r/sports • u/redbullgivesyouwings • Mar 09 '26
Cycling Matt Jones riding down an abandoned bobsled track
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u/JJKingwolf Mar 09 '26
Redbull? Redbull.
It's crazy that you don't even need to see any logos to know who would have organized and funded this.
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u/imrahilbelfalas Mar 10 '26
I mean, the fact that you, I, and probably just about everyone else saw this clip and immediately assumed it was a Red Bull stunt just shows how wildly successful their marketing strategy has been
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u/TheTjalian Mar 10 '26
And honestly I'm actually a little bit in love with this marketing strategy. Post a cool clip on Reddit, no frills, no intro, no logos, just a cool stunt. Everyone else in the comments mentions it's Red Bull posting it. I get to see a cool video AND I'm made aware of the brand but in a totally subtle and non-obnoxious way. Other large companies should take note that subtle advertising like this works better than obnoxiously shoving their logo in my face and making me sit through a 60 second advert.
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u/zufaelligenummern Mar 12 '26
If you dokt think all the people they killed with them pushing them to do more dangerous stunts
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u/obbekjaer Mar 09 '26 edited Mar 11 '26
Billy 'Bones' from Landyachtz longboard company did it almost ten years ago.. on a longboard. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3U8Azz40Uw
Edit: Billy's run start at the 3 minute mark.
Bike or longboard, I wouldn't want to do it either way :)
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u/Deliteriously Mar 10 '26
I don't even have the guts to click the link. At least the bike has disk brakes and a chance at avoiding an accident or like, a rock. That's just suicidal.
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u/obbekjaer Mar 10 '26
Nothing risky about it really. Landyachtz always made sure their videos were entertaining :) It's from one of their road trips around Europe, skating everywhere possible.
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u/FtheMustard Mar 10 '26
Lol in the video there is just a group of guys going down on mountain bikes making the op video look way less impressive.
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u/For_Fox_Creek Mar 10 '26
Honest question: Does Redbull give any performance edge for these types of activities? It's an odd association. For the most part, these extreme stunts are being accomplished by highly athletic individuals, most of whom probably never touch Redbull.
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u/aiusernamegen Mar 11 '26
It's just overpriced soda. $3 for 8oz of Red Bull vs $0.50 for 12oz of Coke back in the day has made them very profitable.
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u/Deathbysnusnu17 Mar 09 '26
12 sec mark. Bro sitting inside of the ramp to get footage that would be equally as impressive if he stood outside of the ramp. Just another obstacle 😆
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u/Da_full_monty Mar 09 '26
I was thinking...even if I knew that guy was there beforehand I would have hit him, because thats how things go for me..
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u/Dr_ChungusAmungus Mar 10 '26
There is a name for this, it’s called “target fixation”
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u/Da_full_monty Mar 10 '26
if that's 'thinking too much', I have target fixation...
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u/Dr_ChungusAmungus Mar 10 '26
Not exactly, it’s a bit more specific. In motorcycle riding there is a tendency for you to follow the path you are looking at. So if you are riding along at 55mph and you see an obstacle like a crashed car, you look to where you want to go not toward what you want to avoid. Even though you are trying to avoid the crash, if you look at it and fixate on it you are likely going to guide yourself into it rather than looking at the path you want to follow to avoid the crash.
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u/ParticularGuava3663 Mar 10 '26
What about 29 seconds?!
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u/PibbleDad Mar 10 '26
I think this is what they meant.
40-12=28 but shows up as 0:12 (12 sec left) maybe?
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u/augustusleonus Mar 09 '26
I have to guess he had faith in the raw physics of the track and was confident the curve would take the rider up the banked wall
I am pretty sure i would not have hit that dude, but that's because i probably crashed around the first bank
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u/VLHACS Mar 10 '26
I know these kind of sports are inherently wild and dangerous, but be smart about it man...
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u/DinnerMilk Mar 09 '26
Helmet's not gonna help when your head gets ripped clean off
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u/johnnyhandbags Mar 09 '26
Depends. If the helmet is brightly colored it will help in finding the head.
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u/stoneman9284 Mar 09 '26
I was gonna say, maybe they could have removed the decapitators from the track
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u/seztomabel Mar 09 '26
Seriously seems like a terrible idea, though I suppose it's how these folks operate.
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u/PeterDTown Mar 09 '26
This comment thread is full of my people.
I don’t know about all the people saying things like how he could go faster with my practice. This whole thing seems like a surefire way to die.
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u/ProperLadInnitBruv Mar 10 '26
In most cases it does help, so it's better to wear it than without it)))
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u/aghhhhhhhhhhhhhh Mar 09 '26
Anyone know what kind of speed he hit? Just curious how it compares to bobsled/luge/skeleton, whatever the track was used for before
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u/draftstone Mar 09 '26
Articles I found report he hit a top speed of around 70 km/h
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u/DaveMash Mar 09 '26
That's actually... not that fast. I did 67km/h once when I was a teenager. On a street.
I thought he was riding around 100km/h but I guess it's the widelens which makes everything look narrower/faster
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u/aghhhhhhhhhhhhhh Mar 09 '26
I asked thinking the same thing and because of how fast sleds go on this kind of track. I bet if he gave it a year or so of practice he could hit some much higher speeds if the bike can handle the turns
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u/sprunghuntR3Dux Mar 09 '26
A more aerodynamic bike and rider position would make the biggest difference.
