How we worked with UCI to turn BMX Freestyle into one of the fastest-growing youth-driven digital sports ahead of Paris 2024.
The challenge
BMX Freestyle isn’t just a sport – it’s a cultural code. But in the run-up to Paris 2024, UCI needed help positioning itself as something more than a governing body.
It also wanted to become a legitimate, credible voice in a space shaped by riders, not rules. To earn trust in a culture where authenticity is everything – and engagement must be earned, not assumed.
The goal
To make UCI the leading expert voice in BMX Freestyle on social – and use that to drive fan growth, media value and future participation.
Our approach
We built a strategy rooted in rider-first storytelling and cultural fluency. Two core pillars shaped this approach:
1. collaboration with riders to elevate their voices, grow their platforms and showcase personality alongside performance
2. leverage of UCI’s Olympic platform to build a narrative arc from qualifier events to Paris 2024 by turning sporting moments into cultural milestones
Execution included:
- content audit of top-performing BMX/competitor platforms
- strategic audience segmentation into three key BMX fan profiles
- creative frameworks for social content that matched the tone, pace and visual language of the BMX community
- ongoing real-time strategy, content production and platform optimisation
Rather than a media push, this was a legitimacy play – showing up in the right way, with the right people, in the right voice.
The impact
- a fast-growing global BMX Freestyle community across core Olympic markets, including the US, the UK, France, Brazil and Colombia
- swifter audience growth and higher engagement than all major competitors on UCI BMX Freestyle channels
- creation of commercial momentum and a scalable social footprint to support new sponsors and formats
This once fringe discipline is now a culturally credible and commercially valuable part of the Olympic movement.
