Toby Henderson

Toby S.^[1] Henderson (born October 10, 1961 in La Mirada, California United States) was a professional American "Old School" Bicycle Motocross (BMX) racer whose prime competitive years were from (1979–1985) He was given the nickname "Coca Cola Cowboy" by Bob Osborn, publisher of BMX Action magazine but the reason for it was unknown even by Henderson. He himself regard it as "lame".^[2]

Racing career milestones

Started racing: In 1973 at 12 years old.^[3] at Hollyfield Park in Norwalk, California^[4] In a September 1982 BMX Action his first race was at Scot Briethaupt's B.U.M.S track.^[5]

First race bicycle: Schwinn Sting-Ray.^[6]

Sanctioning body: Independent.

First race result:

First win (local):

Home sanctioning body district(s): National Bicycle Association (NBA) District "X" (Orange/Los Angeles County);

First sponsor:

First national win:

Turned Professional: December 1978^[7]

First Professional race result: In Third place in Pro Class at the National Bicycle Association (NBA) Supernationals in Saddleback Park in Irvine, California on April 8, 1979.^[8][9]

First Professional win:

Retired: 1987 at 26 years old. His last national race as a serious competitor appears to have been the United States Bicycle Motocross Association (USBA) Grandnational in Dallas, Texas on November 11, 1986. He came in seventh in "A" pro, the senior pro level.^[10] It was the last USBA sanctioned raced before it merged with the American Bicycle Association (ABA) in 1987. Henderson then pursued a Mountain Bike racing career. He would later race at least one BMX race in 1987 at the Vision World Cup in Irvine, California on June 21, 1987 He didn't make any mains.^[11]

Height & weight at height of her career (1981–1984): Ht:6'0" Wt:172 lbs.

Career factory and major bike shop sponsors

Amateur

• Bottema: 1974-1976 The first sponsor Henderson ever had was Jeff Bottema's uncle.^[12]
• Cerritos Bike Shop: 1976^[13]
• Ralph's Bicycles: 1976-Mid 1977
• Left BMX to race motorcycles for a year and a half^[14] Mid 1977-Late 1978
• D.G. Performance Specialist (The initials stood for Dan Hangsleben, Gary Harlow):^[15] Late 1978-June 1979. He turned pro with this sponsor.

Professional

• D.G. Performance Specialist: Late 1978-June 1979.
• Raleigh Cycle Company of America: July 1979-Mid January 1981. The ABA Summernationals in Amarillo, Texas was very likely his first race for Raleigh since it was for Jeff Bottema.^[16] They had joined the team together leaving DG.^[17] Raleigh dropped its racing team in January 1981.^[18] According to Henderson Raleigh allegedly strung himself and Jeff Bottema along with false promises of a new contract for the 1982 season only to abruptly dropped by Raleigh:

Toby Henderson: "...I was getting a couple of good contracts coming up, and I turned them all down, because I kept calling Raleigh, and saying, "Well, are we going to do something next year?" "Oh yeah, oh yeah, we're really going to be full force next year." [Raleigh's alleged response-ed.] So I turned some good contracts down, and I let it all slide, until the middle of January, when I called them up and said, "Well, where's the contracts? Let's get some contracts going," and they said, Well, we decided we're going to go TV advertisement," and that's all they said, like "Click." [imitating a phone hang up-ed.] And we [Henderson and Bottema-ed.] said, "Huh?" Here we turned down like three or four good contracts in October, when all the other teams were setting their budgets up and looking for their riders for the next year."^[19] ---BMX Plus! October 1982

Ironically, Raleigh would restart its BMX sponsoring program a year later. Toby rode sponsorless for six months util June 1981^[20]

• Hutch Hi-Performance BMX/Products: Early June 1981-January 29, 1984. Henderson's last race for Hutch was the ABA Supernationals in Burbank, California on January 29, 1984.^[21] Henderson left Hutch for SE Racing because they offered to pay him three times the money Hutch was offering but ultimately he decided it was a bad move:

Toby: I left Hutch for SE racing. They paid me 3 times what Hutch offered. It was a mistake on my part. I should have stayed at Hutch.

JJR: Can you explain that?
Toby: SE paid me a lot more money than Hutch to switch, but were unable to promote me as much as Hutch therefore in the long run it was a bad move. SE did however buy my first house for me!^[22]

• SE (formerly Scot Enterprises, now called Sports Engineering, Inc.) Racing: Late January 1984-December 1985. It appears that the ABA Winternationals on February 26, 1984 was the first event Henderson raced in SE Racing colors.
• "DAD": January 1986-February 1986. After Henderson was either dropped by SE Racing or as Henderson himself put it "deleted himself",^[23] his father supported him on the race circuit for a couple of months. On his uniform he had "Thanks Dad" sewn on in appreciation.^[24]
• BMX Action Magazine: February 1986-March 1987. After his father financed him to get to a few nationals after he quit SE Racing, then became the test rider for the BMX periodical BMX Action and was also sponsored by them. He would retire from active competition after leaving BMX Action .
• GT (Gary Turner) Bicycles: April 1988 – 1991.^[25] This was primarily his Mountain Bike racing sponsor but he did race BMX on occasion, including the NBL Snipes National in Norco, California on June 19, 1988, the first BMX race since his last one at the Vision World Cup in Irvine, California on June 21, 1987 (he didn't make any main at that time^[26]). He came in eighth place last in "A" pro and seventh place in Pro Cruiser at Snipes.^[27]
• Balance: 1993
• Iron Horse: 1994-

