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[VIDEO] "Insane Eddy" takes you on the wildest gravel ride ever

Aug 31, 2021 at 8:34
by Fine Line Media  

What do you do when you’re late for the Saturday group ride? You hit the pedals, take shortcuts and do everything you can to overtake the peloton, of course!

In “Insane Eddy”, former Belgian trials champion Iciar van den Bergh takes you on the wildest gravel ride ever. His spectacular pursuit takes him through historic villages, beautiful landscapes, straight through gardens and factories, and over the biggest slag heap in Belgium. But is it enough to catch up with the pack?

“Insane Eddy” is a short film by Iciar van den Bergh and Fine Line Media with support from Trek, Vedett, Decca Sportswear, and Bavet. The 8.5-minute video combines humor with unique bicycle stunts, some of which have never been done before. Or at least, we don't think. Riding underwater, swinging from ropes and cables, and freeriding on a gravel bike. Nothing is too crazy for Insane Eddy.

bigquotesThe zipline is the craziest thing I’ve ever done on a bike.

“The zipline is the craziest thing I’ve ever done on a bike”, says Iciar van den Bergh. “We weren’t sure if it was going to work and we had to rethink and rebuild the setup a few times. After a lot of trial and error though, we finally managed to get it done. We were super stoked when I first made it down successfully, but then I had to do it another 30 times to get all the different angles. It was pretty tough physically. I had to pull up and crunch really hard to not let the bike immediately hit the ground upon take-off. We're super stoked on how it came together but I’ve never had such a sore core in my life!”

bigquotesIciar tried the frontflip once into an airbag and then immediately took it to dirt.

“Our goal was to combine unique and funny scenes with high-level riding and we often had to find creative solutions to realize our ideas”, says Tobias Pieffers of Fine Line Media. “With the zipline, the front wheel kept turning sideways as soon as Iciar took off, making the landing pretty much impossible. We taped the handlebar in a fixed position, which helped, but brought along its own set of difficulties. And for the swimming pool scene, we had to weigh the bike down in every possible way to keep Iciar upright while riding over the bottom of the pool. The video is about a wild ride but the creation of it has been pretty wild too. Weather and time issues often left us with very small windows to film. Iciar literally tried the frontflip once into an airbag at the construction site and then immediately took it to dirt. The guy is an absolute beast!"

We are incredibly proud of what we’ve achieved and immensely grateful to the companies and volunteers who helped us turn our crazy ideas into reality.

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We often reminded each other that difficult is good. This one required some serious determination.

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Cheers to well-executed dumb ideas. This was a lot of fun but harder than you might think.

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Still amazed how he managed to act so well seconds before he had to release the monstrosity.

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Our goal was to incorporate as much different sorts of terrains as possible. We were pretty stoked on finding this tree line which for a change, hardly needed any work at all.

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Iciar's ribs probably touched the saddle more often than his bum. Photo by Irmo Keizer.

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It took quite a few slams before reaching the desired height.

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From the beginning we said the video should have high-level riding, humor, and cool locations, so we were pretty stoked about finding these special bicycle paths.

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We spend seven hours in a pool filming this scene.

DCIM 100GOPRO GOPR1957.JPG
We call it the Trek Atlantis. Can you spot the weights?

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One of our favourite scenes. Many high fives were shared shooting this.

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Pretty bridge. Nothing more, nothing less.


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