../people/Martti Kuoppa

Sources: www.marttikuoppa.com, www.kgbflat.com, www.spokesmen.no, Freedom, BMXicos, Cream, www.expn.com, server.byke.org/ukflat, Dig, www.fatbmx.com, ...
If you want to add any info, please contact buissonrouge@23mag.com.
1978 Birthdate: November 1st, 1978.
Birthplace: Helsinki, Finlande.
1991 Martti: When I first started riding it was beginning of the summer 91, after 3 weeks I broke my front teeth, so I was out for about 3-4 months then winter came I couldn't ride for like 6-7 months. So I was kind of out like about a year.

Martti: When I started riding I was inspired by Jesse Puente.
1992 Trond Huso: This photo was taken the first time I met Martti Kuoppa. It was at a contest that Michael "BlueTooth" Gäske held in Gothenburg, and Martti was blowing minds.

LAME.
First video part in Finnish Bmx video called “Lame Bike Video 2”
martti kuoppa 1992
1996 Worlds in Cologne, Germany. Martti Kuoppa had entered in master-class, but Paul Osicka made him change his mind. He said that Martti had to enter in pro. 10th place. You can't call that a bad international debut. martti kuoppa 1996
Martti Kuoppa debuted in the pro class at the 1996 worlds in Cologne, Germany. He did quite well. Photo: Trond Husø/Spokesmen
1997 3rd place pro flat @ 1997 Worlds, Eindhoven, Holland, july 1997.
Venu tout droit de Finlande et pratiquement inconnu, Martti Kuoppa a mis tout le monde d'accord avec des enchaînements aussi variés que difficiles, le tout sur la musique d'ABBA.

Cover and interview in Freedom #19 october 1997.

First trip to the US. 6th place pro flat @ BS finals Seal Beach, CA.

Ride BMX UK december 1997: Martti Kuoppa has joined the KHE team and is therefore riding one of the new Premium Lgger frameset.
martti kuoppa freedom bmx 10 1997
1998 Riding from Martti Kuoppa in the Trick Stars, Comiq Q and Linkt videos.

PROPS.
Cover and profile on the Finish flatland master, Martti Kuoppa in Props #25 may june 1998.

Martti: Chiquita Bananas flew me to Toronto contest, gave me about 600 bucks bonus for the win and flew me to 98´ X-Games.

1st place pro flat @ Elsinore contest, Toronto, Canada.
First victory on pro level.

3rd place pro flat @ San Diego X-Games.

4th place pro flat @ 1998 worlds, Portimao, Portugal.

BMXICOS.
Kickspin hitchiker on the cover of BMXicos magazine december 1998 junuary 1999.
martti kuoppa props

martti kuoppa bmxicos
1999 Riding from Martti Kuoppa in the Trick Stars II video.
kickflip to crack packer

Riding from Martti Kuoppa in the Blend video.

Interview: www.theflatlander.com march 1999

19th place @ San Francisco X-Games.

2nd place pro flat @ KOC, Sothsea, UK.

Letter in Ride BMX US #45 november 1999 about the X-Games.

Interview in Ride BMX UK #44 december 1999.

2000 Riding from Martti Kuoppa in the Connect video.
Rate of his progression is just sick, in fact he has 2 sections on this vid witch are both PACKED with tons of crazy hard original moves, a halfpacker grabbing the bars bar with both hands behind him he spins 180 with the bars grabs the seat with with his right hand a goes to backward half packer!! rope-a-ronie to backward swfoot gliding pedal junkyard! One foot halfpacker jump back through the frame and lands in a sw handed steamroller!! and of course his infamous one handed steamroller kick flip to crackpacker. A catapult straight to op sw foot blender ! and a Pedal death truck! this is just a portion of the originality that just bursts forth from Martti. He does so Much original stuff here it just has to be seen.

Interview: www.theflatlander.com february 2000.

Riding from Martti Kuoppa in the Dorkin 10 video.

2nd place stuntmen flat @ B3 round 4 finals, Nashville, TeNnessee, june 2000.
Martti Kuoppa gets into a death truck standing on both pedals, grabs the front pegs with his hands, and then start cranking in super tight circles. He even threw in some no handers.

