American Bicycle Association

• August 1977: Mennenga creates the ABA

• 1978: The first ABA National is held in Azusa, California, with 35 tracks and 3,000 members
• 1979: The ABA becomes the largest governing body in BMX

• 1980: Greg Hill objects to the 1979 season points scoring[9]
• 1982: ABA discards their points system
• 1982: The first issue of Bicycles and Dirt premiers in September
• 1983: A semi-organized pro rider boycott forms
• 1983: An editorial boycott forms from BMX Action, a major industry magazine
• 1985: Articles about ABA return to BMX Action

An editorial boycott was established by Robert Osborn, the managing editor, publisher, and owner of BMX Action (aka BMXA) after Osborn was denied a photographer's pass at an ABA national in 1980.[9] Unfavorable editorials appeared in the magazine and ABA racing events disappeared after the June 1983 issue. The March 1985 issue covered an ABA event, the 1984 Grand National.

ABA races only warranted brief comments and listings of race results. With the drop of coverage, it became more difficult to get sponsors at ABA nationals. The sponsors would not have the benefits of indirect advertising in the magazines.

BMX Action ended its editorial boycott in part due to an agreement with the ABA to cease publishing its in-house magazine Bicycles and Dirt.[13]

• A pro rider boycott was generated as protests continued, led unofficially by Greg Hill and included legendary racers like Stu Thomsen. The basis for the boycott was Hill's long-standing 1980 complaint was over the alleged unfairness of its pro points system, going back to the 1979 season. The number one pro was selected to go into the ABA's Grand National in November, with most of the points.

• The points earned equaled the amount of money earned in the year. At that time, the ABA pro who won the most money was declared No. 1. The claim was that this benefited the ABA, with an exciting finish to the season, but was detrimental to the pros. A season of consistent wins and near wins could be undone by having an off day, and/or an inconsistent rider could have a great day and capturing the number one spot.

• Many racers preferred the NBL's Olympic or cumulative system, in which the qualifying rounds would be run three times and the average place in each round was added and the four lowest numbers advanced to the main race.
• The pros wanted a bigger pro purse that would be spread out over eight places instead of the top four at ABA Nationals. This would ensure anyone making nationals would get a share of the winnings. The claim was that while NBL, NBA, and independent promotional race purses went up over the years, the ABA purses remained relatively stagnant.

• A pro didn't have to be a pro at the start of the season. An amateur could theoretically race the required number of nationals as an amateur, turn pro before the Grand National, and have a shot at the No. 1 title.

• After the ABA abandoned its own commitment to the transfer system, the luck factor was reduced and awards were consistent, but basically, just one race decided the No. 1 for the year.
• After the 1982 Grand National, all of the pro classes would be subject to the transfer system in the 1983 season, just like the amateurs, instead of the cumulative system they used before and during 1982.
• Hill led a one-man boycott of the ABA during the 1980 season due to Mennenga's perceived lack of concern for an allegedly unsafe number of racers at the starting gate of a national. Mennenga allegedly said to Mr. Hill that the "...ABA doesn't cater to the Pros".[14]

In 1982, the ABA discarded their system because the ABA No. 1 Pro for 1981, had a runaway season and gained the title a full month before the Grand National, rendering the event irrelevant in choosing the No. 1 pro. A low turnout of big-name pros resulted due to a foregone conclusion, which meant a lack of publicity for the ABA. Removing the pro point system would encourage pros to attend future Grand Nationals.

The new system removed the focus on money. Instead, the pros:

• were required to attend at least eight nationals with the top 28 money-winning pros (A or AA class), and;
• had to be eligible to compete in a special pro car main.

After the ABA abandoned its own commitment to the transfer system in 1982, the pros had to run the qualifying rounds in a cumulative scoring manner, racing three times in the qualifying races. The pros with the eight lowest point scores transferred to the Main, which was also cumulative out of five runs.

The ABA decided to reuse the same system it used in 1982 to decide the number one pro for 1983.

