The Red Bulletin UK 02+03/24 by Red Bull Media House

BEYOND THE ORDINARY

AGE OF

ULTRA

TOM EVANS

ON LIVING LIFE AT THE CUTTING EDGE OF ENDURANCE RUNNING

JACOB COLLIER The musical prodigy reshaping pop TREASURE ISLAND Crossing Corsica by bike and ski

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ICE QUEEN How Preet Chandi conquered Antarctica FEB/MARCH

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E D ITO R ’ S L E T T E R

Contributors

SAM HADDAD The Brighton-based writer has travelled far and wide to cover action sports and the outdoors, but the location for her chat with Tom Evans felt like home. “I studied at Loughborough,” she says, “so it was great to interview Tom about his achievements and see how he uses the campus’ performance lab so effectively.” Page 30

TRISTAN KENNEDY “Lake Maggiore is a stunning spot, with a lot of old Italian money floating around,” the British-born writer says of the operations base of all-electric powerboat series E1, which he visited for this issue. “It’s said Donatella Versace has a house there. I wondered what she’d make of all the athletes tearing up and down.” Page 40

BRIGHT FUTURE “I want to be a master of my sport,” says this month’s cover star, ultrarunner Tom Evans. Some would say the 32-yearold, Sussex-born athlete has already achieved this with high-profile wins on some of the world’s toughest – and longest – trail-running courses. But, as proof that the best never stop learning, Evans says he’s far from finished with his athletic enlightenment, which sees him study every possible detail. There’s a thirst for knowledge running throughout this issue. We head to Italy with a selection of world-class pros as they take a crash course in piloting the all-electric racing boats of new series E1. Coming from sports including BMX and rally racing, they have their work cut out. And we meet British explorer Preet Chandi as she flies in from her latest record-breaking Antarctic mission. Having been told she was too inexperienced to take on her first ambitious adventure, Chandi buckled down and studied. ‘Polar Preet’ is now the fastest woman to reach the South Pole solo on skis. Enjoy the issue.

JAMES CARNEGIE (COVER)

BENEDIKT FRANK The Munich-born, Londonbased photographer shoots everything from beauty and fashion to documentaries and travel. Affable wunderkind Jacob Collier left a lasting impression. “It was a pleasure to work with him,” Frank says. “He has a wonderful energy that made the shoot super-fun and relaxed.” Page 68 THE RED BULLETIN

Running up that hill: endurance athlete Tom Evans goes the distance for The Red Bulletin, under the watchful lens of James Carnegie

CONTENTS

EIMEAR NOONE

Making one of your passions a career is a blessing. But two? This gaming score composer is living the dream U LT R A R U N N I N G

TOM EVANS

This one will run and run… and run. The British endurance racer talks motivation, mental strength and the appliance of science P O W E R B O AT R A C I N G

E1 SERIES

Inside the revolutionary, all-electric powerboating competition that’s taking action-sports athletes of all kinds way out of their comfort zone P O L A R E X P L O R AT I O N

PREET CHANDI

In December, as Santa got busy in the Arctic, ‘Polar Preet’ was smashing it down South. Meet the explorer with a knack for setting records DANCE

BREAKING CONVENTION 58 Celebrating 20 years, with its inspirational creator Jonzi D still at the helm, this hip-hop dance festival is keeping the ‘art’ of breaking alive MUSIC G A L L E R Y 8

JACOB COLLIER

P L AY L I S T: T K AY M A I D Z A 15

When it comes to thinking bigger and wilder – in music and sartorial matters – few can match this Grammy-winning Brit for ambition

N O I S E N I G H T S 16

I D A S P O R T S 21 B O U N C E C H A I R 22

VENTURE T R A V E L 77

HEROES

DAWN RICHARD

E Q U I P M E N T: N I G H T-

R U N N I N G E S S E N T I A L S 82

Singer, animator, vegan food-truck owner – the artist known as DAWN is the renaissance woman we all need

ALEC BRIGGS

There’s more than one route to success in competitive cycling, and this Londoner is leading the way 06

MIND SET WIN: M A R C O O D E R M AT T 92 E Q U I P M E N T: M O O N B I K E 94

FITNESS: TRAIN L I K E A G L A D I AT O R 95 C A L E N D A R 96 S E M I - R A D 98 THE RED BULLETIN

SHAMIL TANNA, HARPREET CHANDI

THE STORMPILOT

TAL ROBERTS/RED BULL ILLUME

DAVYDD CHONG

Portland, OR, USA

BRIDGE OF SLIDES

The glorious Gothic arches of St John’s Bridge loom over Willis Kimbel in Tal Roberts’ haunting image – a semi-finalist (Lifestyle by COOPH category) in photography contest Red Bull Illume. “The idea took a long time to make real because this bridge sees a lot of traffic and not many skaters want to wake up at 5am to shoot a photo,” says Roberts, “but Willis [a fellow local] is always down to make cool shots.” This isn’t the bridge’s only link to the sport: in 2019, a DIY skatepark was found beneath its western end; sadly, it was demolished due to structural fears. redbullillume.com

Kamchatka, Siberia

CHILL WAVE

How do you like your surfing: hot or cold? Guy Williment’s search for “world-class waves never surfed before” took him to Siberia in 2022. This drone’s-eye view of surfers Letty Mortensen, Fraser Dovell and Anton Morozov won him a semi-final place in Red Bull Illume (Innovation by MPB). “To avoid getting into the [1°C] water sooner than we had to, they used icebergs as giant stepping stones to get to the other side of the ‘beach’,” says Williment. The Endless Summer it wasn’t. redbullillume.com

DAVYDD CHONG GUY WILLIMENT/RED BULL ILLUME, BRIAN SOLANO/RED BULL ILLUME

Maui, Hawaii, USA

HOT STREAK Meanwhile, at the Pe‘ahi break (aka Jaws) on Maui, surfers practise their craft in the sun, never having to guard against lairy Siberian brown bears, only wipeouts. “My favourite perspective is from the air,” says US photographer Brian Solano of this shot of big-wave icon Billy Kemper, “and [my chopper pilot] Nick positioned above the channel right as Billy dropped into one of the cleanest barrels I’ve seen at Pe‘ahi.” A Red Bull Illume (Energy) semi-final place was his reward. redbullillume.com

Coast Mountains, BC, Canada

RISE AND SHINE

GUY FATTAL

DAVYDD CHONG

No one beats Mother Nature for visual trickery: Aurora Borealis, Fata Morgana, you name it. Here, she’s lending her skills to Guy Fattal on a shoot with US freeskier Connery Lundin. “With some great shots [in the bag], we decided to experiment,” says the Canada-based photographer. “Connery skied towards my lens with an explosive jump turn as the backlit sun illuminated the snow and sparkles around him.” Red Bull Illume semi-final place (Energy) for Fattal, props to Mama Gaia… redbullillume.com

JAMIE NICHOLLS

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UK Stockist @ Subvert in the Chill Factore, Manchester.

messyweekend.com Photography @max.hwrd

TKAY MAIDZA

Serving up aces The pigeonhole-defying rapper and former tennis prodigy lists four of her favourite big-hitters With her rapid-fire flow, genre-bending sound and attention-grabbing visual style, Takudzwa Victoria Rosa – aka Tkay – Maidza is a force to be reckoned with. Born in Harare, Zimbabwe, raised in Western Australia, and now an LA resident, the 28-year-old passed up potential careers in tennis and architecture to bring the world her inventive, experimental brand of alternative rap. Maidza’s second album, Sweet Justice, which features production by Grammy winner Kaytranada, fanfared her arrival on the international music scene. Released in November, it combines hip hop, R&B, funk and industrial pop to deliver catchy hooks and intense drama, all infused with Maidza’s signature swagger. Here, she picks four tracks that left their mark on her journey to success.

Instagram: @tkaymaidza

DANA TRIPPE

MARCEL ANDERS

Scan the QR code to hear our Playlist podcast with Tkay Maidza on Spotify

Fergie

Mariah Carey

The Internet

Janet Jackson

Glamorous (2006)

It’s Like That (2005)

Girl (2015)

If (Kaytranada Remix) (2012)

“This is so timeless! I just love the energy [Fergie] puts into the song, and the energy it portrays. It’s a really beautiful snapshot of a good life, but it can also be taken from so many perspectives. And yeah, I was mind-blown when I first heard it. I still think there’s nothing like this song now. To me, it almost sounds like she’s manifesting peace.”

“[Mariah] is a queen – she embodies the word ‘glamour’ and is so unapologetic. When this song came out, I felt like I was celebrating with her. It’s about being who you are and being proud of yourself, and that’s so important. Also, it sounds so weird that I was like, ‘What is this? It’s so cool.’ You’re like, ‘What?’ But it’s so beautiful at the same time.”

