Tag Archives: Peter Olsen

The Flatmattersonline Year End Award Winners 2021 Are…….

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It’s time to announce the winners of the 2021 Flatmattersonline Year End Awards, as well as show some love to the nominees….

It’s a labour of love putting this together, after two weeks filming, capturing, and editing, the show is finally is done!

If you are unfamiliar with the awards, there are 5 categories in both editorial and reader choice. I made a few changes this year, adding Female Rider of the Year + Brand of the Year to the awards.

Thanks to everyone who took the time to vote, and congratulations to all the winners and nominees, tune into the Year end awards show to find out who won in each category!

Grab a Cuppa and I Hope you enjoy the show!

Flatmatters / Effraim Catlow.

The Winners of the 2020 Flatmattersonline Year End Awards Are….

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It’s time to announce the winners of the 2020 Flatmattersonline Year End Awards, 2020 was a difficult year for everyone. Flatland as a community rallied together to make the best of these difficult, testing times.
We saw riders focus more on edits rather than contest placings, as a result perhaps the rate of progression was a lot greater than previously would be, those that wanted to compete took part in numerous online contests, and in between all that the FM exclusives made to 60 episodes in 2020.
What the future holds is unclear currently, the vaccines are getting out there, and we hope to know more by spring time which really isn’t that far away.
Let’s try, and remain positive and make the best of every situation.

Congratulations to all the winners!!!

Without further a due, let’s get into the show!

Effraim Catlow / Flatmattersonline.

The 2020 Flatmattersonline Year End Awards Nominations Are……..

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It’s time as promised to announce the 2020 Flatmattersonline Year end awards nominations,
I felt there was a lot to say about the awards and the year, which a lot of the time doesn’t get covered under the previous text announcement format.

So, I attempted to make a makeshift studio feel in my front room during lockdown 3.0, and present the nominations, and share my feelings on the year as well as the reader choices.
Congratulations to everyone who was nominated, and thank you to everyone who took the time to vote.

Winners announced: Sunday 24th January.

* If you don’t want to watch the whole show, you can skip through parts using the timestamps.

TIME STAMPS:

00:00 FM Title Screen
00:07 Effraim introduces the FM Year end award nominee show
00:56 Reader Choice Rider of the Year
04:59 Reader Choice Edit of the Year
8:07 Reader Choice Most Progressive Rider
11:38 Reader Choice Contest Run of the Year
15:12 Reader Choice Breakthrough Rider of the Year
19:33 Effraim introduces the Editorial Awards
20:50 Editorial Choice Rider of the Year
27:33 Editorial Choice Edit of the Year
31:06 Editorial Choice Most Progressive Rider
35:55 Editorial Choice Outstanding Contribution
39:37 Editorial Choice Line of the Year / Flatmattersonline Exclusive of the Year
46:06 Effraim Outro

Thanks for watching and listening!

Flatmattersonline / Effraim Catlow.

FLAT ONLY COGcast EPISODE 1: 12 YEARS OF FLATMATTERSONLINE

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YO!!!!

12 Years into running Flatmattersonline on Friday 27th November 2020, it was time for something new for the site.
After various conversations with my co-host Pete Brandt during our lockdown here in the UK, the “Flat Only” COGcast is born, the title “Flat ONLY” seemed to be the most fitting, and described the direction we both feel strongly about, Pete suggested changing “POD” to “COG” to keep inline with that flatland feel.

On the evening of our 12th anniversary, I got together via zoom with Pete Brandt, Bobby Carter, Jody Temple and man of the moment, Peter Olsen to talk about all things 12 years of Flatmattersonline, Wheelie bikes as a trend, lack of flatland frames currently available, the latest video parts, reemergence of flatland only brands, back injuries and much much more. It was a great conversation, check the timestamps below for a quick reference of what is discussed when.

Grab a cuppa FM style and enjoy the first episode….

TIME STAMPS:

00:00 Intro to the FLAT ONLY cogcast, introducing Pete Brandt, and our guests Bobby Carter and Jody Temple!

5:38 12 years of FM, at what point did you guys start checking FM?

12:04 Questions for Effraim about running Flatmatters?

29:13 COVID has affected everyone’s riding. The pros and cons.

41:15: View on the over saturated market of old school frames

43:00 And not much choice in modern day flat frames….

53:57 Peter Olsen joins the show.

55:18 The reemergence of FLAT ONLY brands.

1:05:18 Back injuries and the importance of stretching…

1:11:50 Flatmattersonline year end awards coming up! So many amazing edits lately including Pete Olsen’s Ritual part….

1:26:59 Are wheelie bikes going to be the future or a passing trend?

1:39:45 Outro

Inside the Flatlander’s Mind: Overcoming Riders Block.

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Intro/Article: Effraim.
Photos: Bobby Carter, Kai Kuusisto, Alicja Korbinska, Tom Sevisual, Keith Mulligan.