The ABA changed the way it would decide its top pro for the 1984 season. The pros were given a points system just like the amateurs. A first in the Main will earn a AA pro 240 points, second 200, 160 for third and so on until sixth place would be worth 40 points. As in the amateur divisions the pros would earn rider points. The top ten pros would be determined by this points ranking. Additionally the best ten finishes at the nationals plus the Grand Nationals (making it eleven races) would count toward the pros eligibility to contend for the Pro #1 plate. Purse money would be distributed not only among the racers who made the main, but also those who got to the semis or even didn't make it that far, so practically everyone got something for racing, even if it was just a one hundred percent payback on their entrance fee.This system put a premium on consistency while the Transfer System was a little closer to luck, both good and bad for a racer.

The in-house newspaper ABA Action did not generate enough coverage since it was restricted to ABA members, a limited audience. The obvious solution for the ABA was to create its own magazine to circumvent the established press and attract advertiser: Bicycles and Dirt. The first issue premiered in September 1982. Advertisers did not flock to the new magazine, despite its built-in audience. Like ABA Action, it was a subscription-only magazine at the time.

With this in mind the ABA put BAD on newsstands a year after its premier with Stu Thomsen on the cover. It did not change the situation. The financial woes of BAD only grew worse. ABA pumped funds into the venture but it eventually became clear that they could not sustain the loss. With no hope of a turnaround, and an agreement with BMX Action to cease publication as a condition to end its editorial boycott[16] Bicycles and Dirt was discontinued with the September 1984 issue.[15]

The magazine had left the ABA on the verge of bankruptcy. The rising costs of the insurance crises of the early 1980s, with its skyrocketing rates, affected every sanctioning body, but given the ABA's greatly weakened state it, was life-threatening. By 1984, the first indications of the plateauing of the popularity of BMX were seen in the flattening growth in memberships and the falling off of attendance of nationals.[15] Some of this was caused by the growing popularity of BMX freestyle siphoning potential racers from BMX, and the beginnings of the resurgence of skateboarding, both of which exploded in popularity by 1985.

Another financial drain was the Pro Spectacular concept, a revival of a similar experiment abandoned in 1980 after financial losses. At the time, BMX as a whole was not a mature enough sport for the concept to be a success. In 1984, the perceptible drop in the popularity in BMX racing was outstripped by the explosive growth in BMX freestyle bicycles. Track operators noted a decline in new entrances in the beginner's class at local tracks. Unsponsored racing classes are main sources of income for local races, and these racers are the vast majority in any sanctioning body. Drops in the number of new riders at the local level is a clear sign of trouble. It was necessary to generate and spread knowledge of BMX to the general public to draw more youngsters into the sport.

The idea of the Pro Spectacular was inspired from Motorcycle Motocross (MX) Supercross, where events were held in indoor arenas with tracks of greater difficulty to enthuse spectators. The intent was to turn BMX racing from an almost strictly participatory sport into one with great appeal to spectators.

The events were restricted to pros, eliminating the amateur and children classes, and invested heavily in television advertisements. Races were held on Friday nights and kept to two hours in length, which fit a television schedule and the attention span of an audience. The increased exposure of BMX was hoped to spark an upsurge of beginner classes at the local level. Greater revenue was obtained from entrance fees, making the ABA less dependent on participation on the local level.

The first ABA Pro Spectacular, a critical success, was launched in Reno, Nevada, on January 4, 1985. The efficient event was generally liked by pros and more than enough pros participated to make it interesting, $10,000 purses for each race were offered.[17]

The necessary spectator attendance was lackluster. Despite the relatively low admission fee of $5.00, the venues were either empty, or seating was well below capacity. At the first event held at the Lawlor Events Center of the University of Nevada in Reno, Nevada, only about 2,000 spectators were on hand in a facility that could seat 10,000.[18]

The Pro Spectators ended in 1985. While the Pro Spectaculars were a financial failure, they were a critical success in terms of the quality of races concerning both the courses and the top level pros attending.