“This is music I could dance to but also fall asleep to – and listen to at home when I’m reading a book or cleaning the house. That was an important guideline for my own songs, too – that tranquil energy. And when you get it, that’s where the best artists sit. [Girl] is something you can listen to at a club but also listen to by yourself. Check it out!”

“When I first heard Kaytranada flip this, it blew my mind. It’s like the forefront of electronic music, where people weren’t aware of producers, and producers weren’t aware of being artists. I’m so lucky to have worked with him on my album. That was a bucket-list goal for years, because no one sounds like him. He has created his own genre within house music.”

THE RED BULLETIN

Ever been to a club night where you’re more likely to hear a bassoon than a bass drop? This culture-clash concept might be about to change that Just a fortnight before making his debut with the London Symphony Orchestra last November, Abel Selaocoe played at Camden nightclub KOKO to the screams and whistles of a sell-out crowd who danced on into the early hours. The South African superstar cellist was performing at a ‘noisenight’ – a crowdfunded club night that places classical musicians in less formal settings. “There’s a glamour to playing at the Barbican,” says noisenights co-founder Jack Bazalgette, “but there’s a different climate to walking onstage at The Jazz Cafe to a screaming audience – it’s like being a rock star.” Launched in 2021, the noisenights concept was born 16

Suite harmony: (from top) cellist Abel Selaocoe at KOKO last November; noisenights co-founder Jack Bazalgette

from the struggles of Bazalgette and business partner Jack Crozier – the former a singer and conductor, the latter a trumpeter – to persuade friends to attend classical concerts. To date, their Londonbased promotions company, through the noise, has set up more than 50 sold-out noisenights, where big-name classical artists including Egyptian soprano Fatma Said and Russian pianist Pavel Kolesnikov have got up-close and personal with audiences at venues such as The Jago in Dalston and Chalk in Brighton. Because the gigs are crowdfunded, says Bazalgette, punters are essential to their staging: “Our mission is that we’re only doing stuff that people really want.”

THE RED BULLETIN

RACHAEL SIGEE

Bow selecta

MATTHEW JOHNSON

NOISENIGHTS

And what do attendees get? “You arrive and there might be cocktails, and a DJ playing vinyl,” says Bazelgette. “Then there’s an amazing classical music set before the stage changes over, an Afrobeat or funk band comes on, and everyone will start dancing. That’s where the party starts. Some go on until four or 5am.” This might sound like a shredding of the classical performance rulebook, but the co-founder sees noisenights as an enhancement rather than a disruptor to the status quo, allowing for both the reverence of the traditional concert hall and the fresh energy of more informal, accessible spaces. “At first, the musicians definitely saw it almost like some kind of outreach work,” Bazalgette says. “Now, I think we’re getting more where we want it to be – as just a different part of the classical ecosystem. It’s still a serious gig, and every single artist has loved it. I think it’s opened their eyes to quite how cool what they’re doing is.” With 90 dates booked across Europe for spring 2024, noisenights clearly have something different to offer both die-hard classical fans and novices, opening up new ways to experience music with a reputation for (sometimes restrictive) formality. Even the simple adjustment of having audiences stand shoulder to shoulder makes a difference, according to Bazalgette. “The way people respond when standing is markedly different,” he says. “There’s kind of an infinite range [of responses], unlike when you’re seated. People stand silently for an hour with unbelievable concentration. Then they go from that to dancing with random strangers. It’s quite a spectacular communal experience of ecstasy.” Find upcoming noisenights at throughthenoise.co.uk

When the day ends, the fun begins.

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Storm-chasing pilot Santiago Borja uses a Boeing 767 to capture images most of us would never otherwise see A forecast of stormy weather might give pause to even the most frequent of flyers. But for Santiago Borja – the man known as The Stormpilot – the wilder the better. Borja takes spectacular shots of brooding cumulonimbus clouds and crackling forks of lightning from the cockpit of the Boeing 767 cargo plane he pilots between North and South America. While the storm is swirling, however, Borja and his plane are around 20km away. “I’m always outside the storm, so there’s no immediate threat to the plane,” explains the Ecuadorian. “It’s not scary at all. You’re in completely calm air, which is very important. If it’s going to be choppy, I don’t even bother taking my camera out.” 18

Indeed, if it sounds foolhardy for a pilot to be taking photos when they should be focused on flying, Borja only gets out his Nikon DSLR during the cruise section of long-haul flights. Three or four pilots will be on rotation, allowing colleagues to rest and eat – or, in Borja’s case, to snap away. The skies of Panama and Colombia are particularly fruitful for developing storms, but with the plane travelling at a ground speed of more than 450 knots [830kph], he generally has a window of around five minutes, often taking 200 to 300 images. “A moonless night is best,” Borja explains, “and complete darkness is perfect because you can use a very long exposure.” His self-taught method goes against traditional photography

Perfect storm: (from top) a dramatic lightning strike captured by Borja; the pilot/photographer

THE RED BULLETIN

RACHAEL SIGEE

Lightning, camera, action

‘rules’ that dictate a tripod must be used for long exposures: “The lightning acts as a flash, so the camera is exposing for very long periods but the actual light that goes into the sensor is quite fast. If it’s a very active storm, you have lightning every few seconds, and several chances of capturing something usable.” Borja’s images have won him third place (Landscape, 2016) in National Geographic’s Nature Photographer of the Year contest, as well as enquiries from meteorologists and scientists, and almost 140,000 Instagram followers. “For years, [pilots like me] have been admiring these views,” he says. “No two storms are the same, and being there to watch makes you feel humble. There are times when you can feel like it’s a different planet.” And like any storm chaser, Borja still has a few phenomena left on his bucket list, including ‘sprites’ – red lightning flashes that shoot upwards into the atmosphere. “I’ve never seen them, but I’ve talked to people who have, and read about them,” he says. “Hopefully one day!” Follow The Stormpilot on Instagram: @santiagoborja

SANTIAGO BORJA

THE STORMPILOT

Piercing the Sky, 2022: “I can’t decide what it is that I love about this image,” says Borja. “Maybe it’s the bubbling storm piercing through the ceiling, discovering the sun it couldn’t reach before. Or maybe the tranquillity it finds, leaving all the turmoil underneath” THE RED BULLETIN

FW 23 TO GET THERE

RACHAEL SIGEE STACEY OSBORNE

Laura Youngson was at the top of Mount Kilimanjaro when she realised she wasn’t the only woman playing football in boots that didn’t fit. It was 2017, and Equal Playing Field, the nonprofit initiative she co-founded, was breaking the world record for the highest-altitude football match (5,714m) ever played. “I found that boots never fitted, so it was always about buying the least-worst shoe,” says Youngson. “I’m an amateur, but [on Kilimanjaro] I got to chat to professionals. I was like, ‘Hey, so have you got these mythical women’s boots?’ And they said, ‘No, we just wear men’s and kid’s [boots].’” The Brit discovered that even the biggest sports brands offered only unisex options, not acknowledging that men’s and women’s feet differ in shape as well as size. So, in 2018, while living and working in Melbourne, Australia, she set up Ida Sports to make boots that recognised differences like narrower heels, higher arches, and even how women’s wider hips affect their interaction with the ground. Youngson and co-founder Ben Sandhu, a former semi-pro cricketer, cut up existing boots to study their construction, then created their own prototype using heat-activated resin and a 3D-printed last – a mould in the shape of a foot. Ida Sports’ first boot, the Classica, was launched in 2020. “I know it sounds weird, but my highest praise is that I forget I’m wearing them,” says the now London-based Youngson, “because I spent so long being so annoyed with my shoes.” Some women, she says, have “an emotional reaction” to trying them on, showing this is about more than just physical comfort. “There’s also the emotional side of walking into a sports store and finding there’s nothing for me, therefore I don’t exist and I don’t belong.” Four years on, Ida Sports continues to collect data to improve its boots. The latest THE RED BULLETIN

IDA SPORTS

Levelling the field When founding her game-changing sportswear brand, Laura Youngson had one goal: to make football boots that actually work for women model, the Rise, which launches this February, has greater grip between boot and heel, uses lighter materials, and benefits from minute adjustments based on customers’ feedback. Meanwhile, the rest of the footballing world is playing catch-up. Last year, an enquiry by the UK Parliament’s Women and Equalities Committee investigated a potential link between ill-fitting boots and the spate of high-profile ACL injuries in the women’s game, while a study by the European Club Association showed that 82 per cent of female players experience pain or discomfort from wearing football boots.

