Bernd Schneider

The final push that launched him into the world of BMX was Oliver Hallmann. He was the proud owner of a Redline bike of dubious origin and a stack of BMX magazines. It was then that Bernd first realised the potential of his bike. Together they rode to races at Ponypark Slagharen and practised stand up wheelies. Bernd also took part in a race on the track in Gevelsberg, but the riders around him made him nervous and he crashed in the quarter-finals. But BMX went on. Bernd travelled to the BMX city of Dortmund and discovered the vibrant scene at Reinoldikirche. The BMX Studio Eckhoff became his place of pilgrimage, and people like Thomas Gerstmann and Björn Paetow provided enough inspiration for him to spend the following winter, come rain or shine, in the yard of his primary school, learning tricks on his BMX.

By the following summer, this enthusiasm had already earned him a place on the Dortmund scene. Bernd was now riding a Kuwahara KZ-1, but the bike’s unusual geometry was causing him problems. So he went back to BMX Studio Eckhoff, this time to the new branch in Bochum. And there it was: a brand-new VDC ‘Changa’ – the start of a love affair that continues to this day. Suddenly, everything just fell into place. Bernd was so grateful to VDC that he sent the company love letters and photos of himself on his new bike.

So it figures that his next pilgrimage would take him there: in 1984, Bernd set off on a grand tour of the USA with his sister. The details are a bit hazy. There were many flights and many pensioners, but two things have stayed with him: firstly, the trip to VDC in Santa Ana, where he managed to get his hands on one of only 50 never-before-released Mike Dominguez signature VDC frames, and secondly, his trip to Aji’s Bike Shop in San Francisco to snap up a few cheap Flight cranks – which were unaffordable in Germany at the time. There he met Maurice Meyer, who was due to go on a tour of Germany with Dave Vanderspek and Robert Peterson just a few weeks later. The beginning of a friendship that lasts to this day. They met at the Skyway Show in Gevelsberg, and Maurice invited him to visit him in San Francisco. That’s easier said than done, of course, but Bernd took him at his word and spent every holiday in Northern California from that point on. He immersed himself in the scene at Golden Gate Park. He got to know the people, somehow ended up in a car heading to Venice Beach, and took part in his first freestyle contest, the legendary AFA ‘Chaos at Venice’ contest. Bernd won the under-16 ‘Novice’ class and kicked off his run with Uli Heidkamp’s ‘Astro Hops’. No one else at the contest knew or could do that trick.

Back in Germany, the local contest scene was also slowly gaining momentum, and Bernd competed in his first contest on German soil in 1985 at Cologne’s Jugendpark, where he once again started with the Astro Hops, but above all attracted attention with his unconventional style. Compared to the contest in Venice Beach, which took place under palm trees with rock stars mingling in the crowd, the local contests seemed rather stuffy, but Bernd got to know the new German freestyle scene and forged friendships that would last a lifetime. Roller hockey coach Freddy Schneider began his efforts to give freestyle an official status and crowned Bernd West German Champion in a small gym in the village of Schleiden near Euskirchen. The ‘DFO’, founded a little later, announced the ‘Supercup’ and held its German championships against the bizarre backdrop of the ‘Voets’ car dealership.

Bernd won most of these contests, but he was constantly drawn back to the USA. In 1986, he went on tour with Team Haro, whom he had met the previous year. In 1987, he took his A-levels and then spent a year in the States riding ‘school shows’ for Haro in LA County with Jess Dyrenforth and Sean Wilkerson. They were even flown to Tahiti for this mix of road safety education and freestyle show.

When he returned to Germany in 1988, the freestyle scene had changed. The days of showy chrome stunts were over, and Wolfgang Meinung and Albert Retey had raised the bar for German flatland. Bernd was surprised by the standard of riding in his country. He began his studies in dentistry, which naturally took up time he would otherwise have spent on his bike. And yet, at his final contest at the 1990 World Championships in Kenn, he put on a run which, looking back, he says was the best he had ever performed in a competitive setting during his career. Accompanied by music he played himself on the electric piano, he performed tricks that seemed to be from another era. Old school? New school? Next school? It was the Bernd Schneider school, and his style was unmistakable and unique.

Bernd was already truly ‘freestyle’ at a time when most of the scene in Germany was still copying America in their plastic pants. He performed his own trick creations, which often arose from near-falls or accidents, rode a distinctive bike whose manufacturer didn’t even have a high-profile American freestyle team, and rode his contest runs to music that stood out from the almost standardised hip-hop of his fellow competitors. He himself attributes this to his surroundings: even at the Reinoldikirche in Dortmund, people were searching for their own style, and in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park, influences ranged from heavy metal to skateboarding and acrobatics. Added to this was his ambition and his desire to stand out from the crowd. In this way, he left his mark on the German flatland scene of the late 1980s and played a major part in putting Germany on the international map.

As one of the pioneers of flatland in Germany, he achieved what many could only dream of: he toured the world with the stars of the scene and won competitions in Germany and the USA. We welcome Dr. Bernd Schneider to the German BMX Hall of Fame.