Summer 2000, Martti Kuoppa picked up a new clothing sponsor called Artzone 38.

Martti Kuoppa flatlanding in Vigerlandsparken, Oslo on the cover of Spokesmen issue 4 winter 2000.

Intrikat Infinite Pieces.

martti kuoppa spokesmen
2001 COVER.
Cream #11 march 2001.

INTERVIEW.
Ride BMX US #60 may 2001.

GUINNESS BOOK.
Martti Kuoppa inscrit son nom au Guinness Book of Records with rolling no-footed on the front wheel of his bike for 100 meters and doing 59 pinky squeaks in a minute.

X-GAMES.
Martti won the X Games in Philadelphia and he also took home the BS-series flatland belt.
martti kuoppa cream bmx
2002 Martti signed with Adidas.

Interview in Ride BMX UK #60 august 2002.
2003 Martti Kuoppa has quit riding for Dig-it/Quamen and Camacura saturday march 29th.
Martti: Things didn´t work out as good as I wanted so I decided to move on. I´m not looking for any bike sponsors at the moment, even someone offered me million dollars. I'm just going to do my own thing and concentrate on that. When things doesn´t work with somebody it takes lots of concentration away from my riding and progression.

Martti Kuoppa and Viki Gomez, two of the biggest names in flatland, both recently quit their sponsors to start KGB (Kuoppa Gomez Bikes).

17th place pro flat @ X-Games.
Martti Kuoppa, www.agoride.com, september 2003: I don't really care for the X games anymore, I think that the whole X games thing does not present flatland the right way, it makes flatland look stupid in my opinion. In my opinion flatland should go on its own direction, just flatland. I won that contest for last three years. So I got that money from ESPN and now I´m putting that money back into flatland with KGB. So it´s like a food circle you know? But now I think it is time to move on to a higher level than the commercial X games are, get back into competing against my self and my own limits because that is when flatland is and stays more interesting. This time I've got 17th place, I could care less about the judgement, I know I rode really bad and deserved 17th or even maybe last place so at that point I don´t really care because I won it three times and I know how it feels to win that contest. I guess the main reason I did so bad was that I didn´t enjoy being there.
kgb
2004 www.marttikuoppa.com: KGB tours all over Japan as well as entering many competitions all over the world and learning business.

Martti Kuoppa released his Solo DVD-project: Moments.
Martti: It took me about one year since I filmed my first combo (it was filmed at the end of november 2003), so I had lot of stuff from before that I threw away because I was not happy. Also I really struggled in my head for this project and felt couple of times that I cannot come up with it because I'm never happy about my riding. I hope that this DVD will be still watchable after 10 more years. This is my piece of art for flatland.
martti kuoppa moments
2005 www.marttikuoppa.com: Hardest year of Martti´s flatland career. In January a surgery which didn´t make practicing possible for 3 months. After 1 month of practice, another injury-tendinitis on his right wrist held him back for next 6 months. Entered all the competitions without practice…

Martti Kuoppa megaspin tailwhip megaspin, december 2005.
2006 www.kgbflat.com, january 2006: Martti is no longer riding for Odyssey. They separated in good terms and Martti will be riding all the KGB products in his bike, which makes more sense...
2007 Interview in Ride BMX US october 2007.
2008
2009 Martti Kuoppa, www.facebook.com, october 26, 2009: I am riding a Mankind Alive frame and that frame geometry is not the best for me but I can live with it. I bought it from Flatlandfuel.com as a regular customer because I am not looking to get free anything from anyone. I am not going to ride this frame for rest of my life. It is just for now to ride. I can do my tricks with any frame I want. And if you give me a bike that weights 15 - 17 kilograms or 7 kilograms I can still ride both of them. Also I need to start applying a regular job once again because I did not have so great contest placings last couple of years. So depending on what kind of a job I will have it will tell me how much I am able to ride in future. For now I am just trying my best to keep up the spirit of riding as much as I feel like. Thank you for understanding and supporting! I just want to ride... That´s all...
2010 www.fatbmx.com, january 2010: Martti Kuoppa is no longer riding for RedBull. At least we assume he isn't now that he is working on sales and marketing for Monster Energy over in Finland. He started a new bike company to keep him occupied even more. Not for the serious guys out there. Keep it fun.