All so often we only see the polished finished article, we turn up as riders at a contest and amazing riding, and flawless runs, or we see a “Must Watch” edit here on Flatmattersonline. What we don’t see is the blood, sweat, tears and psychological games that riders struggle with behind the scenes. I have faced this quite often over my riding career, and when it comes, it tells me “it’s time to switch things up”.
Every rider is different and that is one of multitude of things that we all love about flatland. I found something as simple in concept as learning something with bars forwards or backwards, learn something opposite or sometimes ride a different spot than I normally would. I have this saying in flatland, “learn everything you can, there are no bad tricks to learn, as flatland will catch up and bite you on the ass when you need that trick the most. I wondered about what other riders do to overcome this natural process of riding flatland over the years. ”

Continue reading →

Matthias Dandois wins Fise Edmonton Semi Finals

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Matthias Dandois took the top spot yesterday at Fise Edmonton, followed by Jean William Prevost and Alex Jumelin. You can watch Matthias Dandois qualifying run with some nice commentary from Darryl Nau and Lionel Cardoso and below we have the full semi final runs for you to watch.

Finals are going down tonight at 9pm Uk time, watch it live on: http://www.fise.tv

Top Fives with Peter Olsen!

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Intro: Effraim.
Photos: Trevor Oleniuk.

As you may or not have noticed I have been stepping up the amount of exclusive content on Flatmatters over the winter months, particularly the interviews which I think have been quite in-depth. On the flip side of that, sometimes I am aware they can be heavy reading and thats not everyones cuppa tea so to speak. So with that train of thought, I was thinking let’s bring back the top 5’s feature, and who better to kick this off with than S&M’s Peter Olsen. Let me know what you think in the comments. Thanks!

Riders of all time:

1-Ross Smith

2-Simon O’Brien

3- Martti Kuoppa

4-Garrett Reeves

5- Ruben Alcantara

Riders to ride with:

1-Trevor Oleniuk

2-Brandon Derbowka

3-Cory Stratychuck

4-Kevin Desautels

5-Cory Fester

Web edits:

1-Rich Forne DIG

2-PALACE – TRES TRILL

3-Akira Okamura – Magic Fruits

4-Garrett Reeves / LOTEK

5-Dylan Reider – Gravis

Places to visit:

1-New Zealand

2-SF

3-Southern Portugal

4-Sweden

5-British Columbia, CAN

Websites/blogs:

1-Flatmattersonline.com

2-Defgrip.net

3-Boiltheocean.wordpress.com

4-google

5-Quartersnacks.com

Inspirations right now:

1-More daylight hours

2-The sun’s warmth

3-My wife

4-My cat

5-My bike

Reasons to leave your town/city:

1-Long and dark winters

2-I’ve been here forever

3-I need a change of scenery

4-There is a world beyond this city

5-Opportunities elsewhere

Current Albums:

1-Shlohmo – Laid Out EP

2-Blue Hawaii – Blooming Summer

3-Flying Lotus – Until the Quiet Comes

4-Spectrals – Extended Play

5-King Tubby – Dub From the Roots

Tricks to do daily:

1-Whiplashes (any kind)

2-Walkarounds

3-360 pivot tricks

4-pivot whiplashes

5-Backwards tricks

Tricks you can’t do, but wish you could (ideal wishlist):

1-Cross footed whiplashes in front of the bars

2-Backward facing rolling walkovers

3-F-truck around the worlds

4-Big Wallrides

5-360 Bunnyhop Whips

Bike Brands:

1-S&M

2-Heresy

3-BSD

4-Terrible One

5-Primo

Non bike brands:

PALACE skateboards

Brixton

Emerica

POLAR skate co

HUF

Things that piss you off:

1-Racism

2-Closed-minded folks

3-Narcissism

4-Impatience

5-Materialism

Flatland DVDS:

1-Blend

2-RUM 97-05

3-Made you Look

4-Connect

5-Background

Non Riding Movies:

1-Samsara

2-Shawshank Redemption

3-Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

4-Moonrise Kingdom

5-Bottle Rocket

Gadgets:

1-Ipod Nano

2-Panasonic DVX100b

3-My wicked old computer

4-My old Samsung phone

5-I don’t really like gadgets

Favourite no seat touch combos:

1-Xfooted whiplash 360 pivot to xfooted whip out

2-Xarm switchfoot whiplash to backward hang5 to x arm whip out

3-Xarm whiplash walkaround

4-Turbine Frontyard variations

5-Switch footed firehydrant 360 pivot behind the back to switch foot out

Flatland dislikes:

1-Filler

2-Egos

3-Excess scuffing or pumping

4-Intentionally dropping the back wheel down to the ground in the middle of front wheel combos

5-Changing carve directions in a combo (ie. going clockwise then switching it up and going counter wise in the same link)

*#4 & #5 are generally speaking, but there are exceptions as some dudes that can make both of those look sick

Flatland loves:

1-Solitude

2-Fresh Air

3-Good friendships

4-Rolling

5-Finding out something is possible

Who’s next for a Top 5’s?