Kick starter: (from top) the Ida Rise Elite (teal) and Rise Club (purple); cofounder Laura Youngson

“I think that [making football boots] has traditionally been a very male space,” Youngson says. “With the growth of the women’s game, it’s like they’re lagging and everyone is now scrambling to catch up.” With the likes of Nike and Puma belatedly launching women-specific boots, though, she welcomes the competition at last. “My intention was always to change the game. I’m well aware we might get crushed [by our rivals], but I’ll be superhappy if there are women’s football boots everywhere. When you wear stuff that’s made for you, it feels amazing.” idasports.com 21

Meet the design ace using discarded tennis balls to create furniture anyone would be happy to spectate from It’s no easy task to create the perfect bouncy sphere of a tennis ball, tough enough to endure being thwacked across a court at 200kph. The manufacturing process takes six days and includes 24 different steps – all for a ball that a professional player might use for only an hour before it’s discarded. Once the tennis ball is retired from action, as more than 300 million are each year, its combination of felt fused with rubber is extremely complicated to recycle. For this reason, tennis is one of the world’s most polluting sports. 22

This was the data that product design student and keen tennis player Mathilde Wittock serendipitously “bumped into” two years ago while working on her final thesis at London art college Central St Martins. At the time, the Brussels-born designer was searching for a cushion filling with sensory properties – “I was looking into spherical objects, but they’re difficult to manufacture [from scratch]” – and exploring ecofriendly materials: “I was facing projects that’d be problematic for the environment, and I didn’t want it to be part of that.”

Big-hitter: (from top) the Bounce Chair; its creator, Brussels-based product designer Mathilde Wittock

THE RED BULLETIN

RACHAEL SIGEE

Game, sit and match

RODOLPHE DE BRABANDERE

BOUNCE CHAIR

Wittock discovered that the vast quantities of complex waste produced by her favourite sport ticked both boxes. “Tennis balls can be transformed locally because [the sport] is played all around the world,” she says. “So I began experimenting. But I realised they were too beautiful to be put inside the cushion.” So Wittock created the Bounce Chair (pictured), an undulating seat made from upcycled tennis balls housed in a plywood frame. “At the beginning, I was collecting balls myself in local tennis clubs,” Wittock says. “Then I got in contact with the AFT, the tennis federation here in Belgium. They have thousands and are very happy to give them away.” Once she’d accumulated enough balls – 515 are needed for one chair – Wittock hand-cut them in half along the seam line and developed a glueless, interlocking assembly system. As well as the Bounce Chair, she has created a Bounce Bench and Soundbounce, a modular soundproofing wall comprising 282 tennis balls per square metre. Placing her work “at the intersection of biology, design and art”, Wittock takes a psychological approach to creating objects. “Designers design for people,” she says. “It’s not just about shape. It’s multidisciplinary and needs a bit of psychology: we need to know how it impacts people and their behaviour. I’m very passionate about sensory design: the smell, the touch, creating emotional attachment.” The Bounce Chair not only showcases and celebrates the unorthodox waste material it’s formed from, but it also utilises the roundness and springiness of the tennis balls to create a sensory, almost massage-like sitting experience. “There’s something beautiful about the design interaction and the shape and the material,” Wittock says. Aptly, considering the chair’s sporting roots, “people find it very playful”. mathildewittock.com

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| JOHN MYHRE & SEBBY K.

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H E RO ES

A NEW DAWN

New Orleans-born multi-hyphenate DAWN RICHARD doesn’t care what you think of her. The singer turned animator turned vegan food-truck owner unapologetically dances to her own beat WORDS JESSICA HOLLAND

Dawn Richard seems to have lived several lifetimes already. This summer, the New Orleans-born artist is taking her eclectic brand of dance music – dizzying, defiant and joyous, with irresistible beats – on tour in Europe. And when she’s not writing, singing, dancing and creating a visual world to accompany her music, Richard is running a vegan food truck, and working as a culture creator for animation channel Adult Swim. Richard, now 40, has always been this driven. She grew up in New Orleans’ Lower Ninth Ward – a community with poor infrastructure and big dreams, as she describes it – with parents who were hardworking creatives and taught dance and music to pay the bills. During her teens, Richard sang at a theme park, and while at college she became an NBA cheerleader. Then, in 2004, she took an audition for US reality TV show Making the Band. What followed was a gruelling journey into pop stardom as a member of two girl groups produced by Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs: first Danity Kane, then Diddy – Dirty Money. But in 2011, now unshackled and independent, Richards was reborn as solo artist DAWN. Since then, she has released six albums, some featuring her musical alter-ego King Creole, a half-android, half-human warrior. On the phone from Louisiana, Richard explains how she carved out her own unique path… the red bulletin: Did your experiences as a member of Danity Kane differ from your expectations of pop stardom? dawn richard: I was aware of the industry, but it was still a shock to me. We were sewing our own costumes, no sleep, dancing in seven-inch heels, eight-

PHOTOGRAPHY BRIT O’BRIEN

hour rehearsals every day. We didn’t have an opportunity to enjoy the moment, because we were working so hard. But we were able to be something beautiful, and I’m grateful for that. What led to you eventually strike out on your own as an independent artist? For about 10 years, in Danity Kane and then Dirty Money, I helped make a lot of money for other people but not myself. I thought, “If I want to go back to this industry, it will be intentional and I’ll be someone who pushes limits.” I wouldn’t rely on anyone else to dictate my dream. How has your musical style evolved? I was able to become my 11-year-old self fully realised. Björk, Prince, Grace Jones, Portishead, Queen, jazz, funk, R&B, Chicago house, Bounce music – all these things have been part of my story from the very beginning. But no one’s telling me that hook is not commercial enough, or that you’ve got to be pretty or lightskinned. I got to dream bigger. Is it hard to stay true to your vision? I don’t really give a fuck what nobody thinks of me. It’s so important to be unapologetically yourself. No one knows what they’re doing in this; they’re all guessing, so don’t believe the hype. You’ll lose yourself chasing someone else’s vision of you. After Danity Kane and Dirty Money, I got rejected by every major label. Everyone told me I’d fail. You have to believe in yourself to the point that others have no other choice but to believe in you. So quitting was never an option? When we went through [Hurricane] Katrina, we lost everything. I knew what zero looks like. There’s no “It won’t work”; it will work. You have to manifest that.

At what point in your career were you when New Orleans flooded? Literally a week after Katrina [in August 2005], we were sent back on the show as the final 12 [contestants]. When I made the band, I was homeless. I wasn’t like “Yay!”; I was like, “We’ve got to work immediately. I’ve got to get money.” My parents had worked so hard, and now they were sleeping on the floor in my brother’s one-bedroom apartment. That’s what I mean by “It has to work”. How did your sideline in animation come about? [After leaving Diddy’s Bad Boy Records] I had to depend on myself to finance my projects. I knew about drawing, I loved anime and I knew about marketing, so I called Adult Swim. They loved the quirky shit I was doing, so I started licensing my music to them. While doing that for two years, I developed my animation reel, then I told them I’d like to work for them [as an animator]. They thought I was joking, but then they saw my work and were like, “Holy shit, let’s try it.” There’s always a way to open the door, you just have to find it. Now I help bring in Black and queer animators – sometimes it’s their first job in the industry. The message of my career has been to help the underdogs and outliers. Do you have any advice for others on overcoming fear? I love fear – the Leo in me wants to tackle it immediately. It’s why I love skydiving. I like that feeling of “I don’t know if I can do this”. And then I jump anyway. Dawn Richard’s latest EP, The Architect, is out now on Merge Records; dawnrichard.io

THE RED BULLETIN

“You’ll lose yourself chasing someone else’s vision of you” After years of others pulling the strings, Dawn Richard took control of her music career as an independent solo artist

THE RED BULLETIN

H E RO ES

ROUTE CAUSE

How Londoner ALEC BRIGGS is challenging the norms of competitive cycling – with a sprinkling of cheek and charisma WORDS CHARLIE ALLENBY

Imposing, with a thick ginger beard, and wearing a colourful jersey emblazoned with a dinosaur, Alec Briggs stands out in a road-cycling peloton. And that’s just the way this Londoner likes it. He’s the founder of Tekkerz CC, a team bringing positive change to the increasingly inaccessible world of competitive cycling – for a start, the ‘CC’ stands for ‘Cycling Charisma’ rather than ‘Cycling Club’. Combining greater athlete autonomy, a colourful kit he designed himself and – crucially – a sense of fun, Briggs’ aim is to make cycling more inclusive and increase its fan base. And with a roster of riders that includes World Champion and Olympic hopeful Meg Barker, a fourth limited-edition team-kit collaboration with prestige cycling-wear brand Rapha, and its first-ever, professional-level, oneday road race in April, the seven-yearold, south London-based outfit is gearing up for its most exciting season yet. The team’s mission was inspired by its founder’s own journey. With no financial backing to his name, at the age of 16 Briggs persuaded a local shop to lease him two high-end bikes so that he could compete for the British and world cyclocross titles. Although ultimately falling short, still the young rider hustled to pay his debts – all without his parents knowing. Briggs has gone on to build a reputation as a skilful criterium racer, with wins at a national level in both crit and cyclo-cross races. While never the most naturally gifted cyclist, as he readily admits, Briggs combines panache and masterly bike handling to go tyre-totyre with the strongest riders around. Tekkerz CC is a space for young riders who, like Briggs, now 30, might have missed out on traditional pathways to

