Calabazas Dirt Track

I was lucky enough to grow up in a sunny, sleepy suburb just south of San Francisco. Like any kid growing up in the wee 1990s, I was raised on chrome BMX bicycles made by GT, Robinson, Elf, PK Ripper, and the rest. I had my first subscription to BMX Plus! Magazine in 3rd grade and was tearing up the local BMX track which was just a short ride from my house.

Calabazas has changed a lot over the years, some say for the better while others say for the worst. After an injury a few years ago the city of San Jose ordered the park to be closed pending investigation. Eventually they decided that rather than closing a vital and much needed space for kids to ride and race their bicycles, the city decided to renovate the space instead. They chose to hire a company that builds wooden and concrete skateboarding parks, a company that had never once worked with dirt or with designing a park for bikes. Calabazas was fabled as one of the area’s best jumping parks, probably one of the best on the entire West Coast – these folks are a bit disappointed in the renovations. While some of the jumps and turns are not as functional as they could be, it is still quite amazing to know that there is a place in our area that is dedicated to this sport. Any cyclist out there owes a bit of thanks to the dirty world of BMX, it is generally a child’s first exposure to a bicycle and the jumps, dirt and racing make it very fun and exciting and eventually lead the kids onto larger bicycles and races.

This coming weekend there is a Classic BMX Show there and it is sort of funny to be considering things from my own youth “Classic”, seeing that I am not yet even 30 years old and it seems that “classics” are things much older and much wiser people reminisce about. Everyone needs to recapture their youth, even if it did just happen as recently as 10 or 15 years ago. A lot of us started out on these bikes and later moved on to road and track bikes, but it is always important to remember where we came from – it is a good indication of where we are going.

Here are some photos from a trip I took down to the South Bay to relive my own silly youth. Me and my old Chesini did a nice loop through Saratoga, through the sleepy town and into Cupertino. Memories swelled as I rounded the corner that took me to the track. Couldn’t hit much of any of the jumps on the track bike, but it was fun to try! I even skinned my knee from falling over just like old times.

The old dirt track

"Protect your bike and the park from graffiti and abuse"

curve

Jumps, turns, dirt

Reminds me of the old "Hell Track" from the movie Rad