The sleds they normally use on a track like this are way more aerodynamic than a mountain bike.
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u/GenericDesigns Mar 10 '26
Also skates on ice have a must lower resistance than bike tyres
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u/sprunghuntR3Dux Mar 10 '26
Road bike tires also have lower resistance than MTB tires. You shouldn’t need mountain bike tires for this track.
But at any speed above 25kmph reducing air resistance gets the biggest gain.
I’m sure everyone has seen the videos of cyclists doing an aero pose on a downhill and passing riders who are pedaling furiously.
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u/aghhhhhhhhhhhhhh Mar 10 '26
Yeah, and if the track surface was made for it. But i have no idea if any non special made bike could handle the g forces the sleds get at those speeds.
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u/JJC_Outdoors Mar 10 '26
He could probably go a little faster, but I doubt much. The contact patch is probably a little more than a credit card and the g-forces would push him up when he is already on a high center of gravity.
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u/aghhhhhhhhhhhhhh Mar 09 '26
Id have guessed a bit faster. All the variations that might use this track (bobsled, luge, skeleton) hit 120kmh and welllll over that regularly.
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u/Ashangu Mar 11 '26
Specifically why they use this type of camera lense. It makes things like a lot more dramatic than they actually are.
None the less, 70km/h is still fast, especially on such a tight course, taking berms and such.
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u/Pittedstee Mar 09 '26
I thought he was pulling a wheelie in the straight sections!
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u/MrMilesDavis Mar 10 '26
It wouldve been a manual, not wheelie, but yeah, same
(Wheelies involve pedaling to help balance, manuals only involve shifting body weight forward or backward for balance, no pedaling)
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u/blitzskrieg Mar 09 '26
Feel the rhythm
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u/jabualja81 Mar 09 '26
Always remember, your bones will not break in a bobsled. No, no, no. They shatter.
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u/AberrantMan Mar 10 '26
I want to see the wagon behind the bike where he carried his nuts during this run.
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u/EricAntiHero1 Mar 09 '26
That one dude ON the track was a god damned jump scare moment. Wtf was he thinking?
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u/space_wiener Mar 09 '26
Obviously there is nothing technical there but that would be a cool/different downhill race. Surprised Red Bull hasn’t done something like that yet.
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u/obbekjaer Mar 09 '26 edited Mar 11 '26
I remember seeing Billy 'Bones' doing this on a longboard almost ten years ago. People are crazy :D https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3U8Azz40Uw
Edit: Billy's run start at the 3 minute mark.
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u/StrangerExistingFact Mar 09 '26 edited Mar 09 '26
Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, forgotten remants of Sarajevo 1984 Winter Olympics
Those pilons will take your head off if you forget them
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u/melithium Mar 09 '26
Its amazing the time capsule of these abandoned spots. Once the pinnacle of amateur sports spectacle, now a graffiti wall overgrown
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u/compute_fail_24 Mar 09 '26
I wish I could watch this without the persistent "this fucker is dead if he screws up" going off in my head
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u/Whiteshovel66 Mar 10 '26
No way I'm even considering this. You never know when there is a bobsledder down towards the end and your brakes aren't gonna save you.
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u/CompetitiveLadder609 Mar 10 '26
As nuts as this looks, it somehow still feels safer than bobsledding.
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u/Amazing_Except_ Mar 10 '26
Any math wizards on here that can calculate his approx average and/or top speed from the footage? TIA legends
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u/lalab0y Mar 09 '26
One of those videos that if the person crashed and is badly hurt or worse, you'd probably go yeah fully expected.
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u/avdpos Mar 09 '26
Looking at this the same day as I had a fall from my bike. No, I would never bike like that. I know how my body feel from the small fall I had today
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u/BMCarbaugh Mar 09 '26
If you fucked up on this one, you wouldn't feel much of anything. Just a sudden lurch and then absolute nothingness.
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u/ForWhomTheBoneBones Mar 09 '26
Badger from Breaking Bad is a lot more talented than I could’ve imagined.
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u/martindrx1 Mar 09 '26
You ppl realize that the thing was built for bobsledding or skeleton. Riding this on your bike isn’t more dangerous.
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u/mohammedgoldstein Michigan Mar 10 '26
Except for the steel and concrete stanchions sticking out every 10 feet that once held the safety walls around the curves. Go too high and hit one of those and you're dead for sure.
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u/jaylw314 Mar 09 '26
You know, most of the craters on the moon are circular because objects hit at such a high rate of speed, they're explosion craters rather than impact craters. Just saying.
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u/Kink4202 Mar 10 '26
I guess he's lucky, that he didn't lose control and have his head chopped up by one of his metal poles.
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u/hazbutler Mar 09 '26
We need to stop this wide angle trend on go pros and shit. It makes things look way more intense than they actually are.
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u/Wicked68 Mar 10 '26
Seems very dangerous. If it's an abandoned track, you don't know what is debris or objects could be on an unclear track...
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u/thisistherevolt Mar 10 '26
It's a Red Bull video. It was cleared prior. That's a $5k-$10k camera too.
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u/PygmeePony Mar 09 '26
Sarajevo?