Following the same worn path everyday to your mundane job sucks. Growing up, if you listen to the powers that be, you will find yourself moping down that same path -- day in, and day out. Steve and Mat prove you can follow your own path, and actually become the powers that be.

Do you guys ever come up with a big crazy plan, get it down on paper, and not do it?.
Mat: We have a ton of crazy plans that we have in our heads, that we haven't done and are kind of like ... uh, yeah, we end up doing it.

Steve: Our worst enemy right now is time. We are just booked most weekends. We have so many great people working for us, but they can only do so much without killing themselves. Time is our biggest enemy for sure.

I'm sure it was, even before this year, why did you add the CFB Series?
Mat: We wanted to organize something that was start to finish by bikers, so that we could interpret everything how we see it so it could be kind of the purest interpretation of our scene, from the event to television.

Steve was saying, hey we need to start doing amateurs, and we need a way, since the pro class is growing, to find a way to qualify pros into the BS Series. Steve proposed the idea of the CFB Series, and I had been wanting to do the television, and really show our perspective. I've always been into that with the Kids in the Way series and stuff like that. I thought it was a great idea, and I was like let's go for it. I already had such a full plate, so then Steve just kind of manifested it into what you see today. And now it's been three contests, and we're all ready to go home and go to sleep.

Steve: We really wanted to do something more similar to the old BS contests, too. But it was the whole thing where you can't pay for something without TV now. And as much as print media helps, that's awesome, it helps a ton, but TV has got to be there for big sponsors to pay stuff. And it is really expensive to run one of these events.

Mat: It's total timing, too. We wanted to do this series on our own. One, we needed the sponsors, because we didn't want to do a contest right where we left off with the old BS Series, but to do it where the bar has been risen through the ESPN B3 Series. It took a while to get sponsors to understand the idea. And it also took a while for us to develop the media side of Hoffman Bikes so that we wouldn't create this awesome mood that everybody's into, that the CFB Series is known for, and then have it covered like a traditional competition. We wanted to develop our company so that we could encompass everything that it was about, and represent it on all the different levels.

Mat walked away with first place in pro vert at the CFB finals.

The contest isn't structured around the TV; the TV is structured around the contest.
Steve: It's still head to toe just run by bike riders, from almost two years ago since we started planning it, from venue selection to organizing with the venue to the execution of the event, then the filming is all done by bike riders, and the editing. So, head to toe, it's all done by bike riders.

Is it gratifying to see that amateurs, after so many years of not being able to compete, and really the average kid has no chance of ever making it into the B3, are able to be involved in this?
Mat: I always remember going from the home made BMX Action quarter pipes to the AFA eight-foot quarter pipes that were just huge and all of the knots in my stomach. And seeing other riders ride and knowing that there's a whole scene out there, and all of the possibilities. It broadened my mind that the sport?you can just do so many things with it. And here I am today, but if there wasn't that local place to go and to see that, who knows where I would've gone? I see that in all the Soon to Be's, and a lot of the Stuntboy's eyes. And that's super gratifying - it's a definite recruiting system for something that we believe in so much that we've completely devoted our lives to it.

Steve: So many of the top pros today's started in the amateur BS Series way before ESPN, even like Joe Rich, and Taj. There's a million guys that are pros now that started in the amateur BS Series. I was still an am when we started the BS Series- - the first year I rode as an amateur.

Has this year reached all of your expectation?
Mat: We just started by going, ok, this is something that needed to be done. Basically, the BS Series in the old days was a place where we set a stage for riders to come and celebrate their skills with people who have the same devotion to their bike riding. With the ESPN stuff it's a different vibe, and it's made for a different person, and a different audience, and not so much for the bikers. So I think a lot of that community was starting to break up a little bit.

Do you think there was a gap widening between the TV superstars and the kids that just ride?.
Mat: I think for my own motivation, just to have different people that share the same ideas, and to have some new blood, and keep progressing things. But overall, we just need a place to come where we can hang out amongst our own, you know, people that are into the same thing we are, and just feel like a tight group of elite athletes.

It's not like I can go to my local school and have a bunch of athletes like myself to hang out with, and go ride bikes with. This stuff is really important, I think, for all the different riders to come gather and have a place to bond, and ride together. The B3 Series, because ESPN is so structured, you can't really do that because of the legalities or the insurance. I think that's the most important part of what we were trying to accomplish -- creating a venue, not even really a competition, but a venue where a bunch of people can gather, ride as hard as they can, and jam, and just be a bike rider. A gathering where you could be a bike rider and push each other, and get all psyched, and go home, and just want to ride their bike because they got so amped by seeing all their friends and riding together.

What's the hardest thing about your job, and what you lay on the line so all of these other people can enjoy these events?
Steve: For me it's time, and not just me, our whole crew. Up to today I haven't had a day off in five weeks, and it's 12, 15, 16 hours a day. Not just with this, but with all of the stuff combined, it's all of the events we do. There's so many hours of planning that goes into just the CFB - I've been working on Woodward for a year. It's all satisfying, I'm not at all in the slightest complaining, but that's always an issue. Getting a venue to handle this whole thing is really difficult. The thing that is the hardest, and the thing we all work at the hardest, is judging. It's real difficult, and it's always going to be opinion, and it's difficult to get good judges. Those are the three hardest things for me job wise, but mentally, when everybody leaves happy, it's totally worth it.

Mat: I see it in all of the guys that work with us. We've got about fifteen people that have completely dedicated their lives to better the experience of the bikers that come to these events.

Steve: A lot of the riders don't know them personally, but they are all riders themselves, and they've been working with us a long time, and they put in so many hours it's ridiculous, just to get it done. They deal with complaints - I mean there's a million riders that yell at us each day, just for whatever reason. So there's a million things that they put up with just because they're dedicated to it, and they love the sport, too. They put in millions of hours - it's not thankless, but they put in tons of time.

Mat: It takes all of that in order to be able to do a series, and do it exactly how you envisioned it to be done. We couldn't do just a part of the series, and leave it up to someone else's vision for the rest of it. We had to do everything, and now, because we've done that with the CFB, we can exactly set the mood, and we can change with the times. And we can cater to ourselves, who are bike riders, which ultimately has proven a success in anything we do.

Steve: Mat and I, when we've let things get out of our control they seem to get changed, and they're not as much fun. We really do believe in controlling our own destiny, and that not only includes a rider's perspective, or companies, but as a sport all together. We mean us controlling our destiny, not as in Mat or I, but the riders. We really believe in that, and I think ESPN's been a really big help, and it's helping us maintain that, too. Despite some of the complaints about the ESPN Series - they stepped up as a partner in this also.

Mat: I think this has tons of momentum going into the new year, and every bit of sponsorship we can sell through this is going right back into it.

Steve: We definitely want to raise the pro purse, medical is a giant issue - medical is very expensive to pay for.

Mat: There are a lot of things we wanted to do better. We just didn't have the money. And I think with the track record of these events, and with everybody so excited about them, hopefully we can get the right amount of sponsors to step it up and make it the ultimate experience for a biker to come and gather, and do what they do. And that's what our ultimate goal is.

Steve: I'd also like to say thanks to all of the riders for supporting this whole season, too. Even to get it on TV we kind of have to say pros are gonna show up, and it will be a good event, and that happened. So that's a big help. Mat and I have been talking about getting something going in Oklahoma City, again. So we might resurrect, and build a new Hoffman Sports Park in OKC. We're talking about it anyway, but that's another giant project on our plate.

Does it ever end?
Mat: This is like what you asked in the very first question. Do you guys ever have things in your mind that you don't do - we have books of things.