• Those who signed up to race in the National the next day got a discount on the spectator's fee in the Pro Spectacular, so they may have not been there to support Pro Spectacular.
• Not enough people knew about the existence of BMX.
• Bicycle racing of any type was more common in Europe, where capacity crowds fill venues and racers are front-page news. The same was true for South America. As a comparison, the 1983 International Bicycle Motocross Federation (IBMXF) sanctioned World Championship held in Slagharen, the Netherlands drew 15-20,000 paying spectators and was televised live in Europe.[19]
• Despite the expensive 68 30-second TV advertisements shown on the-popular programs like Magnum, P.I., Dynasty and Good Morning America,[18] it was difficult to win over the public. The light attendance most likely did not justify the reputed $4000 in television advertising the ABA invested.
• The most successful of the Spectaculars (non-racer attendance) was the fifth round held in Phoenix, Arizona, on February 8, which drew 2,600 paying spectators. However, the cost of renting the arena and lack of entrance fees were financial expenses the ABA could not absorb.
• By the time of Land of Lincoln Pro Spectacular on April 28, the last in the series, they had dropped the TV advertisement campaign due to the only few dozen spectators on hand for the event at the Coliseum State Fair Grounds in Springfield, Illinois. To help reduce costs, the ABA ran a few selected Amateur open classes to offset, at least partially, the losses.

Those five former officers were Geoff Sims, Steve Schaefer, Dave Cook, Rich Mann, and Rod Keeling, the head of the new governing body that was the ABA company pilot who rose to the rank of Vice President of Marketing.[15] Previous to the piloting position with the ABA, he had no experience with BMX racing. Mr. Keeling had departed the ABA on March 2, 1984, and announced the creation of the new governing body on March 23, 1984. Some thought the creation of the USBA was timed to take advantage of the ABA's financial dire straits and to cause a stampede of ABA tracks to change affiliation to the new organization. Mennenga saw it as a personal betrayal to the point that he called a press conference to denounce them. He charged at that press conference that it was they who had given him bad advice to take a hard, uncompromising line against the track owners, the racers, and the BMX press. His basic charge was that their collective advice was deliberate sabotage to undermine the ABA so they could make this move to set up their own governing body and destroy the ABA.[20] This was a tactic not unknown to Mennenga. During a 1981 dispute with the promoters of the large-pursed ($10,000) Knott's Berry Farm race, the ABA bristled at being scheduled directly opposite, i.e. on the same Thanksgiving weekend as, their prestigious Grand National in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. That it was sanctioned by the NBL, being run under NBL rules and racers received national points at that race as they would at a national created directly by the NBL, exacerbated already raw feelings between the NBL and the ABA. The ABA felt it was a deliberate action to siphon off racers, particularly the pros from their season-ending Grand National. The hiring by the Knott's Berry promoter Thomas Henn of former NBA founder and President Ernie Alexander to run the race (he also designed the temporary track at Knott's) didn't help matters. Alexander had a reputation of deliberately scheduling NBA events against the events of other sanctioning bodies when he ran the NBA. Mennenga sent out press releases and faxes to the BMX press, track operators and bicycle manufactures allegedly hinting that they should boycott persons and organizations that participated in the Knott's Berry race.[21] The ABA allegedly had a boycott list that had many notables of the BMX industry on it, including promoter Renny Roker, which the ABA ordered tracks to boycott his upcoming Pro seven race series that would later come to be known as the ESPN Pro Spectacular. Several ABA tracks left the ABA and joined Roker to participate in his series which were to be NBL sanctioned.[21] With this siege mentality in his background it was easy for Mennenga to believe that USBA stole the valuable ABA membership records to proposition ABA racers to join the USBA. While the value of this list would be a motive to steal it, Mennenga provided no evidence.[17]

As then, in the USBA controversy, whatever Mennenga's intention, it came off as a desire to shift blame for his actions as well as being unlikely that this conspiracy could keep its cohesion for over two years. The ABA even went as far as to launch a lawsuit against the five founders of the USBA, and while dismissed by the court, the lawsuit drained the resources of the new competitor and engendered the atmosphere that followed. It would the actions of the new USBA leadership that would lend credence to Mennenga's charges.