PHOTOGRAPHY OLIVER BROOKWELL

high-level success. And he has imbued the group with a touch of Briggs magic – whether that’s riders pulling wheelies over the finish line or turning heads in the Volvo 850 Estate team car. “[The car] is synonymous with our ethos,” he laughs. “We went to [cycling expo] Rouleur Live and all these Aston Martins were parked up, but everyone was taking photos of our £3,000 Volvo. Money doesn’t buy class or charisma.” the red bulletin: What inspired you to set up Tekkerz CC? alec briggs: My route into cycling was very alternative: aged eight or nine, I was a bit lost at school and my parents took me to Herne Hill Velodrome to regain my confidence. I never really had the natural talent, but my bike handling was good. I wasn’t good enough for the British Cycling talent team or the Olympic Development Programme, but I was fortunate that [British Cycling] still helped me and appointed me a coach who said, “Why don’t you try to beat all of them [on those teams] anyway?” I wanted to be that voice for someone else. I still wanted to make a living riding a bicycle and challenge those making it the traditional way. I respect those guys, and I love racing against them, but I wanted to offer an alternative route. What’s your aim for the team? [When I started Tekkerz] I was looking at the general side of cycling – everyone was focused on power and aerodynamics, and it was becoming like an arms race. Bike costs were going through the roof; financially it can be so hard. I wanted to be able to take the weight of equipment costs, logistics, and share my knowledge. I imagined it would be skilful 16-year-old kids who perhaps lacked some discipline or knowledge, or who didn’t come from a

cycling background. But by year two we had an Olympic and a world champion on the team, too. I want to cater to anything and anyone who comes up with a cool story or idea: preparing for the Olympics, impressing a team and getting a WorldTour contract, trying to inspire young Black kids because they only see white guys [in the sport]. I keep things small, with eight riders maximum a year. Most teams have 15, but don’t have the resources to cater to every rider. That backward way of thinking needs to go. You have a different approach out of the saddle, too, with lively launch parties you DJ at. What inspired this? Cycling is one of the most intricate and exciting sports, but explaining all the finer details is tough. You have to entice [people] in different ways. For example, I like doing cool team cars because I love cars and they interest motorheads. There is a divide between drivers and cyclists, but if they see one of the coolest cars on the road and it’s something to do with a cycling team, they’ll be like, “Hang on a minute, these people do have a life.’’ What’s next? Long term, I want Tekkerz to be a brand that interacts with different subcultures – sport, fashion, art – and becomes its own convoluted mess that anyone can interpret in their own way. But it’ll stay rooted to cycling. We’re doing our first UCI road race in April: the RutlandMelton CiCLE Classic. We’ve got to be challenging for the win and show what we’re doing is worthwhile, cool, and that we can challenge those bigger teams. @tekkerz.cc

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“I wanted to challenge all those making it in cycling the traditional way” Tekking over: Alec Briggs offers an alternative pathway to success for talented young riders

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H E RO ES

HIGH SCORER

From writing the soundtrack for World of Warcraft to conducting at the Oscars, EIMEAR NOONE has built a career combining her two passions: orchestras and gaming. Now she’s taking the music she loves on tour WORDS ALICE AUSTIN

Eimear Noone had two loves when growing up in the village of Kilconnell in County Galway, Ireland: orchestral music and Nintendo. At the age of seven, Noone had seen a white-haired conductor leading an orchestra on TV, and immediately she knew her destiny. To that end, she learnt to play the tin whistle, flute and piano; spent Saturdays – when not gaming – at the Royal Irish Academy of Music, then studied composition at Trinity College Dublin. Aged just 21, Noone co-founded the Dublin City Concert Orchestra, and since then she has conducted musicians around the world; in 2020, she became the first female conductor to lead the orchestra at the Oscars. Combining her two passions, Noone has also become one of the most influential composers in gaming: she has written for many of the industry’s biggest franchises, as well as co-creating the Dublin International Game Music Festival. In May, Noone is set to tour the UK with the Heritage Orchestra, performing a unique show with music from Fortnite, The Legend of Zelda, World of Warcraft: Warlords of Draenor and more… the red bulletin: What were your early experiences of gaming? eimear noone: Because it rains so much in Ireland, we produce many artists and writers – and there’s a lot of gaming. I grew up with three brothers in a Nintendo household. I loved Zelda. With gaming, as with music, you lock into something and become immersed. I have ADHD, and the only relief comes when I’m conducting, or working on a composition project. When did you first see an orchestra? My first experience of seeing an orchestra [live] was from inside one. I grew up in a

PHOTOGRAPHY ANDY PARADISE

village of around 400 people, about 100 miles [160km] from Dublin, so the only time I’d seen an orchestra was on TV. I played flute in [an orchestral] performance of Sibelius’ Finlandia in a church in Galway city, and I was completely and utterly gone after that. Was conducting the next logical step? When I was 15, I was playing in a concert with an army band, and the conductor turned to me and said, “You’re up next.” I was supposed to go up there and flap my arms around and make my classmates laugh, but I’ll never forget looking at the score and my ADHD brain just feeling really calm. Everything came into line, everything slowed down. I felt like I had found my place. What’s your process when composing for a video game? It’s all about the creatives and how they envision expressing the story. There are so many ways of doing it. I always say that if Mozart was alive today he’d write video-game music. We have evidence of him doing musical puzzles and putting hidden messages in his music, and there’s so much about scoring games that’s like a puzzle. We’re basically doing what composers have always done, only this is the 21st-century version. What’s unique about writing a score for a game? When you get a film, generally the picture is locked and there’s a structure in place. But with video games there are multiple uses of music: [for instance] you walk into a room in a game and there’s music coming from a gramophone or from a club or hotel lobby. Composing this music is really fun because I get to work in all sorts of styles. That’s how so much Irish music snuck into Zelda.

What have you found most challenging in your career? It’s a marathon rather than a sprint. In the early days, gender was a challenge, so I had to fight for my rights. And I had no contacts. I’m a classical musician – I had a scholarship to the conservatory, but I didn’t know anyone in gaming or films. So every person I know is someone I met personally along the way. What can we expect from your Video Games in Concert tour? People will be surprised and be taken places they might not have imagined. I love how gaming is such a leveller: it doesn’t matter where you live or how able-bodied you are; there are no country borders or cultural boundaries. I always ask the audience if it’s their first time seeing an orchestra live, and more than half will say yes. That’s really special to me. How does the audience react to hearing video-game music live? I love seeing people who are so excited about the music in their game but don’t realise there’s millions of others who feel the same. It’s weird being in a room with all these people you’ve never met but who share this passion. I feel so moved when I’m standing on stage and I see them all so completely bowled over and appreciative. It never gets old. I love sharing that with an orchestra, because we’re from the same musical background but my people are the video-game music community. It’s really fun for me to bring those two worlds together. Video Games in Concert featuring Eimear Noone tours the UK this May. For tickets, visit aegpresents.co.uk

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“I always say that if Mozart was alive today he’d write video-game music” Skyward sword: Eimear Noone conducts clouds near Dublin’s Bord Gáis Energy Theatre

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TRUE GRIT

At 32, British athlete TOM EVANS is one of the world’s most talented ultrarunners, a specialist in running extreme distances with unprecedented pace. His secret? He doesn’t just endure these gruelling races, he enjoys them Words SAM HADDAD Photography JAMES CARNEGIE 30

ULTRA MAN Tom Evans, photographed for The Red Bulletin at Beacon Hill, Leicestershire, in December last year

BACK TO BASICS Evans hones his running just a short drive from his Loughborough home

Tom Evans

espite being in California in June, world-beating British ultrarunner Tom Evans had run more than 30km on snow – a task he admits is as difficult and discombobulating as you might imagine – when finally the trail began to thaw, at first in patches, then entirely. “There was a line where the snow suddenly stopped,” recalls the 32-year-old athlete. “That was a real switching moment in my mind. The prelude was now over – the race had begun.” Evans was competing in the 100.2-mile (161km) Western States Endurance Run, a prestigious and almost unfathomably gruelling ultramarathon that sees runners climb around 5,500m of elevation – greater than that of Mont Blanc, Western Europe’s highest mountain – and descend another 7,000m as they traverse the rugged, boulder-strewn terrain of the Sierra Nevada mountains. He had thought about this race for years, and had been training – unrelentingly – for it for months, but he couldn’t control the weather. Thanks to the unseasonable snow, Evans began this new chapter of the race 37 minutes down on the course-record pace. But he didn’t let it worry him. “In ultrarunning the race doesn’t start until you’re six or even eight hours in,” Evan says. “That’s how long it takes to know if you’ve got things right.” On this particular day last year, he’d done exactly that. “I felt great and just put my foot down,” he says. Evans went on to beat the course-record pace for the remainder of the historic race, breaking off from his closest rival at 110km, and winning in a time of 14 hours, 40 minutes and 22 seconds – the fourth fastest men’s time ever in the event’s 47-year history. And as only the second European athlete to ever win it, Evans cemented his reputation as one of ultrarunning’s most formidable talents.

