Must Watch: Reed Boggs' Full Length Film 'Riding Off Cliffs'
Words: Yeti Cycles
Reed Boggs grew up on the flatlands of Ohio with dreams of freeride lines only seen in the glossy pages of magazines. After honing his skills at indoor bike parks imitating those big mountain sends, he moved out west and dedicated his life to riding off cliffs with hopes of one day winning Red Bull Rampage. We follow along with Reed and document his sacrifices, hijinks, friendships forged in the desert, and the consequences and rewards of livin' life on two wheels.
!WARNING!
This film is not a shred-it. It's a real story beyond the social media facade about a passionate crew of riders who live the Freeride life. Yes, a few beers were drunk, but not on send-it days, so relax.
Presented By: Yeti Cycles & Race Face
Support By: Marzocchi, Giro, Stans
Director/DP: Craig Grant
Producer: Bag Carrier Films
Featuring: Reed Boggs
Cinematography: Craig Grant, Wiley Kaupas
Editor: Craig Grant
Post Sound: Keith White Audio
Director of Steeze: Sterling Lorence
Motion GFX [Design]: Craig Grant
Motion GFX [Animation]: Wiley Kaupas, Craig Grant
Build Crew: Ian Carpenter, Sammy Mercado, Alan Mandel
Photography: Sterling Lorence, Craig Grant, Josh Conroy
Appearances By:
Monte Boggs
Meg Showell
Josh Hoffer
Nic Hilton
Chad Christensen
Ethan Nell
Nicholi Rogatkin
DJ Brandt
Cam McCaul
Pete Johnson
Carson Storch
David Lieb
Johny Salido
Dusty Wygle
Jaxon Riddle
Kaylee Gibb
Brandon Semenuk
Dylan Stark
Additional Footage
The Call: Nic Hilton
iPhone: Dusty Wygle
Archival: Monte Boggs, Jacob Hossack, MTB FISE
Archival Photo: Ale Di Lullo
Author Info:
Member since Aug 22, 2000
Must Read This Week
Sign Up for the Pinkbike Newsletter - All the Biggest, Most Interesting Stories in your Inbox
PB Newsletter Signup
Content is king and Reed's figured that out for sure.
Before bars are bent to create rise and sweep, they are shaped through butting and swaging. Butting is the manipulation of a tube’s wall thickness and swaging is the manipulation of its diameter. But that’s over-simplifying it.
“There’s a lot of kung fu,” as Vos puts it. “You end up working the material, and you put it under a lot of stress. Then, when you bend, you get expansion and contraction, outside and inside, and that causes some form of distortion on the material. You have something called ‘orange peel,’ which is a wrinkling. We had to increase the wall thickness so we could grind away the faults.” Going from 25.4 to the 22.2mm at the grips was relatively easy, but from 32mm was uncharted territory. “This is more of an understanding than a strict engineering discipline. It is quite manual to some degree.”
Eventually, they produced a bar that had the right shape, wall thickness and finish, and went into production, expecting to create the first 32mm bar. But that’s not how it went. “Our first 250 or 500 bars had all suffered some shrinkage, which was just a flaw in our manufacturing … but we hadn’t machined our stems yet.”
Thus, 31.8 was born. Vos can’t point to a specific reason why the Fatboy Slim gained enough of a following to launch a new standard. There was a competing oversized bar at the time from Azonic, but it used a clumsy three-piece design instead of tapering, which actually makes sense now. Also, it was called the Chubby.
Ironically, Vos is skeptical of new standards. “I think it’s the industry stretching to create interest among consumers. A lot of these things are meaningless, and create a lot of waste.” But 31.8 is not meaningless. It has clearly made an impact on how we ride. A measurable impact."
I swear I only bought Outside+ for the Gaia subscription. I even tried to claim a refund on my credit card after I learned they swooped me in USD instead of CAD and it ended up being so much more than what I had anticipated.
Reeb needs to get around to sponsoring Reed!