BOOM BOOM HUCKJAM Jumps, bumps and bruises -- it's a wild ride

The tour makes a stop at Gund Arena in Cleveland on Thursday.
By JOE SCALZO
VINDICATOR SPORTS STAFF
At the moment, Mat Hoffman has two bruised heels, a broken rib and a broken tailbone.
Is that all?
"Yeah, that's all," he said.
He's not worried about it. Hoffman stopped counting broken bones when he got to 50. He just had his 15th operation. He lives on a steady diet of ice, Advil and doctors.
"But I'm still going strong," he said. "I've got great doctors."
Hoffman, 32, has spent most of his last 20 years on a BMX bike, watching his sport -- and sports like it -- grow from a fringe activity into a mainstream cultural phenomenon.
He grew up in Oklahoma (of all places), befriended skateboarding legend Tony Hawk, traveled the country, performed stunts in movies, got his own video game ("Mat Hoffman's Pro BMX" -- On sale now!) and lives comfortably as an international action sports star who just so happens to batter his body for a living.
And he's coming to Cleveland.
Hoffman, along with action sport stars like Dave Mirra, Bucky Lasek and Andy McDonald, will showcase their talents at Hawk's Boom Boom HuckJam at Gund Arena on Thursday.
"We're all great friends and we've been doing this for 20 years," Hoffman said in a phone interview from California on Wednesday. "We've dedicated our lives to the progress of the sport, and it's become so accepted now that we can fill stadiums with these types of events.
The tour
"So we took to the road and we'll spend the next few months traveling across the country. It's pretty intense."
The Boom Boom HuckJam -- "The name takes a little poetic license with what we do," Hoffman said -- features skateboarding, BMX and Moto X freestyle riding.
The tour started Oct. 2 in Vancouver and will end (31 tour dates later) in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., on Nov. 16.
Last year's tour -- the first ever -- packed major venues across the country, and Hoffman said this year's event is even better.
"It's improved 10-fold," he said. "And last year's event blew everyone away."
Unlike the X-Games or the Gravity Games, the Boom Boom HuckJam is not a competition. It's more of freestyle exhibition.
"It gives you a different perspective because the stuff we do in our sport doesn't always exist in competition," Hoffman said. "We don't worry about choreographed programs or scores, we just express ourselves.
"We just let go. It's pretty wild."
It's also pretty expensive.
Cost
Tickets range in price from $25 to $75, which helps cover the cost of assembling a multi-million dollar skate ramp with a motocross track on the outside in a new venue four or five times a week.
"It'd be nice to charge $5 a ticket, but we just can't," Hoffman said. "It takes over 15 buses to transport the equipment, and when you take the tour from place to place every night, it costs a lot of money."
In addition to the exhibitions, you can also get free stuff at the sponsor tents and check out some of the bands who travel with the tour.
Hoffman isn't sure how much longer he'll be able to compete -- the years of injuries have started to take a toll -- but he isn't worried about it. He's just going to enjoy it while it lasts.
"I know a lot of people who live their life with regrets, and I don't have any," he said. "I've been doing this my whole life. I just love these kind of sports.
"I've had so many injuries, but I keep coming back. I owe my career to medical science. We'll just see how far I can go."
scalzo@vindy.com