Squeaky Bum Time – Rampage 2023!

It’s crept up quick, but this Friday (yes, the 13th!) is once again Rampage time!

I must admit I was maybe getting a bit blasé / numb to the ever larger sculpted slope-style features and games-console tricks.. but this year seems to be bringing back the gnar with some pucker-inducing exposure! Brendan and Gee are both making a return so looking forward to seeing some full-gas descents.

Excellent. Love the Rampage. Hope the Red Bull app still works on me telly!

Some of those features are 😵 couldn’t even stand up there, let alone ride a bike along and off….

Some of those features are 😵 couldn’t even stand up there, let alone ride a bike along and off….

I could stand there, but I’d have to be roped in with a harness.

I watched one of Brendan’s dig videos last night.

Looked bloody terrifying.

i am very much looking forward to it!

Lets hope the wind doesnt stop play on the day.

That feature in the thumbnail of Brendogs video is the first thing that’s actually made me scared for the riders, dunno why really – just looks like there’s no margin for error at all.

it’s just incomprehensible how they do it… i struggle to work any of it out honestly.

Again I am reminded of two things:

– The photos are better than video.
– I feel increasingly uncomfortable with the risks being taken in the name of entertainment.

That line off the start line and onto the top of that…bluff?… Is just ridiculous.

I do so hope nobody messes it up 😳

Best bit of the whole event for me is Brendog, Deaks and Ollies videos.

Great to see Gee back on it too. Looks like he’s going to make a point of it 😳😳😳

That ridgeline gap right up the top is more full of nope than pretty much any feature I’ve ever seen…

Lets hope the wind doesnt stop play on the day.

A hell of a lot of digging and crushing and scraping goes into it (ie hard work!) – must be so gutting for them all if it gets cancelled due to wind.

– I feel increasingly uncomfortable with the risks being taken in the name of entertainment.

Yeah, I’m in awe of the skills, but it’s not something I could watch live. Even the diggers seem to be taking some serious risks with the situations they’re working in. I guess I’m maybe not the target audience!

Cam Zink digging in his flip flops exemplary of the risks they take 😬

https://www.pinkbike.com/news/video-matt-jones-checks-out-the-huge-lines-at-red-bull-rampage-2023.html

just insane… quite insane.

just insane… quite insane.

I know – who in their right mind would post the same video twice in a thread!? 😜

Some of those features are f***ing mental!

Massively high consequences if you get those wrong.

I felt light headed just watching Matt stand on them!

Not sure I’m going to watch it this year…….

Yeah, I’m in awe of the skills, but it’s not something I could watch live. Even the diggers seem to be taking some serious risks with the situations they’re working in. I guess I’m maybe not the target audience!

Indeed.

Matt Jones is just the perfect guy for this sort of video- right sort of voice, and exactly the right skillset and experience to be able to say “that’s horrendous” with authority 🙂

The older Brendog gets the more he turns into Fruitbat from Carter USM

I feel really conflicted about whether the riders should be encouraged to take such a mental set of risks.

Matt Jones again, but not the same video.

You’ve just got to laugh at the absolute insanity of it.

Matt: “The thing is with a canyon, being 2% short is the same as being a 100% short”
Brendog: “Yeah…. Woah””

They are all mental. Brave and skillful, absolutely yes, but not right in the head. This stuff is up there with BASE jumpers and wingsuits. Top of the nutter tree.

I feel really conflicted about whether the riders should be encouraged to take such a mental set of risks.

I know exactly what you mean, its undeniably thrilling, but the whole time you are watching it you’re hoping no one dies.

As a spectacle in mountain biking its unsurpassed, i just hope the cost isn’t too high.

A hell of a lot of digging and crushing and scraping goes into it (ie hard work!)

Yeah, watching Brendan and co smashing the roll in to that rock chute was an eye-opener.

cubist
Free Member

I feel really conflicted about whether the riders should be encouraged to take such a mental set of risks.

Me too, but… Well, I think I’m right that it’s no longer points scoring for the tour, and is back to being a standalone? Which if so is good, reduces pressure to enter, it was a really bad idea. And the sheer madness of it means there’s just not many people who can even consider it, being invitational takes away a lot of the risk there too. Like, first you have to be one of the best mountain bikers to have ever lived, and then you also need other people to agree with you, and these days you pretty much have to surround yourself with supporters/strong opinions too ie people who will tell you no.

Everyone up there is qualified to make those calls, is the main thing, and none of them’s daft. And seeing stuff like the wind cancellations, where you get to see in real time the competitors judging the risks and rewards and seeing how that works out (and how much the organisers are driven by the riders for stuff like that) is a good thing too I reckon. That people still walk away after all the buildup says a lot.

If they would just do more to look after the riders, that’s the change I’d like to see.

But yeah if nothing else does feel like sooner or later a tired dried-out builder’s going to step off a cliff.

