Birthplace : Paso Robles, California, USA.
John : I'm from Paso Robles. It's kind of nowhere, you know? Check it out, LA and SF, and I'm in the middle.
John Parker on his very first quarter pipe. Photo from BMX Plus july 1999.
John :At my first contest ever I got second in amateur. I was pretty overwhelmed. I even got a photo in BMX Plus! Luckily I made it to a contest a couple of months after and I won that one.
NorCal's John Parker has landed a freestyle sponsorship from Wilkerson Airlines.
John, Ride UK august 1994 : When it first happened I was totally stoked. Got a free frame and fork it was good for then.
Touring with Ron Wilkerson and Rob Seward
John, Ride UK august 1994 : I went and did some shows at a fair, for like a couple of days, and that as pretty fun, I was stoked, those were like my first shows ever. Then once more we did the video thing, that was all the riding I really did for him, as far as shows and stuff like that.
John is riding for GT.
John : After GT talked to me though, I could get totally full bike parts and stuff, so I decided to go with that.
Interview in BMX Plus! june 1993.
July, John is doing shows in China with Bart de Jong, Stephan Prantl, Day Smith, Rob Nolli, Chris Young, Todd Seligman and Pat Miller.
John : My first Pro win was in England at the Backyard Jam.
Cover and interview in Ride UK #12 august 1994
No-hand on the cover of Props #2 may 1994. Photo Brad McDonald.
John : I quit GT because they were fuck, working the fucking shit out of me. I was like on the road all year. Non stop. No fun anymore. So that is why I quit that. Then I got the call from K2.
It didn't take John Parker long to find a new bike sponsor. Parker signed a deal with ski-manufacturer K2 in march. He will be helping K2 design a freestyle bike and will also be going at every vert contest there is.
John : They looked at David Mirra first, they were like we get Mirra and a couple other guys. So they call Mirra up but he has another year with Haro and they couldn't sign him up, then he gave them my name and Dennis, call these two guys. Cause I had just quit GT a month and a half earlier. I got to design my own bike, go to all the contest I want, or skip if I don't feel like it. Get to do my own thing.
John Parker is no longer on K2 bikes.
Interview on www.fatbmx.com november 2000.
I'm married, I live in Mesa, Arizona, right outside of Phoenix, got one halfpipe and a little mini ramp that the city is trying to make us tear down, that's another old story that I told many times, my backyard is just a pile of wood that used to be a rad miniramp and jumpbox set-up. I've got my wife Jolene and my two dogs; Charlotte and Jane, cute two little pups, you'll meet them eventually. I'm riding with Jason Davies, Joe Tecca and Jim Burgess pretty much every day. We're working on forming a skatepark but that's a pain in the ass and I've been busy for the last two months so.
Monthly column in BMX Plus!
