholly owned manufacturing division created for insurance purposes to be separate from BMX Products, Inc, even though RECO was always produced in-house.
Coming only a year later was the 1983 Australian film ‘BMX Bandits’, arguably resulting in an even more significant impact on BMX than ET. The film is famous for being shot in the northern beaches of Sydney (primarily Manly), featuring Nicole Kidman in one of her first ever acting roles and for its portrayal of BMX in its freestyle form. Originally written with 9 year old characters mongoose excursion in mind, the lack of finance meant that the script was re-written by a different team, this time pivoting to teenagers as the central characters. This was a crucial shift, and one which ultimately led to the success of the film and in turn, the cementing of BMX in popular culture. Inevitably, wider society was sooner or later going to come into contact with BMX.
Having absorbed the extent of Mongoose history, it is evidently clear that the brand is deeply intertwined with BMX, not surprising given that the two have been in partnership since 1975. So in remembering all the things that BMX and Mongoose have been through, when everyone stops to stare at your slick, shiny steed, never forget that mongoose excursion you’re on a bike made by the leader of the pack. Mongoose now has a number of decades to the history of the brand, with BMX now moving towards the 21st century and entering a new era, literally and figuratively. It is perhaps at this point that the story skips forward, with there being way too many moments and characters to emphasise.
For the Mongoose brand and its long history, the role of BMX bandits further improved the iconic status with the chrome ‘Supergoose’ model (with blue wheels and accessories) being ridden by one of the central characters ‘Goose’. Young ‘Goose’ is joined by another BMX bike enthusiast ‘P.J.’ who one day have a run in with a young trolley collector by the name of ‘Judy’ and embark on a journey to help her tally funds to buy a BMX bike. From here, the film centers on the trio as they find themselves embroiled (unintentionally) in a series of shady situations as propelled by a couple of halfwit goons attempting to rob a bank. As earlier eluded, ‘Judy’ was played by a teenage Kidman, emerging out of a field of 200 audition hopefuls, Nicole was noted as having a remarkable ability to understand, interpret and adapt to a script. Shifting back to Skip, with his mechanical engineering knowledge and in working as an automotive rim designer at the time, the design and production of the first BMX specific wheelset (i.e. ‘MotoMag One’), the aforementioned problem had met its solution. Surely enough, purposefully crafted design was met with demand as the ‘MotoMag One’ was soon accepted by the BMX community as a superior product thanks to the trellis shape, ribbed spokes and light-weight alloy.
His new recruits also blossomed into the most sought after bikers on the BMX circuit at the time, with ‘Fuzzy’ landing the very first cover of Ride BMX and Dennis McCoy dominating the Bicycle Stunt Series for 4 x years straight. The mid 1980s resulted in a significant downfall to the growth of BMX (primarily racing), enabled through the rise of adjacent modes (i.e. freestyle, mountain bikes and scooters) and a lack of mainstream interest. It was a time to either stick to your guns and perish or reimagine and grow. Arguably, that Mongoose hired ‘Magoo’ at this point was a milestone moment for the brand and one which helped to maintain the company’s trajectory and popularity. The man was and is a stalwart of the BMX scene, having remained relevant over multiple decades and having been behind the scenes of many different companies, events and products in BMX. For almost 40 years, Mongoose has been in the dirt, on the trails and off the ramps.