Like with Hardline I think sponsors are realising now that they get more visibility from the build up than they do from the event itself. I’ve enjoyed watching the build stuff on YT from Brendan / Ollie / Ben

Brendans gap – if you know the gap is physically doable then the drop is an insignificance. However it’s when you look at his line in , there is no where to stop/ pull out.

If Gee falls all that metal in him will smash what remains of his bones, but I’m sure his surgeons have told him that

Worries me that both Gee and Brendan are trying to prove/win something as they get older

That ridge gap at the top is nuts with lots of exposure 

But they all love it and I can see why they do.

i still don’t like the fact that it’s going to a natural hill side and smashing it to pieces to make nice smooth mtb trails, but I guess I’m old fashioned as the whole mtb world these days is about building man made stuff 

Yeah 👆 I can’t actually believe they’re allowed to chip out rock and generally change the landscape.
I suppose there’s quite a lot of it to go around, but still.

Agree with the proving themselves thing above. I think Bren said he wasn’t going back after his last time, but he obviously gets a lot out of it and so made the return.
I imagine that was difficult to broach with his family.

Ok, NOBODY fall off please 🙏😐

For years all the comments on forums/PB etc have been

“oh it’s too easy now, they’ve turned it into a Slopestyle event”..

2023 “it’s insane, they’re all gonna diiiiiiiie”

Whilst yes it LOOKS insane, you have to remember, it’s all just psychological. They’re 100% used to landing zones being minimal, they’re hitting gaps, jumps where they have to land in a 2′ square, they make it, time and time again, landing inbetween 2 rocks…
It’s ‘normal’ to be so precise to them…

Yes, the risk/reward is insanely different, but the fact is, this is kinda/sorta/hopefully OK for them….

Yes, the risk/reward is insanely different, but the fact is, this is kinda/sorta/hopefully OK for them….

As I said on the other thread, I for one am increasingly uncomfortable with the risks being taken for entertainment. I guess I watch DH and enduro all the time where there are injuries, but for some reason this feels a step up in the consequences game….

Watched that Matt Jones video last night, you get some idea of how big and STEEP the lines are, but in the flesh, oh man. Brendog was so nonchalant about it all!

They’re 100% used to landing zones being minimal, they’re hitting gaps, jumps where they have to land in a 2′ square, they make it, time and time again, landing inbetween 2 rocks…

This is a fair point but they also don’t always make it, see Gee’s recentish massive injuries. That said, I think even if there wasn’t the media coverage (or at least as much) or any prize money, given the opportunity a lot of these guys would probably do it anyway.

Not sure about the environmental impact though with smashing the rock faces and smoothing off pinnacles etc.

Presumably they (Red Bull) have permissions from the relevant state authorities etc.?

Oh and they’re all MAD!!!

Not sure about the environmental impact though with smashing the rock faces and smoothing off pinnacles etc.

With the amount of devastation on this planet in the name of many other things, 30 blokes with a few shovels for 3 weeks a year surely is completely insignificant. They’ve probably shifted less dirt than a big digger can do in a day.

We went to the area last year. Its vast and mostly empty. There is a relatively small touristy area in the park that sees around 5,000,000 visitors a year and has roads, walkways, lodges, etc. They were tarmaccing the car park while we were there. I’m not going to worry about a few sandbags. The rest of the park is way harder to get around and barely visited. Apparently they also average 1 landslide a day so its always changing even without Ollie digging away.

Apart from where they are removing rock (and even then it’s not really a significant impact on what looks such an eroded landscape anyway) most of the changes they make seem to be ultimately reversible and/or erodable?

Guiltily, we probably have more environmental impact digging a few trails in the local woods…

Not sure about the environmental impact though with smashing the rock faces and smoothing off pinnacles etc.

But unfortunately that is what 99% of mountain biking has become today. Find some nice countryside and rip it apart. Just look at any trail centre/bike park/ DH race etc

The older Brendog gets the more he turns into Fruitbat from Carter USM

I thought Benny from Crossroads was back .

https://www.vitalmtb.com/forums/hub/all-things-rampage-2023?page=1#comment-367856

Just watched the Gee Insta video on here and my only reaction was laughing at the madness of it.
No wonder he smashed his balls, they must be MASSIVE 😂

When you look at the old rampage zones you see how fast it all returns to nature- and they still get ridden and maintained (a bit). Nature in this case being basically a chunk of scraggy desert in an area of lots of scraggy desert, it’s not a super delicate or scarce ecosystem as a lot of empty-looking land can be

Same for most bike trails for that matter, even just not getting ridden regularly means they cover up super fast. Sure there’s still changes but, ground changes, a single stormy day disturbed the forest at the golfy or glentress more than every bike trail and every skid. Car parks and cafes are pretty much always the only things that’ll still be visible in a decade, except in odd locations where you don’t get water flow or regrowth.

@Northwind….he just needs a roadie cap to finish off the transformation.