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“It’s not the best athletes who’ll win these races, but the best prepared”

Evans is at Loughborough University’s Performance Centre only an hour today for his photoshoot with The Red Bulletin. But, keen to make use of every minute with the experts, he’s squeezing in some training for an upcoming London International Cross Country event at the capital’s Parliament Hill Fields. Evans is currently running at chatting pace – for him, an easy 10 minutes 30 per kilometre – on a state-of-the-art, supersize treadmill programmed to match the race’s incline. He’s also hooked up to breathing apparatus that makes him look like an astronaut training for a lunar mission but is actually measuring his VO2 Max, or how efficiently he’s using oxygen while running. Every now and then, Steve Harris, a performance physiologist, steps up and pricks Evans’ earlobe, drawing blood to test his lactate and glucose levels. This is all standard practice for the athlete, who brings an incredibly data-heavy, detailed approach to ultra-endurance trail running – or ultrarunning as it’s more succinctly known. An ultramarathon is defined as a race of any distance longer than a marathon, and this extreme offshoot of running has surged in popularity in recent years – according to research by sports footwear review website RunRepeat, between 2010-2020 the number of participants rose globally by 345 per cent. More than 10,000 events take place around the world each year, ranging from 80km jaunts across the frozen Arctic tundra to epic multi-stage races through desert, forest and mountain landscapes. Since turning pro in 2018, Evans has broken course records for the South Downs Way 50, Coastal Challenge Costa Rica and New Zealand’s Tarawera Ultra-Trail T102, and won the Ultra-Trail du MontBlanc CCC – the shorter, 100km version of the iconic 171km Alpine race. But at the professional end of the scale, 100-milers such as the Western States are 33

Tom Evans

“Science doesn’t lie. There are no miracles on race day” considered the ultimate race distance, and it’s in these events that he’s looking to push the boundaries of the sport. When competing, Evans explains, he thinks of each race as a story in which he’s the main character, creating an action-packed narrative in real time. “The [story of a] race has to be written about you,” he says. “It doesn’t matter what other people are doing. Being on the podium is brilliant, but to achieve that you can’t just sit back and let it happen around you; you need to make decisive moves. That has to be the headline, for me as a runner but also as a human.” If, as Evans says, his approach to ultrarunning is the same as his approach to life, then in the same way that life isn’t a race to the finish, the satisfaction the athlete gets from excelling at some of the world’s toughest trail-running races is about more than punishment in pursuit of a podium – even one he’s long lusted after, such as the Western States 100. It’s also about the journey – or the story – of even the toughest races, and the sheer challenge they pose. “I go into races knowing there will be a point where it is going to be hard,” he says. “But when things get tough, I really enjoy finding out a little bit more about myself.”

t was this mix of decisiveness and curiosity that led Evans to become a pro athlete, something he’d never planned as a career. His first-ever race entry was the consequence of a bet made back in 2017, when he was a British Army captain in the Welsh Guards. While on a night out at the pub, Evans boldly declared to some friends who’d entered the Marathon de Sables – the super-tough 251km desert ultra – that he’d run it too, and beat them all. True to his word, he did what he could to prepare in just four months. And when he found himself out in front on the first day, Evans thought, “Why am I leading this race? Am I going too hard?” He ended up taking third place, his pals merely finishing in the top 300. Later that year Evans came fourth in the Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc CCC, and when he won the same event in 2018, he made the decision to leave the military and make a go of ultrarunning full time. From the outset, Evans adopted a slightly different approach to what had gone before. Traditionally, ultrarunners have run with the finish line at the forefront of their mind, without a huge 34

RUNNING THE DATA Physiologists at Loughborough University’s Performance Centre measure Evans’ levels, including his VO2 Max – the maximum rate of oxygen consumption during extreme exertion

LOCAL LEDGE The 31-year-old knows that all the mental and physical coaching at Loughborough, and every hour spent training on the treadmill or here on Beacon Hill, will prove crucial come race day

focus on pace and race specifics. But that approach didn’t make sense for Evans who, even before joining the military, was meticulous about his training regime. At the age of 13, as a promising cross-country runner and rugby player growing up in East Sussex, he would devise his own interval-based training plans and log his times in handwritten diary entries. He has a keen interest in sports science and the use of data analytics, which, until recently, physiologists predominantly used to drive improvements at track events. Evans wondered what would happen if you took that scientific knowledge and tailored feedback and 36

applied it to endurance running, to push speed and performance on the trails. “Athletes have more data available to them than at any point in history,” says Harris, adding that the insights these numbers yield are of particular interest in endurance sports with a steady intensity, such as an ultrarun, Ironman or a long bike ride or swim. “With Tom, we’re measuring his physiological response to determine how hard his body must work to run at a certain pace. Energy in a race is like a bank balance: go too hard too quickly and you’ll [drain] your funds. We want to help determine his race pacing and give him a steer on nutritional strategy.” THE RED BULLETIN

Tom Evans

“The story of a race has to be written around you”

For Evans, the benefits of this data-driven approach are simple. “Science doesn’t lie,” he says. “The data gives you a really succinct and detailed approach as to what is going on in your body, so that when you get into a race you know physically what you’re capable of doing. There are no miracles on race day.” Before the Western States 100, Evans spent time in the Performance Centre’s environmental chamber, a sealed lab with a treadmill where temperature and humidity can be tweaked, allowing him to acclimatise to the conditions he’d encounter during the race. Much of the race was THE RED BULLETIN

run in temperatures around 30°C, despite the cooler conditions at the start. “I spent time getting comfortable being uncomfortable,” Evans says. “You want to know your physical and psychological limit so that you can work out how much you can take.” At his Loughborough home, Evans worked on a thorough, almost military-grade, reconnaissance of the Western States 100 course for months ahead of the event. He’d first entered the race in 2019 and come third, but he knew he wanted to return and win it one day. COVID and a stress fracture injury prevented this until last year, the delay only making his desire to win even more acute. Evans printed out pictures of key sections to familiarise himself with the course, saved scenes from the race as screensavers for motivation, and programmed his treadmill to match the climbs and descents of the race to the very last contour. “It was like Zwift but on the treadmill and with me staring at a white wall,” he says. “Running on a treadmill is super-boring and psychologically really tough, but it makes the race so much easier. You have the reassurance of knowing you can run a certain distance of climb at a certain pace, but [in a race] you have these incredible mountain vistas which provide an amazing distraction.” He also moved to Flagstaff, Arizona – a city more than 2,000m above sea level – for three months to train at altitude. Evans says it’s about giving his training this “specificity”. “Tom is the terrifying combination of extreme talent and extreme discipline,” says Dylan Bowman, one of America’s top ultrarunners of the past decade, and host of The Freetrail Podcast. “He leaves no stone unturned. Before UTMB [in 2022], he told me about the analysis he’d done to account for the reduced light resulting from a 30-minute start-time delay. My response was, ‘I’d be scared to race against you.’ At the sport’s top level, nobody else is thinking that way.”

p on Beacon Hill, a picturesque country park with a high point of 248m, just a short drive from the Loughborough campus and close to his home, Evans is leaping between rocks for the camera, something he doesn’t usually do outside competition. But, relaxed and affable away from the rigours of training, he’s happy to accommodate. Hardly one of the UK’s hilliest counties, Leicestershire wouldn’t seem the ideal training base for an elite trailrunner wanting to perform well in mountain races. But Evans believes his proximity to some of the world’s leading sports scientists gives him an edge over the competition. And the terrain, which ranges from jagged volcanic rock to ancient woodland to a field inhabited by fluffy alpacas, allows him to focus on getting the basics right. “I find it really difficult to improve my baseline fitness if I’m in the mountains, as I don’t want to do the boring runs there,” he says. “I want to do the really amazing ridgeline runs that aren’t that good 37

GOING THE DISTANCE Evans is focused on the 171km Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc in August – “the pinnacle of 100-mile ultrarunning”

