I was approached by Mike Fordham, an editor I've been lucky enough to work with for the last few years, who is editing a magazine for Size?. Spaces In-Between magazine is free, and can be found in the sports shoe/sportswear shop in the UK that takes a sideways look at different sub-cultures. Mike has known about the UK dirt track scene for years (he made the video for Bikesure, featuring Leah Tokelove, below) and wanted a feature on the cross-section of people who race with the Dirt Track Riders Association.
Photographer Benedict Redgrove shot and manipulated wonderful images of some of the riders at Round 1, Rye House and I wrote the story for a non-specialist audience. You want a taste? Oh, go on then...
'This pick ‘n’ mix of amateur racers, listening to the final instructions, remind me of the deck of a deep sea trawler that’s just filled with the wriggling mass from a spilt net for closer inspection. There are the sleek tasty morsels that look like something you’d see on an advert or a tin, but there are the misshapen lurkers with eyes in the wrong places, the odd deep sea monster and something that’s just tentacles and head. Yet they are all, to a man, woman, girl and boy, motorcycle racers. Even the ones that would get thrown back over board.'
To find a copy, check the Size? store locator for your nearest shop.