Jeff Bottema -- Hot Shots

From the 1980 issue of Bicycle Motocross Action.

BMX Action July 1982

I will just come out and say it, I freaking love this cover. Classic BMX shot from Bob Osborn. To bad the rest of the magazine was kind of weak. I can't knock it too hard, they where giving the Murray X20c six and half pages of coverage in this issue. The rest of the issue seemed to suffer from it. Old Bob must have really been trying to get all of Murray's advertising money. All in all though, rather bland issue.

I guess I still liked it due to the fact that I had one of those Murray bikes. And to tell the truth, it was a pretty cool bike. Nice little build for the price. Real Dia Compe brakes, nice Array rims, ACS hubs, Elina seat. Murray did a good job with the component specs. Helped also that they had it covered in stickers with all the cool key words. "Full Chrome Moly." "Track Certified." "Team" I would like to see the sales numbers of these bikes from 1982 and 1983. I am sure it was crazy high.

I wonder if that is the same bank from the cover shot? Nice little trick of camera angle. Even if it was, at 12 years old, I didn't really care. I just wanted one of those number plates.

Good old cruiser class. The 24's looked so big and clunky from around this time. It is really cool how the geometry has changed and that class has gotten so fast. Pro cruiser is scary to watch sometimes, guys are crazy fast on these bikes. Jeff Bottema;s green forks stood out real well at the race track, eh, they didn't need that color to stand out. They did that on their own.