BMX Video
BACO
BACO is a series of ten home-made BMX videos made by a Wisconsin crew from 1990 to 2004, mixing flatland and ramp riding with skits and crude humour.
Updated 3 min read716 words
BACO is a series of ten BMX videos made by a crew of riders from north-eastern Wisconsin between 1990 and 2004, starting with Bacovision. The videos were home-made, shot on consumer camcorders by a crew of friends that included Chad DeGroot and Chris Rye, and released on VHS. They mix flatland and ramp riding with skits, pranks and a crude sense of humour, and they are remembered as the clearest example of a particular 1990s attitude: BMX as something done with friends, for fun, with no regard for how it looked to outsiders.
Background
The BMX industry had shrunk sharply at the start of the 1990s after the boom of the previous decade. Company videos were rare, contest coverage was limited and most riders had no way of seeing what was happening outside their own town. In that gap, crews started making their own tapes, in the same spirit as Dorkin' in York, which had started in 1988.
BACO came out of a Wisconsin scene in Green Bay, Menasha and Appleton, built around flatland, backyard ramps and long drives to other towns to ride. Baco Designs was founded in Green Bay in 1988, and the crew around it, including Chad DeGroot, Chris Rye, Mark Hilson, Mark Fluette and Dave Freimuth, filmed themselves constantly. The tapes were cut together from whatever was on the camera: riding, crashes, parties, arguments and whatever else happened. They were passed around by hand and sold by mail, and they spread far beyond the scene that made them.
Contents and sections
The BACO videos do not follow the rider-section format of later BMX videos. Each tape is closer to a home movie, with riding and non-riding footage mixed throughout. Several things recur across the series.
- Flatland. The early tapes in particular are built around flatland, the discipline the crew was most focused on at the start of the 1990s.
- Ramps. Backyard ramps, including the crew's own "Baco House" set-up, ridden on the heavy bikes of the era.
- Skits and stunts. Comedy sketches, pranks played on each other and on the public, and stunts that have nothing to do with bikes. These are as much the point of the tapes as the riding.
- Daily life. Driving, eating, drinking and talking. The videos are a record of a group of friends as much as of a sport.
Production quality is deliberately low. Hand-drawn titles, in-camera editing and bad sound are part of the character of the tapes rather than something they tried to hide.
Standout parts
Because the tapes are not structured around sections or enders, what people remember from BACO tends to be moments rather than tricks: a particular crash, a particular prank, a particular line of dialogue. The series is quoted more than it is analysed.
The riding is worth more attention than it usually gets. Underneath the humour, the crew were pushing flatland and ramp riding at a time when there was little outside reference for either, and Chad DeGroot went on to a long professional career. But the videos are standouts chiefly for their attitude. Watching BACO is watching a group of friends who did not care whether anyone else was watching, and that comes through on every tape.
Impact and legacy
The BACO videos had an influence out of proportion to their production values. They showed that a BMX video could be funny, and that the people in it could be the point rather than the tricks. The link to what came next is direct: BACO member Chris Rye co-founded Props in 1993, and Dave Freimuth rode on the first Road Fools trip in 1998, which brought a tidier version of the same loose, personality-led approach to a far larger audience.
The series also helped define a Midwest identity within American BMX, based on home-made ramps, long drives and a refusal to take the sport too seriously.
The series was collected in a box set in 2014, released with the documentary Push It To 11: The Bits of Baco, and footage also circulates through online uploads. For the broader context of the decade that produced them, see BMX in the 1990s.
Related
- Dorkin' in York: the earlier crew-made series
- Props Video Magazine and Road Fools: where the loose, comedic approach went next
- BMX in the 1990s
- Flatland and street
Frequently asked questions about BACO
What are the BACO videos?
BACO is a series of ten home-made BMX videos made by a crew of riders from north-eastern Wisconsin between 1990 and 2004, starting with Bacovision. They mix flatland and ramp riding with skits, pranks and crude humour, and were shot and edited on consumer equipment.
Why do people still talk about BACO?
The videos captured a side of BMX that company videos and contest coverage left out: friends riding for fun, falling, laughing and not taking the sport seriously. BACO member Chris Rye went on to co-found Props, so the attitude fed directly into later video series.
Are the BACO videos still available?
Original tapes are rare, but the series was collected in a box set in 2014 alongside the documentary Push It To 11: The Bits of Baco, and footage has been uploaded online over the years.
Related articles
BMX in the 1990s
In the 1990s BMX rebuilt itself after the freestyle bust through rider-owned companies, the X Games, video magazines and the growth of street riding.
6 min readProps Video Magazine
Props Video Magazine was a BMX video magazine founded in 1993 and released on VHS and DVD until about 2011, covering contests, riders, bike checks and scenes.
4 min readRoad Fools
Road Fools is a BMX road trip video series from Props in which a group of pro riders travel together by bus, riding spots, parks and trails along the way.
4 min readDorkin' in York
Dorkin' in York is a series of BMX flatland and street videos made by Mark Eaton in York, Pennsylvania, starting in 1988, documenting the Plywood Hoods crew.
4 min readFlatland
Flatland is the BMX discipline of performing balance and rotation tricks on flat ground with no ramps, using a short bike with zero offset forks and four pegs.
5 min readStreet
Street BMX is the discipline of riding urban architecture such as ledges, rails, stairs and banks, with video parts rather than contests as the main measure.
5 min read