It was a slight miscalculation in speed

http://www.pinkbike.com/news/red-bull-rampage-2014-mcgarrys-crash.html

Holy shit!

how the hell did he walk away from that!?

PB image

You know it’s a bad crash when both wheels are pringled – that’s a 10/10 crash!!

Needs to go a bit slower. Schoolboy error.

He panic braked on landing, he needs to get over to Jedi to get that sorted.

Roll on Rampage, bonkers. I’m scared to even watch the high ridgeline traverses never mind the jumps

Love that

a slight miscalculation of speed

🙂

There must be something in the Kiwi water. That’s a hell of a hit to walk away from.

I blame the stupid hair cut. If he had a nice short back and sides he may have been able to see where he was going…

Whaaaaaaa…!

Mental.

Glad he came away relatively,unscathed

Looks like the front wheel folded on impact.

Wheyyy!!

Weirdly, If I visualise myself attempting a 75ft gap jump, that’s exactly what I think it would look like 😉

Looks like the front wheel folded on impact.

I’m not bloody surprised! He hit a 75ft gap to flat (or pretty close to).
Nails.

Weirdly, If I visualise myself attempting a 75ft gap jump, that’s exactly what I think it would look like

I don’t give myself even that much credit. Would not have made the gap.

He’s a loon and a half alright… The other diamond back rider wrecked a wheel on the go pro step down.

He panic braked on landing, he needs to get over to Jedi to get that sorted.

Nah, just folds the wheels on landing, someone posted a slow-mo link on that Pinkbike thread and you can see that he still upright in a good position at the point the front wheel folds.

The other diamond back rider wrecked a wheel on the go pro step down.

Interesting. I wonder what wheels they are running? Seems like they’d be smart to borrow a set off Gwin.

Looks like the front wheel folded on impact.

Thanks I couldn’t quite make out where abouts the front wheel folded in that video.

Nah, just folds the wheels on landing, someone posted a slow-mo link on that Pinkbike thread and you can see that he still upright in a good position at the point the front wheel folds.

I wonder if smaller wheels would have been stronger ?

That’ll buff out etc etc

Thing is, after some of the cases I’ve seen in practice, I would be terrified of getting back on the same bike.

I would pretty much want a brand new frame, fork, bars and crankset. The thought of going back out on a bike that has taken such a hard landing and then hitting a 40ft drop makes me shudder.

We’ve all seen instantaneous headtube disengagements on relatively innocuous jumps and they look sore as. Imagine what it would be like at Rampage!

I don’t give myself even that much credit. Would not have made the gap.

+1, forking mental.

just noticed those are Atomlab DHR rims….i’ve been running a pair of those for the last 9 years…now i know what i must do to kill them!! 😛

I don’t give myself even that much credit. Would not have made the gap.

I’d rather overshoot that canyon than go too slow…….

I don’t give myself even that much credit. Would not have made the gap.

Jumping over gaps that size is easy! It’s all just down to speed, if you hit it fast enough you’ll clear the gap.

Landing, on the other hand. F’ing terrifying.

just noticed those are Atomlab DHR rims….i’ve been running a pair of those for the last 9 years…now i know what i must do to kill them!!

I expect he’s got the newer, lighter version.

@lemonysam, LOL, that’s the exact image I had in my head. If I had any internet skillzzs I’d have put that up.

just noticed those are Atomlab DHR rims….i’ve been running a pair of those for the last 9 years…now i know what i must do to kill them!!

I expect he’s got the newer, lighter version.

he should have borrowed mine then…he would have survived as he wouldn’t have been able to go that fast on the heavier rims!!

It’s not exactly a massive overshoot either – wouldn’t have needed to be all that much slower to do what all us lot would have done as demonstrated by Wile E.

I can’t believe he rolled/tumbled out of that ok! If his wheels hadn’t pringled I think he’d have landed it fine – it looks like the front buckled and then jammed in the fork. Mentalist!

Impressive. And scary.

Having nearly killed myself on a piddling nine foot tabletop, I’m always amazed by how good these guys are at crashing, never mind the stuff they land. They smash themselves into the floor from twenty, thirty feet up in the air at twenty, thirty miles an hour, and then walk off throwing gang signs. I think it was Cam Zink who landed the massive canyon gap the other year on his feet without breaking anything. Tough as old Nokias.

Jumping over gaps that size is easy! It’s all just down to speed, if you hit it fast enough you’ll clear the gap.

So how do they know what the magic speed is, without first having come up short or overshot, both of which can be pretty serious? Is there some Wizard behind a curtain working out all the angles of the take off ramp, approach, landing, gap etc and calculating where they need to set off from to not die??

So how do they know what the magic speed is,

Practise and judgement pure and simple, much like you couldn’t explain how you aim when you throw something or a pro golfer couldn’t tell you how they judge how hard to hit the ball.
It’s not pure ballistics anyway, there’s a range of approach speeds that will get you over depending on whether the rider works the take-off as hard as possible or squashes it. Most folk will go for a bit fast the first time when the consequences of coming up short are so high and as they actually get to the ramp they will rely on gut feel to know how much to pull or squash it. In this case I guess he either misjudged the kick from the take-off or was simply going so much too fast that even squashing it left him way, way overshot for the landing.

So how do they know what the magic speed is

A little thing called physics.

So how do they know what the magic speed is, without first having come up short or overshot, both of which can be pretty serious?

Yep, that’s the trick.

Jedi taught me to clear his 6ft tabletop but it was in a very controlled way, gradually building up speed from further and further up the hill. Great for technique but the gut instinct that tells you what speed you need / what level of push you need solely from looking at it only comes with experience.

And 75 feet over a canyon is a tough mistress to miscalculate on.

Find me a Red Bull Rampage rider who actual calculates how fast to go using “a little thing called physics” and I’ll show you a major MTB brand investing in 26ers.

…comes with experience…

Which makes Rampage all the more impressive, since I assume few have experience of such huge terrain.

A little thing called physics.

Find me a Red Bull Rampage rider who actual calculates how fast to go using “a little thing called physics” and I’ll show you a major MTB brand investing in 26ers.

Heh. Actually I love the idea of Kelly McGarry and co. sitting down with protractors and calculators and working out the correct velocity for the parabola needed to ensure landing in the right spot.

“Dude! Totally gnarly calculus there man!”

“And next up, Bandon Semenuk will be sure to throw down some sick differential equations.”

You could avoid all this messy digging and whatnot, not to mention the risk of death and injury, and just get each rider to hand in a detailed breakdown of their proposed runs in equation form, it’d be awesome! 😉

Any decent wheelbuilder should be able to bring those back into true.