Cover Story – Issue 39: Jon Taylor
Every week we’re going to be looking back at a previous Ride UK cover and find out a bit behind it. This week is Hoffman Bikes rider and Vans UK Team Manager, Mad Jon Taylor who graced the cover of Issue 39 riding Pipeline skatepark in Manchester massive indoor fullpipe.
‘Robin sent me this pic over of a cover I had years back and asked me to write a story behind the full-pipe thing. Anyway I looked at the cover pic and realized it was ten years ago! Holy shit time flies. Believe it or not this full-pipe fascinated me, it was so rad to ride and the more I rode it the more I wanted to go round it!
The guy that owned the park was well up for it and had a load of boxes for his other business next door, so we dragged them round and started filling up the pipe. You wouldn’t believe how many we needed to fill that thing so I didn’t kill myself if I bailed. Anyway with that done I then needed to work out how to get speed for this thing, – just rolling down the flat bank wasn’t going to cut it. So the only way this was going to have any chance of working was to do an air over the 20 foot wide flat-bank, out of this ten-foot quarter and into the other. So I went ahead and tried it. It felt totally nuts, I must have tried it a load of times but never quite pulled it totally over. But hell it was fun trying it. I nearly shot out of the top on one try so after that I called it a day. But as I said before, that thing was so good to ride and I was stoked how the photo turned out. Grotbags ain’t a half bad photographer. When I actually saw the cover I was totally blown away, and still have a copy of the magazine to this day.’
-Jon Taylor
LINKS: Hoffman Bikes, Seventies Distribution, Vans UK
May 6th, 2009 at 16:24
This is what Mad Jon Taylor decided to do one day instead of judging our local youth club competition at the Boneyard skatepark. instead we had to make do with a very young Alistair Whitton on his Dk SOB, ha ha
May 7th, 2009 at 10:30
Pipeline/Woodhouse, best skatepark ever. So many good memories from there I remember being so pissed off when it shut down. I still drive past the land where it stood and wish it was there.
Robin, post the videos of you tailwhipping your car, just for the memories like.
May 7th, 2009 at 10:33
Pipeline was epic, just the smell was amazing. The roll in flyout challenges were so much fun. Tailwhipping the cxar was so funny, getting my shitty Nissan Primera in there was so hard! Ali Whitton also 360’s it I think… Good times.
May 8th, 2009 at 13:28
didnt mad jon get professor science to work out he had to be doing 88mph to get round?
September 16th, 2009 at 00:14
how do i get a copy of this issue?
I was riding the all nighter at pipeline when the guy (i forget his name) on the vans advert (inside cover) was ally ooping that huge quater on the right to the massive flat bank and i am in the pic. good memories. I miss this place!!