Tom Evans

“In ultras, your mind will give up before your body” for training. Here, I can focus on the foundational training, which is exactly what I need.” Evans is still recovering from an incident that no amount of practice could prepare him for. Just a month before our shoot, while in South Africa ahead of the Ultra-Trail Cape Town, Evans was mugged at knife-point during a training run. “It was such a shock,” he says. “I hadn’t felt unsafe at any point, so when it happened I almost thought [the two men] had slipped and ended up on top of me.” Finally realising the danger, Evans’ Army training kicked in and he fought the attackers for what he says felt like a long time but he knows probably wasn’t. “As soon as you’ve got this long, sharp knife pressed into your neck, there isn’t much you can do,” he says. Evans’ wedding ring, watch, phone and headphones were stolen, but, beyond a big cut on his neck and some bruises, he escaped otherwise physically unscathed. He left the country the next day and didn’t take part in the race, which saw three other runners mugged and their shoes stolen. “It is what it is,” Evans says. “When something like that happens, the ability to go from one mindset to the next quickly is pretty important. It definitely brought back some things from the military that I hadn’t dealt with, so I’m using professional help to deal with that. It’s really important to be able to open up and talk about it.” For Evans, seeing a psychologist has long been an essential part of his routine, as important as his running coach, strength and conditioning trainer, and performance physiologist. “I want to be a master of my sport,” he says. “I do a lot of reading and spend a lot of time learning, but these partnerships with my coaches are really important. My psychologist is a sounding board, someone who isn’t a family member or friend, who is going to tell me the truth rather than just what I want to hear.” After all, Evans says, “In ultras, your mind is going to give up before your body.” Although he credits his mental endurance in part to his Army training – “As an athlete you can stop whenever you want, whereas in the military you didn’t really have a choice; you were part of a bigger picture” – Evans believes anyone is capable of running 100km if they can get over their mental barriers. “[An ultra-distance race] is less about the physical fitness and more about how tough you are mentally,” he says. “Of course I have times I want to give up, but you only have that thought for a second or two, because you remember all the work you put in and you’re expecting it. I prophesied it

was going to be hard and, funnily enough, it is hard. Let’s acknowledge that thought and embrace it.” Ultrarunning races are so arduous that Evans will only race two or three times a year. This means that unlike a footballer, for instance, who might play more than 40 games a season, he doesn’t get much opportunity to put different techniques or rituals into practice. But he knows every session on Beacon Hill, on a treadmill or with his psychologist will prove crucial come race day. “It’s not the best athlete who’ll win these races,” Evans says, “but the best prepared. That’s what makes it interesting.”

aving ticked a milestone win at the Western States 100 off his list – something he describes as a “dream come true” – this year Evans is focusing on August’s 171km Ultra-Trail du MontBlanc, a race in which he finished second in 2022. “The pinnacle of ultrarunning is the 100-mile distance,” he says, “and the pinnacle of 100-mile races is UTMB.” As ever, Evans will put his all into preparing his body and mind for the challenge, but he says he’s still able to retain a healthy sense of perspective. “I absolutely love what I do, but it’s important to remember it’s only a race,” he says. “When you’re in the supermarket the next day, no one knows who you are or cares where you came.” Evans and his wife of just over a year, Team GB triathlete Sophie Coldwell, are mutually supportive of each other’s training and racing demands. But when training ends, he’s just as disciplined about the time he spends away from his sport: “A lot of people put all their eggs in one basket and have nothing outside of sport. Whereas I finish training, go home and I’m not an athlete any more – I’m a human and a husband and a dog dad. I was gardening yesterday for three hours. And we have chickens. When I’m away I want to make sure it counts, but when I’m at home I want to be present.” At the end of each race, Evans performs a trademark salute – not just a nod to his military past but a show of respect to Sophie, his family, and the support team who help him excel in a sport he would recommend to anyone. “You’re immersed in nature and the most incredible environments, among a non-cliquey community,” he says. “If you’re aiming for a three-hour marathon and run 3:05, in your eyes you’ve failed, but in ultrarunning you can test yourself physically and mentally and do things you didn’t think were possible, and no one will ask how quickly you ran.” Evans also hopes the stories he writes with each race can help even those with no appetite for ultrarunning redefine their idea of what’s possible in life – because, for him, the approach is the same. “Whether it’s in sport, family, friendship, business, whatever, you don’t need to abide by the limits that have been set for you,” he says. “Go out and find what your own limits are.” Instagram: @tomevansultra 39

With an X-wing aesthetic and hydrofoil technology, the futuristic all-electric boats in the new E1 SERIES are set to revolutionise the world of competitive powerboating. And the athletes driving them are as green as the tech Words TRISTAN KENNEDY

Photography SHAMIL TANNA

GEORGE MONK

CHARGING AHEAD

ELECTRIC DREAM The RaceBird, shot at sunrise during E1 Series pilot training on Lake Maggiore, Italy, in December last year

The RaceBird is the world’s first fully electric powerboat FLIGHT ACADEMY The RaceBird at full speed during a practice session at E1’s ambitious training school

E1 Series

GEORGE MONK

riss Kyle is not afraid to admit that he’s scared. Terrified, even. Four years ago the 31-year-old, widely recognised as one of the best BMX freestyle riders of his generation, jumped from a helicopter onto the 321m-high Burj Al Arab building in Dubai. Then, on December 2022, he spun front flips in a specially designed skatepark dangling beneath a hot air balloon 640m above the Cotswolds, with only a parachute to protect him. But here, standing barefoot on the beige tiles of a swimming pool in a suburban leisure centre in northern Italy, he is, to use his own blunt idiom, “fucking shitting it”. The object striking terror into this bravest of Scottish hearts is a full-scale fibreglass replica of a racing-boat cockpit, a training device in which Kyle is about to attempt a ‘dunk test’ – a simulated capsize. Upside down, underwater, and strapped into his seat with a five-point harness, he will have to locate the emergency air supply, a scuba regulator, and then remain calm as the cockpit fills with water, allowing him to push open the hatch and escape. Kyle has never done any kind of diving before. In fact, he says, “I can’t even swim that well”. Why would such a seasoned pro, so comfortable in his own sport and his heavily tattooed skin, subject himself to this kind of torture? As Kyle takes a few minutes to psyche himself up for the task, powerboating coach Claire Toohey, an unflappable 53-year-old from Ireland, explains, “If he doesn’t do it, he doesn’t get in the boat. It’s that simple.” “The boat” Toohey is referring to is the RaceBird. It’s the world’s first fully electric powerboat, and the first to use

THE RED BULLETIN

SURFACE TENSION Kyle prepares for his dunk test, with guidance from powerboating coach Toohey

hydrofoils – wing-like protrusions that lift the craft clean out of the water as it gathers speed. This futuristic, zeroemissions vehicle – part boat, part X-Wing fighter from Star Wars – forms the basis of E1, a new race series that aims to turn the polluting world of powerboating on its head. The sheer ‘wow’ factor of the RaceBird, along with its environmental credentials, has helped E1 attract interest from people you wouldn’t associate with boat racing. Tennis megastar Rafa Nadal, all-American quarterback Tom Brady and the Ivorian football legend Didier Drogba have all signed up to be team owners. Red Bull Racing’s Formula 1 driver Sergio Perez is also on board, and shortly before his star turn in front of 1.4 billion compatriots at last year’s World Cup, Indian cricketer Virat Kohli threw his cap into the ring. The championship has even signed up

top-selling salsa crooner Marc Anthony and superstar DJ Steve Aoki as team owners. Aoki was persuaded to join in part because his late father raced boats, but mostly because of the spectacle. “When you see these electric powerboats just flying, just hovering, it’s like you’re literally looking into the future,” he says. It’s not only the all-star cast of team owners or the revolutionary nature of the boats that make E1 different, but the way the pilots, as they’re known, are being picked. From the outset, the organisers were committed to gender parity, requiring each team to field one man and one woman. And because their craft is unlike anything built before, E1 decided to look beyond the ranks of existing powerboat racers for its recruits. Throughout autumn 2023, they have invited 44 professional athletes from a huge variety of disciplines to attend their unique academy and try 43

LEARNING CURVE (From left) Ordóñez, Kyle and Hansen in the academy’s classroom

out for a spot on the starting grid. Swedish rally drivers, Kuwaiti jet-ski champions, and even a Spanish Le Mans veteran who got his break playing Gran Turismo on the PlayStation 3: all have come to the E1 training base on Lake Maggiore, north-west of Milan, and all – so far – have passed the dreaded dunk test. Finally, Kyle can postpone it no longer and straps himself into the replica cockpit. The ill-fitting red swimming cap on his head makes the BMX icon look almost comically uncomfortable. But a few seconds later it’s all over. “Fuck that!” he says as he pulls himself, dripping, onto the side of the pool. He’s smiling, though, and thanks the coaches and crew before padding off to get changed. Only then does Toohey show the video from a previous dunk test, when motorcycle trials champion Laia Sanz became tangled in the harness and had to be rescued.

