Gee's POV - Red Bull Hardline 2016
Watch Gee Atherton in the POV video above as he takes on the whole course in this top to bottom preview. It’s not until you witness it from this first person perspective that you realise the magnitude of this insane course and quite how terrifying that road gap feature really is.
Don’t forget to tune into Red Bull TV on September 18 to watch the impressive list of international riders push their limits on this technically challenging course as they aim for that winning combination of speed and accuracy.
MENTIONS: @redbullbike / @trek
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.........He can only say "ok boys...boys.....?????
he knows it will be heard and seen by thousands and all he can do is grunt and mutter 5 words and zero comedy?
.........enter sandman negs
Do you notice they just calmly flow the jumps that last year caused some issues? What a difference some experience and course tuning makes..
Last weekends world champs had 3-4 days of 2-3 posts a day on Pinkbike, plenty on Vital and Dirt etc and Rampage will get an immense about of coverage.
: )
Gee Atherton
Rampage is not a race and has hardly any world cup racers present any more, anybody else other than Brendan take part? - There is good reason behind that other than it being beyond their skill-set and that is potential for injury.
Rampage is a different league to Hardline too having worldwide TV and online coverage. Hardline is a 'race' that a handful of riders compete in - Most of the riders are WC racers and as is the case with Mike Jones there is huge potential to hurt yourself, he will now have to struggle to get back to form before next season.
I imagine there are quite a few riders that wont race Hardlie or couldnt even if they wanted to - Am I right in saying Danny Hart competed in the past, he certainly wouldnt be this year as I am sure he and his sponsors want to keep him in one piece.
I am not saying Hardline isnt an awesome display of what is possible from a track and riders, its just that I cant see it growing into anything more than it is now and if anything it will only die out unless it becomes more of a Rampage style thing and lures that crowd into competing - The top racers have a job at the end of the day, racing the WC season and not getting injured is crutial to that.
Never the less, I think you're wrong.
Dan isn't holding these riders at gun point to ride his track. Yes, there's risks in it, but there's risks in everything. Downhill mtb is literally one big risk. These guys are out there to have fun. Judging by their Instagram's everyone is loving it, and for good reason. People ride bikes for fun, and sending it down this course is about as fun as mtb gets.
At no point did I say Dan was forcing riders into doing it - I also didnt say the riders themselves wouldnt want to race the event. What I did say was that some of the sponsors who pay the riders wages might not want their riders competing in an event like this - Can you not understand that, I know people ride bikes for fun as you put it but some people also ride them for a living and if they are injured then they cant do that, can they?
Yes DH mtb has risks but it doesnt usually have 40ft road gaps and 20ft+ kicker risks, does it?
You can think I am wrong, that is your opinion but it doesnt change the fact that the list of riders competing is so small and many of the riders are not challenging the top spots at any races - The big names have slowly dropped off over the last few years.
These are top guys. Their sponsors aren't going to chuck 'em off their team because they want to ride Hardline lol. If they did, then f*ck that company. I would never buy a product from them. Because that is not what this sport is about. It's about doing sick shit and having fun.
Besides, Hardline has exactly the same exposure as Rampage, it's all streamed on RebBullTV. Sponsors will like that.
Hardline will always have people competing for as long as Dan wants to keep it running. Who cares if they are not WC winners, I just want to see rad people do gnarly shit. If I was good enough and got an invite from Dan, I would say yes in a heart beat. Because it's challenging, FUN, and the adrenaline rush is second to none.
And that is why hardline won't die.
For example, Trek don't pay Brandon Semenuk to just compete in Rampage. They pay him to compete in slopestyle. Yet Brandon, along with loads of other slopestyle dudes, still compete in Rampage.
Your comment about the sport being about 'doing sick shit and having fun' shows your age - these guys do love doing that stuff, of course they do but they still have bills to pay and if they get injured, have a poor off-season and dont get results they wont get a new contract, they wont get their race-win bonuses and thats it, no more riding for a living - Back to being like you or me, no more getting waged to do 'sick shit'.
I did not suggest sponsors would 'chuck riders off the team' if they wanted to ride Hardline but I did suggest that sponsors may not allow them to ride, even if they wanted to - You sign a contract when you become a sposnored rider and there are many terms to contracts.
If Hardline carries without the top WC racers, great! I for one dont want to see it stop but I could see why that would happen. Open your eyes a bit and see the difference between us and paid pro riders and the industry that relies on sponsorship, exposure, coverage and results to keep going. You can say you would ride hardline if you had the chance but you dont have a mortage to pay for that is based on your wold cup DH results, do you?
On a sperate point, I dont know how you can think Hardline is on the same level as Rampage - Rampage is a worldwide event and almost a phenomena of this sport in that it is played on 'real' TV and has prize money that isnt a complete joke (though still too small) - Rampage is almost fully fielded by riders that specialise in Slopestyle events so that is what the riders are paid to do!
Back to the main topic of whether Hardline has a chance of continuing to run: I would like to think so because of the added respect people like you and me have of riders who are willing and capable of competing on a track like this. Whether or not that added respect translates into sales is up for question, but the same could be said for WC results.
To quote adam brayton:: "this is what downhill shoukd be"
Stop hating on the young lad, hardlines in its infancy hence the supposed.lack of media coverage. Everythig starts somewhere
WTF are you talking about? Of the top 30 fastest riders in the world this year 11 of them are in this event. Of the 20 or so riders you have a handfull of up and coming young riders, 1 privateer and all the rest are seasoned pros 2 of which were in the top 5 at world champs just last week!
Anyway, I'm fairly certain the only other time RedBull stream a race in the UK is at the WC in Fort Bill. So this is a big opportunity for sponsors to be shown to a world wide audience which is exactly what they want.
And also Hardline does cause quite a stir on social media. RedBulls 2015 video of Hardline 2015 has racked up nearly 3M views on YouTube, and Gee's POV of practice yesterday has racked up nearly 140k views in 7 hours on FaceBook, and that number is only going to increase, especially as more footage emerges throughout the weekend.
(and if rampage wasn't a month away I'm sure the rider list would be ridiculous.)
shame
What happened t the DeVinci guy ?
I suspect there is not much to be happy about in your life