BMX champ of the 80's, presenter of BMX beat. He was a hero of mine when I was ten. Ended up talking about him at work, cos I wrote to jim'll-fix-it to get BMX lessons from him.

Anyway, googled him, and turns out that far from fading into obscurity, he went on make documentaries, co-founded the MOBO awards and now runs an events company out of Miami that does big televised music events and awards.

That's mental. Did any-one else know that? Does anyone else remember him? Does anyone else care?

And no, I didn't get on to JFI.

I saw him do a demo when I was kid. I was very impressed. 😀

Yes I knew that, hes fat now iirc. I have his autograph somewhere. And Bob Haro's. And Harry Leary's, Stu Thomson, Eric Rupe, Mike Dominguez, Eddie Fiola, Tim March etc.

we made up a song called ruffles style,an was sung if sum1 did a rad trick

I wanted an Andy Ruffel Raleigh Burner replica when i was about 13, they go for silly money on ebay now 🙄

Yep, knew all that.
He also has a pretty good old school BMX page on Youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/user/Andyruffell#p/u

And I believe he also invented the raspberry ruffel, a quality sweet if there ever was one.

One of my childhood heroes. I met him once at a BMX racing national in the mid-80s and was a bit starstruck to say the least. In my defence I was only 11. Good to see he's made a success of himself. Wonder if he can still do those 30ft quarter pipe jumps?

I remember him failing spectacularly on Superstars 😛
Was always more of a Tim March fan myself, seemed less squeaky clean.

indeed Mental..didnt know that, more here

Trivia- Andy snapped a pedal axle off the start gate on TV during the Kellogs series, after giving a how-to about bike maintenace.

There's a big Andy Ruffell interview in the current issue of Fast Lane BMX mag. You can google Fast Lane and buy the mag online. Well worth a read.

edit: sorry, I was being lazy: http://www.fastlanebmxmag.com

Was it his brother who came along later with the specs? Neil Ruffell? He was ace!

Yes, Neil Ruffell was Andy's bro. What a rider Neil was!

Sadly, Neil passed away a few years ago. RIP.

mike,is there a bit about the clydebank bmx racing up here in scotland in the latest issue?