“Alejandro and Rodi’s brief for the boat design was just, ‘Make it wow’” Sophi Horne

andwiched between the motorracing Mecca of Monza and the ski slopes of the Alps, Lake Maggiore has long been a playground for the rich and famous. The E1 circus rolled into town last April, setting up a testing and training base at the Marina di Verbella on the eastern shore. Parked up next to the marina’s pleasure boats, the RaceBird looks like it’s just flown in from outer space. Its green livery leaps out amid a

GIVING E1 WINGS RaceBird designer Horne

sea of yellowing fibreglass. Even with its X-wing-style foils submerged, the boat’s elegant lines speak of a need for speed. The learning curve at E1’s training academy is ludicrously steep. The course, designed to be completed in just five days, was created by Toohey herself. Trainees start in a classroom, where they’re taught the elementary skills needed to obtain a basic powerboat licence, such as mooring and knot tying. From there, they progress to a Joker Boat – a leisure craft – then to a high-powered racing RIB (rigid inflatable boat) called a Puma, before finally climbing into the RaceBird. “You would never normally put someone from this to that to that in five days,” Toohey says. “It’s like learning to drive then jumping into a Ferrari and then a Formula 1 car.” With several of the 44 selected athletes coming from a powerboating background, and only 16 seats available, these outsiders know their chances of securing a ride are slim. But the prospect of testing out this unique vessel is too tempting to resist. “It’s such a cool opportunity, I’ve come with an open mind,” says Kyle. “This is so different. Everyone’s going to find it hard.” Standing on the wooden jetty, Kyle looks up to the challenge as he pulls on a sleeveless orange jumpsuit and adjusts his white crash helmet. Squint and he could almost be Luke Skywalker. By contrast to the previous evening’s dunk test, the bike star is raring to go. The foils stay submerged as Kyle cruises out of the marina, following a noisy Joker Boat that chugs along as support in a fug of two-stroke fumes. At the wheel is Lino di Biase, a grey-haired powerboat veteran who has won multiple world championships. Next to him, race engineer Dean Clark is analysing a baffling array of real-time performance data on the same Advanced Telemetry Linked Acquisition System (ATLAS) used in Formula 1. On the bank, two elderly fishermen cast their rods into the water, seemingly unperturbed by this vision of the future that’s passing right beneath their noses. When the convoy reaches the main body of the lake, trainer Matilda Wiberg presses the talk button on her air traffic controller headset: “OK, Kriss, you’re clear to go.” There’s a cognitive dissonance when watching the RaceBird gather speed. The craft starts flying almost instantly, lifting THE RED BULLETIN

GETTY IMAGES

E1 Series

RACE READY (From top) the RaceBird undergoes maintenance checks in a marquee outside the E1 hangar; Piria prepares for a practice session on the lake THE RED BULLETIN

SPACE RACE The RaceBird’s sleek design, which has drawn comparisons to a spacecraft, has already won the powerboat some famous fans

E1 Series

GEORGE MONK

right up out of the water, with clear air visible beneath the bottom of its hull and the lake. But, in contrast to every other powerboat ever built, it produces almost no sound. The key to maximising the RaceBird’s speed is to keep it flying on the foils through each turn. This requires a delicate balancing act with the throttle: drive the boat too slowly and you won’t generate enough lift; push it too fast and the foils will generate too much lift. If they get too close to the surface, foils no longer have enough water flowing over the top to function and the boat splashes back down in a clumsy bellyflop. Cruising up and down in a straight line is one thing, but as soon as Kyle tries to tackle the corners, he loses his balance. The hull hits the surface with a smash, sending up an enormous plume of spray, and the engine shrieks as the boat bounces up and down, ‘porpoising’ like a poorly designed Formula 1 car. On the support boat, Wiberg smiles. “I can hear him cursing even when he’s not pressing ‘talk’.” With a maximum speed of 50 knots (93kph), the RaceBird can’t compete with conventional racing boats in a battle of straight-line speed – but E1 isn’t interested in straight lines. The RaceBird’s strength lies in its manoeuvrability and tight cornering – the kind Kyle is currently trying to master – which will make for more dynamic racing. Because it skims along above the water rather than through it, the RaceBird also creates very little wake. Combine this with the lack of noise pollution and you have a craft that’s less disruptive to marine life than regular speedboats. It’s also less likely to erode beaches, banks or historic waterfront buildings. Traditionally, powerboat racing has taken place miles offshore, but E1’s hydrofoils can race much closer to the coast, allowing spectators to follow the action from the waterfront. With eight teams in the championship, there will be four boats going head-to-head at any one time in what promises to be an

Its elegant lines speak of a need for speed THE RED BULLETIN

ON CALL Trainer Wiberg whips the rookie powerboat racers in shape

action-packed showcase for the power of all-electric watercraft. Through its Blue Action Programme, E1 is aiming to leave a positive environmental legacy in every city it visits. As well as building a network of electric charging points, which other boats will be able to use, E1 plans to partner with local authorities on ocean restoration initiatives in the future. “We want to work with universities, local NGOs and regional and national governments,” explains Professor Carlos Duarte, a marine biologist who serves as E1’s chief scientific consultant. “The ambition is that the level of investment will eventually be similar to the investment in the race itself, so five to 10 million US dollars.” The inaugural, seven-race season will stage races in iconic waterfront cities including Monaco, Geneva and Rotterdam, followed by a finale in Hong Kong in November. In Venice, where the championship will land in May, the island city’s mayor has promised to lift its strict 20kph speed limit for the event. But none of this will be possible, of course, without pilots trained and ready to race. “You feel it when you hit a bit of chop!” Kyle says, with session one complete. “You’re on the edge of your seat. I was gripping that steering wheel like it’s a set of handlebars. I spent a lot of time fighting the boat, but when you get a good lap it feels great. It’s like railing a corner on a mountain bike – literally like railing a berm.”

ilot training is just one part of the complicated process of getting E1 shipshape and ready for the first season. The slick videos being shared on social media by E1’s superstar backers belie a lot of high-speed paddling. The team behind it, however, are nothing if not well qualified. The boats themselves are the brainchild of Norwegian designer Sophi Horne. As founder, chairman and head of design of Seabird Technologies, at the age of just 28 she’s fast becoming one of the most prominent women in the maledominated world of yacht design. “My inspiration actually came from birds,” she explains. “My family have a holiday house in Sweden, overlooking the water, and the whole aerodynamics came from that – you have the bird’s beak that is quite pointy like a needle, and then the wings are the foil section.” Horne was an early adopter of electric vehicles – “I bought my first, a BMW i3, maybe 10 years ago,” she says – so she already had a good idea of the technology’s potential. After spending a summer trying – but mostly failing – to fix the knackered engine on her family’s Askeladden motorboat with her father, she hit upon an idea: why not build an electric boat, one that would be less noisy, less smelly and less prone to breaking down? In January 2019, Horne pitched her ideas to Alejandro Agag, the founder of two existing electric racing championships – Formula E and its off-road equivalent, Extreme E – at an ‘ePrix’ race in Marrakesh. A former member of the European Parliament, the 53-year-old boasts a bulging contact book that spans the worlds of sport and politics. Initially, Agag “didn’t seem very interested”, Horne says, but a few months later he called with an offer of investment. Agag helped Horne hire a team for her fledgling startup – the name Seabird Technologies was inspired by the terns she’d seen at her Swedish holiday home – which included his friend Rodi Basso as CTO. A trained aerospace engineer, Basso had studied at NASA, worked in F1, and first met Agag while employed by McLaren Applied Technologies, where he built batteries for Formula E. “I think Alejandro respects my ability to manage complicated, if not crazy, projects,” Basso says. The E1 championship – a joint venture between Basso as CEO, Agag as 47

chairman, and Horne as head designer – was Basso’s idea. It would provide the perfect launch platform for Seabird Technologies, he argued, and just as electric race cars were helping drive the development of commercially available EVs, it would play a part in “accelerating the electrification of the marine industry”. All they needed was for Horne to tweak her original plan for a familysized Seabird boat and create a more nimble, single-seat version: the RaceBird. “The brief that Alejandro and Rodi gave me was just, ‘Make it ‘wow’,” Horne says, laughing. Her eye-catching new design, combined with Basso’s engineering skills and Agag’s pedigree in electric racing, soon caught the attention of investors. Within a year, PIF – Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund – had bought a major stake in the championship. Having invested vast sums in buying Saudi football clubs, and stars such as Cristiano Ronaldo to play for them, PIF has been accused of sportswashing: spending big on entertainment to distract from the Kingdom’s human rights record. It has also been accused of greenwashing. Professor Duarte, who works in Saudi Arabia, accepts that some suspicion of

“You’re not boating, you’re flying” Lucas Ordóñez the series’ environmental credentials is inevitable. But he’s quick to defend E1. “We need to get our act together to face challenges like climate change, but, for many of us, the only big unifier is sports,” he says. Professor Duarte has worked with other sporting bodies as well as E1, including the Spanish Olympic Committee, and his long experience has taught him that “when it’s a sports hero that talks about climate change, that message resonates much, much more”. E1’s potential to drive electrification in the marine industry is important, he argues, but its real environmental impact will come from its power as a tool of communication. As Agag points out, if you include the reach of both the athletes and the team owners, “we will have well over a billion followers

SEA CHANGE Hansen is accustomed to a cockpit, but usually only the rally-driving kind

on social media platforms”. Now the pressure is on to deliver.