The two-year war between the ABA and the USBA was perhaps the ugliest rivalry that BMX has ever saw. It seems the USBA was making most of the aggressive moves. The motivation for rivalries like this was the $2 million to $4 million in revenue yearly that BMX generated at the time. Compared to other older more established sports like baseball, European football (soccer), American football and auto racing, this was a pittance but still enough to generate bad promoters and political infighting between and within sanctioning bodies. Track operators had quite thin profit margins to work with, which perhaps made the back biting even worse since there was so little to go around. There was a slump in the BMX racing market as mentioned with the growth of Freestyle, the resurgence of skateboarding siphoning off young people and the insurance crises to drain resources further. Pretty desperate times for the organizers of BMX racing, and desperate times generate desperate acts, including actions straight out of Watergate.

Despite all the foul weather facing the ABA, Mennenga, who was said to be an eternal optimist, hung on. There was one instance that was probably responsible for him relinquishing his position and BMX, the sport he had helped nurture, all together. On January 27, 1985, at the GT Supernationals in Pico Rivera, California, a disgruntled woman hurled a cup of coffee into the face of Mennenga. In all his years involved in BMX he had never been attacked physically, but that was only the beginning of his humiliation. After ABA security had to physically remove the spectator from the facility, she filed a false police report that Mennenga assaulted her. The Pico Rivera police came down to the track and arrested Mennenga during the event. The true story eventually came up and the charges were dropped and Mennenga released, but very likely the experience forever soured him on the sport he once loved.[22]

On March 5, 1985, ABA founder and President Merl Mennenga with the loss of membership and tracks (in part because of rising insurance cost of liability), the ABA on the verge of bankruptcy and personal burnout and exhaustion-and possibly with the Pico Rivera incident on his mind, announced he had sold the ABA to Bernie Anderson and Jamie Vargas, two wealthy ABA track operators, for a reported $250,000 (paid out over several years[23]) and resigned as owner and President of the ABA. Vargas was a computer consultant from Louisiana who ran the first track in Louisiana. Anderson owned a magazine subscription sales service who founded Rebel Racing, a regional BMX bicycle firm he started in 1980 and sold in 1982. He at one time operated the first successful track in Texas. Both men had sons who raced at the time. The new owners installed Walt Ehnat, who had just previously been a partner with Gary Ellis Sr. in running four tracks in the Seattle, Washington area (including one in Tacoma, Washington) as the new president. They reversed some questionable programs like having three separate point seasons in a year (as opposed to having one continuous season for about a year) meaning a racer would race for the lowest number he could get not once (but three times). However, they decided to hold the remaining Pro Spectaculars despite the immediate financial gain it would cause by canceling them; the damage it would cause with their relations with the pros far out weighed in their view of any immediate financial benefit.[24] They tried to stave off bankruptcy by paying off other debts, although declaring bankruptcy would have also helped the ABA immediately. As canceling the remaining Pro Spectaculars would have been bad policy regarding the pros, the new management felt that declaring bankruptcy would have put out a false impression to track operators around the country that the USBA would exploit.[24] Despite all efforts and the Internal Revenue Service at the door and a reported liability to twenty creditors of $700,000[24] to $750,000.[23] Most of the financial hemorrhaging was inflicted by the losses over Bicycles and Dirt magazine. Anderson and Vargas filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on November 25, 1985.[24] Bankruptcy protection was not the end as many people think, it simply allowed a company to keep functioning while a disinterested third party, in this case the Federal courts, work out how it would pay its debts. As predicted, the USBA tried to take advantage of the situation, with some success, by playing on the fears of track operators. Some tracks worried about the solvency of the ABA changed their affiliation to the USBA. The USBA tried to fan a stampede by calling individual track operators and citing the precarious position of the ABA with the publicly published court papers outlining the debts incurred by the ABA under Merl Mennenga.[24] It attempted to generate among ABA track operators a sense of impending doom facing the ABA over its financial dire straits in order for them to change their affiliations to the point of harassment. The father of pro racer Gary Ellis, Gary Ellis Sr., who ran the ABA-affiliated River Valley BMX track in Sumner, Washington, was a prized target for conversion. Rod Keeling, the founder and President of the USBA, went so far as to have a face-to-face meeting with Ellis to convince him to jump ship. Such a defection of a high-profile track operator would have been a large propaganda feather in Keeling's cap. He was not successful, in large part according to Mr. Ellis. Keeling stressed the problems of the ABA, without stating how joining the USBA would be advantageous to Mr. Ellis and BMX as a whole. However, Gary Ellis Sr. was of the opinion that bankruptcy was good for the ABA since it removed most of the top management that got the ABA into dire straits in the first place:

"... We basically felt ... well, I basically felt the person that started the USBA was part of the bad managment [sic] of the ABA that put them towards bankruptcy in the first place. You can quote me on that."[25]

Many ABA track operators were of the same opinion. Also, since most track operators were businessmen themselves, they understood that the ABA filing for Chapter 11 protection wasn't the disastrous thing most laymen think it is. Many took it as a good thing since filing Chapter 11 would get rid of most of the executives who mismanaged the ABA in the first place, as was Gary Ellis Sr.'s opinion. They knew other companies in the industry that were in the same position as the ABA was but came out of it. The Van Doren Rubber Co., the maker of Vans tennis shoes that were then a favorite with BMX racers and freestylers and skateboarders alike, filed for bankruptcy a couple of years before and eventually came out of it solvent.[25] However, nearly 160 track operators did switch to the USBA, effectively splitting the world of BMX racing three ways.

By late 1985, Sims and Cook, both commercial pilots, had left the USBA for flying jobs. Keeling was forced out by a USBA major investor, Phoenix, Arizona, businessman Ira Hall, and replaced with a new management team, including Walt Ehnat, who was installed as president of the USBA after Keeling was removed. Ehnat was Keeling's Vice President at the USBA who had earlier replaced Merl Mennenga as President of the ABA. A few months later he was fired by the ABA's new management and had bitter feelings towards it.[25] The USBA, which was in worse financial shape than the ABA by that time, was growing desperate, which may have inspired an unethical and illegal act.

As noted, a few months after his appointment as ABA President Ehnat was fired by the ABA under bad circumstances and was replaced by the new ABA management by Clayton John, a former motorcycle racer and BMX track operator and who is still the current (2006) ABA President. Ehnat became Vice President of the USBA and became active in the campaign to shore up the image of the USBA which was beginning to take damaging hits in the BMX industry, including its dealings with disgraced BMX promoter Renny Roker. Bob Hadley*, team manager of the Huffy BMX team noticed at one time that Erhart was pretty prescient in questions he had with him even before he mentioned them. At the time only Clayton John was privy to the specific concerns in a letter Mr. Hadley had that he had shared only with Mr. John at the time. The timing of Ehnat responses and the fact that the USBA seemed to always be one step ahead of the ABA in court actions was so uncanny Mr. Hadley joked that someone must have bugged Mr. John's office.[25] Clayton John took the whimsical joke seriously and had ABA headquarters swept for bugs by experts in counter surveillance and corporate espionage. After the sweep, two experts, one a former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) agent and the other a former Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agent found evidence of tampering in one of the telephone trunk lines leading to Mr. John's office. The lines were stripped in a way that it was evidence that a telephone tap was in place at some time.[26] No conclusive proof, only circumstantial evidence has suggested that the USBA was responsible. Another suspect, the IRS could have done it given the pressure they put the ABA under, including showing up during ABA nationals but aside from it being illegal without a court order, the IRS had perfectly legal ways available to them to get once sensitive information about the ABA, including financial assets. Most of it was public record, particularly court proceedings. The IRS had no real motive to go through the unnecessary risk of wire-tapping the ABA offices.[27]