2012 Highlights : Rider/Industry perspective (Part 1)

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As I began reviewing the year, and realising just how many good videos/contests/interviews/scene edits there have been. It hit me that in addition to my review it would be cool to get the opinions of some of the riders/and industry heads that have made these highlights happen. Theres a real sense of things are on the up this year, read on to the first part of this 2012 Highlights article.

“2012 has been a great year for flatland. What has been the highlight of the year personally riding wise for you?”


Photo credit: James White.
When James White dropped this incredible bikeflip on “Whitelines” the whole flatland world took notice. As I look back on the year, this is without a doubt one of the standout moves of the year! Find out what his highlights were right below.

James White: Haven’t really travelled this year so my highlight is pretty restricted but it’s also a very easy one, The return of the Jaffa! Let me take you back to the close of 2011. It’s dark,cold, miserable weather and I’m pretty down. I get a call from Sam, when ever we get to catch up it’s so much fun putting everything to rights. So great I think this will cheer me up, but this call was different. Sam wasn’t riding said he wasn’t into it anymore, my heart dropped nooo can this year get any worse I was thinking. But I didn’t let on to him just telling things like, ‘well if you ain’t feeling it then that’s cool. don’t worry about it just concentrate on enjoying life and see if the motivation comes back, just take it slow with no pressure’. It was a hard phone call. It was like losing a family pet! (Sorry Sam, best I could come with on the fly)…
Anyway fast forward a few months and there’s rumblings of Sam riding, out the blue he goes to that redbull comp and with little practice smashes it. I speak to Sam shortly after this and asked what happened with the not riding? He replies ‘oh, well after our phone call I went out the next and the next day messing about and really enjoyed it, went out the the next and the next and been pretty regular since’……..Bastard!!! There’s me at home worrying about my boy giving up and all the time his out behind my back riding!
Anyway then comes the banging edit by Chris Massey at the Manchester jam. And my year is made!
2013 will have to have Sam’s return the contest scene to beat this year!!!

Sam Foakes: Highlight of the year for me was watching Hiro vs Ucchie on the COB livestream and seeing Hiro go off! COB was the event of the year. Don’t forget to invite me next time Red Bull 🙂 Personal riding highlight would be the Manchester jam. Nice weather and great atmosphere.

Alex Jumelin: Yes it has been a really coooool year for flatland and worldwide I can say that flatland as never been so big. In the number of contest and riders, I just hope that now big sponsor will follow ??????
My highlight of the year was of course to win the FISE.

Bart de Jong: The riding at the Red Bull COB was off the hook!


Without a doubt the most popular choice for highlight of the year. And who would argue really? The Red Bull COB went off! It was a huge honour for me to host the livefeed show!
Photo credit: Naoyuki Shibata/Red Bull Content Pool

Martti Kuoppa: Seeing / Feeling Viki being one with his bike at the COB.
Seeing DUB busting out at the COB.
Hearing Chase Gouin getting rid of illness and getting back on his bike.
Learning to ride flatland just sometimes and be happy about it.

Simon O’Brien: I would have to say for me the highlight was ‘Circle of Balance’. Not only was it an amazing event, but after being away from the scene for a while, it was great to get amongst it and be around so many riding friends again. I didnt realise how much ive missed it! And the event was in Japan….so just an amazing time!

Jean William Prevost: COB for sure!

Tom @ Sevisual: I couldn’t pick a specific highlight, but there were some great moments in the 2012 season for sure!
I was able to travel a lot with Adam; we hit lots of contests this year and had so much fun. Hanging out and filming with Viki and the Madrid crew…JFB was a guest of mine for several weeks…Vienna with my friends Michael and Sebastian was priceless with great memories! 
Flatland wise the best was the high number of Hungarian flat contests this year. Keep organizing guys!

Matthias Dandois: Riding wise, 2012 has been such a turning point in my career, My point of view on riding has changed a lot the past year. I started not give a shit about contest, actually stopped practicing for contest, started riding everything (street, flat, park, dirt, whatever) and I’m more happy in my life than ever before. The highlight of the year are all the tours/trip I did with some of the coolest people: Odyssey trip in the Californian desert, The Frenchys distribution trip around Lyon, The dawn tour all around France, visiting the Jumelin’s family in New Orleans… Theses trips are more fun than anything else, you just have to wake up, go ride, film a couple clips and have the time of your life. BMX is, before everything: FUN, let’s just not forget about it! 


Amazing photo of Matthias Dandois shooting with Soul BMX mag #77… Photo credit: Hadrien Picard

Peter Olsen: I’d say just feeling really comfortable on my bike and not feeling entirely stagnant was a main highlight of the year for me . I can’t really think of any particular tricks or days or anything that stand out, but just the overall feeling that you can go out and learn what’s on your mind has always been one of favourite things about riding. 

Scott O’Brien: Emcee Voodoo, Dew Tour and COB in Japan. But nothing will beat a session with my homies in New Orleans. I had a lot of progression this spring and it was a lot of fun. Lets see what the winter will bring?!

Stay tuned for Part 2….