Now this looks like fun. Red Bull’s latest challenge is a floating obstacle course that goes 200 metres across a lake. The course features teeter-totters, rolling balance features, wall rides, ladder bridges, narrow log skinnies and an unforgiving final skinny that truly separated the trials riders from the non-trials riders. Scottish mountain bike legends Danny MacAskill and Kriss Kyle gave it a solid attempt.
Hours of crashes, close calls and cold swims
Before MacAskill and Kyle rolled in, a group of accomplished British riders tested the course. None made it through. The challenge was split into easy, hard and impossible sections, but even the opening features proved difficult.
Kyle tried the course first, using all his BMX skills and eventually getting really far along on the course. MacAskill took the opposite approach, studying each feature before piecing together longer and longer runs.
As daylight faded, both riders reached the final sequence, where exhaustion became a serious part of the equation.
Persistence pays off
After hours of failed attempts, MacAskill finally pieced together a clean run, becoming the first rider to complete the course Red Bull billed as nearly impossible. Was anyone surprised that MacAskill could pull it off? Probably not. We’ve all seen the guy ride across a tennis court net.
Kyle came within touching distance of the finish but fell just short after repeatedly pushing deeper into the final section. It would be hard to fault him though. There aren’t too many people in the world that could ride the final sections.
If you’ve got 12-minutes to spare, this is an impressive feat of bike handling skills that’s worth checking out. Plenty of laughs and a course we’d all love to take a stab at. But few of us are delusional enough to think we could ride that final obstacle (if we could even get that far!).