By early 1986 while the ABA was slowly getting back on its feet financially the USBA was starting to sink under the financial weight of poorly attended nationals and the loss of the core of their original management. Still, Mr. Hall approached the ABA with a plan to buy the ABA from the new owners Anderson and Vargas. This was quite strange since as mentioned the USBA was in worse shape financially than the ABA. On several occasions Mr. Hall approached Mr. Vargas and Mr. Anderson with buyout proposals. The talks came to naught.[28]

There was a rumor of one final act to survive conducted by the USBA. The idea to turn Merl Mennenga, the founder of the ABA to somehow force Mr. Anderson and Mr. Vargas to sell back the ABA and then to sell the ABA to the USBA which would then close down the ABA under the Chapter VII bankruptcy law with the USBA inheriting the tracks ABA's then current leadership. If true, perhaps they were thinking about the precedent of Walt Ehnart, the former President of the ABA and by then the Vice President of the USBA that they could have turned Mennenga. However unlikely it would have been, nothing came of it.[26]

Instead it was the USBA that ended up being bought out by the ABA. A few months later Messrs. Vargas and Anderson bought a majority share of the USBA from Ira Hall, becoming its two principal stockholders in 1986. About 24 hours later Ehnat was fired and replaced by ABA President Clayton John, placing him at the head of two sanctioning bodies simultaneously. Until the end of 1986 the USBA remained a separate body. The final merger of it to the ABA was in early 1987. The result was the ABA re-reacquiring most of its old tracks and some brand new ones—160 in total—and the USBA's membership. Later Mr. Vargas would sell his interest leaving Mr. Anderson the largest share holder.[29]

After 22 months in bankruptcy protection On September 24, 1987, the United States Federal Bankruptcy Court approved the ABA's plan for financial reorganization and removed it from Chapter 11[30] as well it should have been since it promised exorbitant gifts to the various national number ones that year, including the amateurs. For instance, the eventual amateur No.1 Mike King received a $14,500 Glastron boat and a Honda Reflex motorcycle valued at $1,600 for a total value of $16,100. To reiterate, the top amateur received the boat, not the professional number one. That winner got the "standard" automobile. The Pro number one for that year, Charles Townsend, received $1,600 in cash, a GMC Chevy S-10 pick up truck valued at $10,500 and a Honda XR250R Honda motorcycle valued at $3,500. Total value of $15,600. You had the odd situation of the amateur winning prizes of greater value collectively than the professional by a $500 margin.[31] The amateur girls class champion Nikki Murray (unlike the NBL at this time, the ABA did not have a professional women's division) and the Pro Cruiser number one Eric Rupe also received Honda Reflex motorcycles.

If there was ever a sign of health of the ABA (and BMX in general) it was the 1988 Grand National in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. It was then the largest BMX race in history at 470 motos. This was by 27 motos larger than the previous record holder, the 1982 ABA Grand National (the 1989 ABA Grand National would be 467 motos, knocking '82 back to third).[32] This was in the teeth of a general two year sag in ridership on the racing side of the industry and in the face of the popularity of BMX Freestyle, skateboarding and the rise of Mountain Biking.

Though all this it still remained the larger of the two major bodies. The ABA has demonstrated over the years the desire to become even larger. In a plan to diversify and not rely on its BMX income totally for its survival, the ABA purchased the National Off Road Bicycle Association (NORBA) in the summer of 1986 (The ABA later sold NORBA to the United States Cycling Federation (USCF) in 1989). It also acquired from Hutch Hi-Performance Products, a respected BMX bicycle manufacturer, the National Freestyle Association (NFA) a BMX Freestyle sanctioning body. Hutch had recently reacquired the body back from the USBA which it had sold it to a few months prior. Hutch, which had started the NFA in the first place, sold it to the USBA because competing manufacturers were reluctant to send their freestyle teams to a sanctioning body run by a competitor, therefore helping him financially. The USBA, suffering its own financial dire straits, sold it back to Hutch who in turn sold it to the ABA.

In 2002, the ABA attempted to purchase the NBL from USA Cycling after it was approached by officers of USA Cycling to sell the NBL[33] but was turned down by the USA Cycling board.[34]