For years now I’ve been traveling with a point and shoot film camera. Sometimes I forget that I brought it. Sometimes I decide to shoot a full roll in a day and see what comes of it. I decided to not worry much about the actually shots and fire off 36 shots throughout out the day and evening of BMX CGN (aka 'The Worlds', before the UCI took that title). 

I’ve worked on countless events, one of the things I’ve learned is any event isn’t about the course, the sponsors, the prize money. It’s about the people that show up. Whether it’s the riders, the vendors, the spectators, or just the random person looking for a party. Everyone is part of the event. 

Some events separate the riders from the people there and some it’s just a big mix of everyone.  An event like BMX CGN is of the latter. The crowd is right on top of the riders. There’s a vendor village with some people selling things, people showing off old bikes, people cooking food and camping out right in the vendor village, and then there is Camp Holland handing out the cheapest beers they brought from back home to anyone that walks up. To me this is what makes an event, there are no points for future contests, there’s no dreams on claiming the medal on your Instagram, and there’s hardly any prize money. Yet people come from all over to ride bikes, talk about riding bikes, do beer races on strangers bikes and just meet other BMX riders, hang out and hopefully you leave with more friends than when you showed up. 

I first came to the event in Cologne in 2000, I’m so glad it’s still going on. In one form or another this event is 40 years old, and that is amazing to me. 

So here’s the best of what I saw through the lens of my point and shoot film camera in one roll of film. 15 shots, from one day of BMX in Cologne. –RC

The Cologne worlds will return  on July 5th/6th 2025. Follow @BMXCOLOGNE for more info