Career bicycle motocross titles

Amateur

National Bicycle Association (NBA)

• 1978 16 Novice Grandnational Champion

National Bicycle League (NBL)

American Bicycle Association (ABA)

• None

Fédération Internationale Amateur de Cyclisme (FIAC)*

• None

International Bicycle Motocross Federation (IBMXF)*

• None

Professional

National Bicycle Association (NBA)

• None

National Bicycle League (NBL)

• 1980 National No.3 Pro
• 1981 Pro Cruiser Knott's Berry Farm Grand National Champion (NBL, United Bicycle Racers (UBR) & World Wide Bicycle Motocross Association (WWBMXA) sanctioned.)
• 1982 National No.2 Pro Cruiser
• 1983 "A" Pro Grandnational Champion
• 1984 Pro Cruiser Grandnational Champion
• 1984 Pro Cruiser National No.1

American Bicycle Association (ABA)

United States Bicycle Motocross Association (USBA)

• 1985 National No.2 Pro and National Pro Cruiser No.2
• 1986 National No.3 Pro

International Bicycle Motocross Federation (IBMXF)*

Fédération Internationale Amateur de Cyclisme (FIAC)*

• None (FIAC did not have a strictly professional division during its existence) (defunct).

Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI)*

Pro Series Championships

• 1981 Pro Cruiser International Grand Championship Champion

Notable accolades

• Henderson is a 1994 ABA BMX Hall of Fame Inductee.
• Henderson is also a 2000 Inductee of the United States Bicycling Hall of Fame.

BMX product lines

• 1985 SE Racing SE Hauler Toby Henderson Signature Model aka "Henderson Hauler"

Product Evaluation:

American BMXer January/February 1985 Vol.7 No.12 pg.10

BMX Plus! February 1985 Vol.8 No.2 pg.56

Significant injuries

• Broke Collarbone at the NBL North Park National in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on August 9, 1981. He crashed in his first Pro Trophy qualifying moto when his front wheel did not clear adequately and struck the second of double moguls, breaking the front end of the Thruster frame he was racing and catapulting him at high speed into the ground head first, injuring him.^[28][29] He was laid up for approximately six weeks until the 1981 NBL Grandnational in St. Louis, Missouri held on September 26, 1981. He didn't make it out of his Senior "A" pro quarter semi finals, but he did come in third in, ironically, Pro Trophy.^[30]

Miscellaneous

• His pants had the slogan on the seat of it that said "No Way" in 1983.^[31]

BMX press magazine interviews and articles

• "Henderson & Hutch" BMX Action September 1982 Vol.7 No.9 pg.35 Combined article about Henderson and product evaluation of the Hutch XL24 Cruiser.
• "Toby: Confessions from the 'California Kid'" BMX Plus! October 1982 Vol.5 No.10 pg.52
• "Toby Henderson" BMX Action August 1983 Vol.8 No.8 pg.44
• "Toby Henderson" American BMXer January/February 1985 Vol.7 No.12 pg.12
• "Back in the Day: Toby Henderson" BMX World December 2005/January 2006 Vol.1 No.1 pg.8 (Premier Issue)

BMX magazine covers

Bicycle Motocross News:

• None

Minicycle/BMX Action & Super BMX:

• July 1983 Vol.10 No.7 (SBMX) in centerfold poster Henderson poses with actress and Miss Ohio 1969 Katherine Baumann.

Bicycle Motocross Action & Go:

• November 1979 Vol.4 No.9 (300) with teammate Jeff Bottema (195) (BMXA)
• September 1982 Vol.7 No.9 (BMXA)
• April 198 Vol.8 No.4 behind Brent Patterson (2). (BMXA)
• July 1983 Vol.8 No.7 (2) in the lead ahead of Dave Marietti (Torker) racer in second, Brent Patterson in third; Jeff Bottema in fourth. (BMXA)
• September 1986 Vol.11 No.9 (BMXA)

BMX Plus!:

• March 1982 Vol.5 No.3
• June 1983 Vol.6 No.6 ahead of Harry Leary.
• December 1983 Vol.8 No.12 (BMXA) This is the famous cover of Henderson jumping his bike into a lake.
• BMX Racer December 1983 (7) in upper left insert doing one footer. In upper right insert Freestyler Mike Dominguez; in lower right insert Brian Patterson (1) leading Brent Patterson (2); in lower left insert Eric Rupe (9) leading Stu Thomsen (1); in center insert Greg Hill (3). This magazine was a special edition printed by Daisy Hi-Touque, the publishers of BMX Plus!.
• February 1984 Vol.7 No.2 in lower right insert. Main image freestyler Mike Dominquez.
• August 1984 Vol.7 No.8. In lower left insert. In upper left insert racer Clint Miller. In upper right insert Freestyler Woody Itson. In lower right inser racer Mike Miranda.
• February 1985 Vol.8 No.2 in main image. In insert Eric Rupe.

Total BMX

Bicycles and Dirt:

Bicross Magazine: (French Publication)

• Juillet (July) 1985 Vol. No.34

NBA World & NBmxA World The official membership publication of the NBA:

ABA Action, American BMXer, BMXer (the official membership publication of the ABA under three different names):

Mountain Bike Action:

• 1991 Buyer's Guide with female model

References

External links

• The Old School BMX Toby Henderson interview
• The American Bicycle Association (ABA) Website.
• The National Bicycle League (NBL) Website.
• Toby Henderson interview January 2003
• Decent World.com Interview
• espn.com 1999 profile.