TRAVIS Pastrana has reflected fondly on his experience filming the latest Gymkhana clip at Mount Panorama alongside the Supercars championship at last year’s Repco Bathurst 1000.
For the video, several drivers partook in a day of filming around the circuit and its surroundings.
A highlight for Pastrana was engaging in a genuine race with Will Brown’s Red Bull Ampol Racing machine, with the Camaro remarkably matched to the performance of the Subaru Brataroo.
On YouTube alone, the video has earned over 12 million views since its launch in December.
Following the passing of the legendary Ken Block, Pastrana decided to keep his promise and continue the franchise.
“Ken said, Look, I want you to do three Gymkhanas. If the first one doesn’t hit 20 million views, you’re done,” Pastrana said on the Stacking Pennies Podcast.
“I’m like, I think I could do that, I have no idea.
“And then he goes, I’m passing it to my kids, so when he passed away, everything kind of split.
“Everything was separated, and I got talking to Brian Scotto, who was the producer of Gymkhana.
“I said, I promised Ken I’d do three; he wanted to see his kids have a chance to do this, but I felt it was my obligation to Ken to at least get this kind of reboot.
“So we went down to Australia, which had a lot of meaning to me, because Ken had tried to get Gymkhana in Australia for years.
“They made a law, no hooning – obviously they’re like, you can’t drift here, we don’t want it here.”
Despite the early resistance, the shoot encompassed multiple locations in New South Wales, including numerous scenes with the Supercars field.
“You always think you’ve got time, you’re like, oh, we’ll do rehearsal,” Pastrana said.
“No, we had three hours to get all of these shots and to coordinate the day before all of these guys in the cars or the race cars for the biggest event of the year, and I’m sliding in and out and weaving, that’s why I love race car drivers.
“Stunt drivers are great – they can do anything that you set up.
“Race car drivers, we were on the fly – nothing that we had planned went right, everyone just filed in.
“I thought we were just going to get smoked with this four cylinder, you know, (but) we had about the same amount of horsepower.
“We’ve got 850 horsepower (in the Subaru), I think we might have had a little more, but we could crush them 0 to 100.
“There’s this corner that you’re hitting 160 (mph, 260km/h) at the end of the straightaway into this kink (at The Chase).
“And I’m like for sure Will (Brown) is going to pass me – we’re going through, we’re racing, and I’m everything it’s got right to the maximum.
“It goes 9,600 RPMs, which is pretty amazing for a four cylinder, it sounds like an F1 car almost, and we’re going down to this dog leg, right?
“We’re at 152, 155 (mph), and we’re side by side, and I’m like… I have never hit it before in my life, either, man, and we’re racing.
“And Will’s like, how much faster was your car?
“I was like, how much faster was your car?
“They were so identical down the straightaway.
“It was freaking awesome, dude.”
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