Van Homan: The Robot

BMX is not your average sport, Van Homan is no your average rider, or even professional rider for that matter. Homan is a fearless, and talented BMX machine. His accomplishments within the sport and huge and he is one of the most inspirational riders in the BMX industry today. He has especially made a big impact on his hometown of Pennsville, New Jersey, where he recently a bike and skate board shop called Two By Four. The shop has brought BMX to his community and shows just a small part of his talent within the industry.
For those who do not know, BMX stands for bicycle moto-cross, and is an intense form of riding a bicycle. The sport involves doing tricks on all different types of objects and architecture using a small almost clownish twenty inch bicycle. BMX is done everywhere from your average skate park to your street riding to your dirt jumps. Racing is another small part of BMX. Van Homan started out racing, but then progressed in to street riding, when he started out for the now well-known company, Little Devil.
Van Homan was born in Pennsville, New Jersey and started at the age of thirteen. After racing for a few years he gained some small sponsors, like a local bike shop from Mt. Holly, New Jersey, Chip N Dale. Then after that he was sponsored by a bigger company, Schwinn. After riding with them for a little bit, he started working with a good friend, Derek Adams, on his at that point, small t-shirt company, Little Devil. As Little Devil grew as a bike company, Homan grew as a rider.
“We [Little Devil] grew up together,” said Homan referring the relationship between him and the company. Homan is now also sponsored by Orchid Footwear, a sister company to Little Devil, and he also rides for F-It Bike Company, better known as just Fit. Van Homan has competed in the X-Games numerous times, and done well. Although, he is not known for his competition skills and achievements. However, he has also competed in contests like the Toronto Metro Jam, and he received first place in the Nora Cup for street riding. This is a huge accomplishment with in BMX.
During Van Homan’s riding career he has also made some amazing video parts, this just adding to his accomplishments. One of the best video parts was in the Little Devil video, Criminal Mischief. Van had the last section of the video and did an amazing job of closing out the riding section of the video with his talented riding, doing tricks like a manual down a railing, a huge rooftop gap, and doing a double peg down a rail with a break in the middle of it. Criminal Mischief was even voted the most inspirational bike video in Transworld RideBMX, the industry’s most popular magazine. Van Homan was and is still part of that insipartion.
“He’s inspiring because he is a robot,” said Greg Simms a BMXer from New Jersey. By robot, he is referring to how Homan will just ride and ride. How if he falls, he will just get up again and again until he gets the trick. This is why Greg believes Homan is so inspirational.
Van’s talent, determination, and fearlessness has caused him to become the inspiration he has become today.
“I never set out to do this,” said Van when asked how he feels to be so inspirational to so many kids out their. “It’s weird to be ‘that guy.’”
However, being “that guy” has given Van the ability to go further in the BMX industry. Not only has he recently begun working with two smaller BMX companies, Coalition and Duo, but he also has his new skate board and BMX bike shop, Two BY Four. Two BY Four opened in 2006. Two By Four is named for the two wheels a BMX bike has, and the four wheels that a skate board has. The store also has a professional BMX and skateboard team, along with flow (less-skilled, usually younger riders) teams. At the shop they sell all the parts, clothing, and shoes that a skate boarder or BMXer would need. They also have demos and video premieres held at the shop every few weeks to keep the kids entertained.
Keeping the kids “entertained” is why Van opened up his shop. He wanted a place where he could provide a place for bikers and skaters to not only come and get the parts, supplies, and equipment they needed, but have a place to chill, hang out and be part of the BMX community. While at the shop Van always has some kind of bike video playing to get the culture out there.
“[The shop] makes BMX a priority,” said Van Homan in a one on one interview I was lucky enough to get to do with the robot. He said he wanted to open up the shop to provide a place to promote BMX.
“It made sense, there needs to be a place to showcase brands,” said Van. That is just what the shop does.
Recently, DIG BMX, another well-known BMX magazine ran a huge article on Van Homan. He was even on the cover. In the article it discussed just how much of an impact Two By Four had on Pennsville, New Jersey. The article opened up talking about how a year ago before the shop opened up you could drive down Route 49, Pennsville’s main road that goes from one end of the town to the other and you would just see a nice quiet South Jersey town. Now as your drive down Route 49 you see lots of kids out being active, riding BMX or using their skate boards. Homan’s shop helped with this progression of these sports within the town. He brought a new culture to the kids within Pennsville, the place where he grew up. He was once one of those kids of Pennsville, which is another reason why he chose to open up his shop in the location he did.
Homan’s shop had a large impact on his home town. Homan himself has had a large impact on the BMX industry itself. As such an inspirational rider he has done a lot with his career. He even just recently got married. He grew up riding, and now helping the BMX industry to grow. Two By Four has brought more awareness to BMX, which is exactly what Van wanted out of the shop.