Podcast – Todd Huffman

This week Dr. J and I head up to the Fox Theatre in Fullerton to sit down and do a Podcast with Mr. Todd Huffman. We go in depth from the mid 70s of Todd discovering BMX, racing locally in Northern California, traveling and racing, getting on SE turning Pro, working for Scot Breithaupt, moving to SoCal and driving across the country on the famous SE Bus and the Murray World Cup. Todd talks being roommates with Steve Giberson (VitalMX), placing second behind Crazy Ronnie Anderson in B Pro at Magic Mountain, Quitting SE and a big fight with Scot, starting up MOR Distribution with Bob Morales at the Torker Auction, judging AFA contests and later creating Auburn. We then talk about GT absorbing MOR/Auburn and Todd going to work for Richard Long/GT with the job from events, sponsorships, TV, traveling and being part of the GT juggernaut in the 90s - which started at $36 million in sales when he joined to over $220 million in sales and was a publicly traded company with a marketing budget of $7 million with 70+ people on the payroll with team riders and promotions. Todd talks about things going sideways with Chris Moeller, the S&M vs. The Firm drama, GT's involvement with the 96 Olympics and contract negotiations with Gary Ellis, Danny Nelson, Charles Townsend and so on over the years. We talk in depth about Rich Long and the passion he had for GT and racing and how things changed after Rich passed in 96 and the mark he left in the bicycle industry. We talk when Todd left GT becoming an agent for Brian Lopes and Hans Ray, the development of Invert Events, its potential before the Metal Mulisha, the Troy Mcmurray brawl that shut down the Irvine event and the end of Invert. Todd shares about starting Digital Media with Don Hoffman, Surge TV, Pump TV, MX-Files right up to current times working on the Jag BMX Film, the Richard Long book and its expected release and his thoughts on BMX today and some potential cool things in the pipeline with streaming and BMX content and media moving forward and so much more. Enjoy. It's a good one.