f Toohey is the officer in charge of E1’s Top Gun-style pilot training academy, then Wiberg is Charlie, the character played by Kelly McGillis in the original 1986 movie. A 20-year-old Swedish powerboat champion with propellershaped earrings, it’s Wiberg’s job to whip the wannabe hotshots into shape and teach them everything they’ll need to know about racing boats – which can be very different from what they’re used to. “I tried to drive it like my rallycross car,” laughs Swedish Extreme E driver Timmy Hansen, recalling his first session in the Puma training boat. “I got pretty aggressive into the corner and I tried to slide a bit, but apparently that’s way over the limit. I was close to flipping it all the time.” When he steps up into the RaceBird for the first time, Hansen can’t prevent a few dramatic belly flops. “It’s so different [from driving a car],” he says. “It’ll take a lot of practice.” Not only is the boat more difficult to drive than it looks, it feels much faster than it really is. “Imagine you’re doing 200 in the road car on a bumpy highway – that’s kind of what it feels like at 40 knots,” Hansen says. “It’s pretty violent when you crash down.” He soon gets the hang of it, though, and by the final session of the day he’s moved up to Torque Map 5, the boat’s fastest setting. There’s a natural rhythm to the training days, dictated by the requirement for the RaceBird to be put back on charge after every hour on the water. Between sessions, the trainees have time to compare notes. “You were fast,” Kyle tells Hansen, laughing. “Maybe too fast.” They may be fellow students now, but these highly competitive individuals know there’s a chance they could end up going head-to-head in the championship itself. Wiberg says she’s been impressed by everyone so far. “The racing drivers like Timmy are great at understanding how to get the fastest turn,” she says, “but Kriss is doing really well with balancing on the foils, and I think that reflects the way he keeps his balance on a bike.” The would-be pilots are helped by the fact that the boat, like a jet fighter, is flyby-wire – there’s no mechanical strength required to drive it, which is one of the reasons men and women can compete on an equal footing. It helps, too, that the controls are intuitive. With light-up purple THE RED BULLETIN

E1 Series

existing boat. “We called her Frankie, short for Frankenstein,” Horne recalls. “She was not a good-looking craft.” The latest RaceBirds, by contrast, are sleekness personified – even when lying in pieces at the Seabird factory, waiting to be assembled. Just a short drive from Marina di Verbella, this cavernous warehouse space is a hive of activity, with a highly qualified team swarming around five new carbon-fibre hulls like mechanics in a pit lane. “Ninety per cent of the guys are ex-Formula 1, Formula E or Le Mans,” says technical operations manager Chris Bluett. Whether or not the boats’ drivers will have the same high levels of competence remains to be seen. But Toohey has faith. “These athletes are so used to absorbing information at high rates,” she says, “that I think even if it was tiddlywinks they’d be champions.”

B ZOOM CALL Kitted up with his jumpsuit and helmet, Kyle is ready to get out on the water

and green buttons, the steering wheel looks more like an XBox controller than an aeroplane yoke. “But it’s completely different to anything I’ve driven in my life,” says Spaniard Lucas Ordóñez, a former Le Mans driver – and a boat owner himself – who’s training alongside Kyle and Hansen. “With this thing, it’s not boating any more, it’s flying.” Vicky Piria, another of the trainees, knows what it’s like to drive new vehicles, having raced in Formula 3, GT championships and the now-defunct W Series. But even she is apprehensive about racing something this new – especially because in the real-life races they’ll be up against three other boats, all jostling for position. “What worries me is overtaking, just the risk of contact,” says the Italian. “It’ll be more overwhelming driving with other boats next to you.” Piria has previous when it comes to high-speed crashes. In 2022, she broke her coccyx when her GT car suffered suspension failure at 260kph. “As soon as THE RED BULLETIN

I touched the brakes, the car completely lost control,” she says. But Piria’s parents were more scared about her trying out for E1. “When I told them, they were like, ‘No, you’re not doing that!’ I think what worries them is the electric side of things because, you know, electricity doesn’t like water,” she laughs. The obvious question of how to make a high-voltage battery safe in the water was solved relatively quickly, according to engineer Clark. The battery is “a box within a box”, suspended from eight fixings in its own carbon-fibre housing, he says. Finessing the shape of the foils, however, took years. The earliest versions were simply bolted onto the hull of an

“It’s nothing like driving a car” Timmy Hansen

y his fourth and final session in the RaceBird, Kyle is showing real promise. As he flies by, tapping the controls to keep the boat pitch-perfect, the only sound is a high-intensity hum and the soft, cassette-tape hiss of the foils slicing through the water. Watching from the support boat, Wiberg is impressed. “They’ve all got to a really good level by the end of the training,” she says. “That’s our goal, because you want a competitive race series from the get-go.” Soon, the mechanics must put the boat back on charge before getting it ready for the next batch of athletes. With only one day’s basic training each, Kyle, Ordóñez and the others will return to their day jobs, unsure whether they’ll ever again step into a RaceBird. The teams are still to be picked, and schedules and contracts negotiated, meaning the final line-up is far from decided. Whatever happens, Kyle says, it’s been an incredible experience: “To be one of the people who are even considered to be a pilot is cool – it’s so new and unique.” And despite his dislike of the water, he’s even thinking about buying a boat: “Maybe even an electric one.” Out on the water, Kyle makes his last few turns as di Biase looks at his watch. Like the old pro that he is, he’s been taking lap times for each of the athletes. As Kyle shoots round again, he mutters to himself in Italian, “È bravo, questo ragazzo.” Or, as Han Solo might put it, “Not bad, kid.” e1series.com 49

POLE POSITION Fresh from her trailblazing Antarctic speed record, PREET CHANDI reflects on the unique buzz of shattering world records – and cultural expectations Words MARK BAILEY

HARPREET CHANDI

Slide away: Chandi pulls her heavy sled across a vast expanse of ice during training in Iceland in September 2021

Preet Chandi

hile many people were snuggled up watching Home Alone at Christmas, Preet Chandi was alone in the frozen wilds of Antarctica. Battling temperatures of -30°C and vicious 60mph polar winds, the British Army medical officer from Derby was on a secret personal mission to become the fastest woman to ski solo and unsupported to the South Pole. Chandi departed Hercules Inlet, on the western edge of Antarctica, on November 26, 2023. The 34-year-old dragged her 75kg sled, loaded with fuel and freeze-dried food, for 12 to 13 hours a day, hauling it over huge sastrugi (wind-sculpted snow ridges). Despite nursing a painful, cold-inflicted calf

wound, she completed her 1,130km odyssey, arriving at the South Pole on December 28, after 31 days, 13 hours and 19 minutes. Her electrifying time, currently being verified by Guinness World Records, is set to shatter the previous record: 33 days, two hours and 53 minutes, achieved by Canadian Caroline Côté in January last year. “I’m exhausted, but proud I made it,” says Chandi. “Even when the expedition was going well, I didn’t know if I’d be able to maintain the speed and distance. The beauty of Antarctica is breathtaking. But it is huge. And it could wipe you out in a second. You don’t conquer Antarctica; you just hope it will let you do the journey you want to do.” THE RED BULLETIN

HARPREET CHANDI, ANDREA ASTARITA/CANADA GOOSE

Balancing act: (above) sleds teeter on the edge of a crevasse during training in Greenland in August 2020; (opposite) Chandi in the Swiss Alps last October

“I’m proud that I pushed my boundaries, and I want to inspire others to do the same”

“Antarctica is breathtaking. But it’s huge. And it could wipe you out in a second”

Preet Chandi

Icy determination: (opposite) in the Swiss Alps, October 2023; (above, clockwise from top) a Twin Otter plane drops Chandi off at her starting point in Antarctica last November; training in Norway in February 2020; digging a hole in the snow in the Cairngorms that same month

ANDREA ASTARITA/CANADA GOOSE, HARPREET CHANDI

Polar pioneer

Until just a few years ago, Chandi knew nothing about polar exploration. She was enjoying her work as an Army physio in Buckinghamshire, providing rehabilitation for injured soldiers. Having served on Army expeditions in Nepal, Kenya and South Sudan, and competed in ultra-marathons, she was already fit and strong. But she began to crave a deeper personal adventure. “I wanted to do something big, but I didn’t know what,” Chandi recalls. “When someone suggested Antarctica, initially I was like, ‘Not a chance!’ I don’t even remember learning about it at school. But [the idea] stuck in my head. The appeal was that I didn’t THE RED BULLETIN

know anything about the place. That was exciting for me.” Since those first dreamy reflections, Chandi has broken multiple polar records. On her first expedition to Antarctica, over the winter of 202122, she skied 1,100km to the South Pole in 40 days, becoming the first woman of colour to complete the journey solo. A year later, she returned for an epic trans-Antarctic endurance expedition: between November 13, 2022, and January 23, 2023, Chandi skied 1,484.53km from the Antarctic coastline to the South Pole and beyond. After 70 days and 16 hours spent dragging her 120kg sled, she finished with two Guinness World

Records – for the longest solo, unsupported, one-way polar ski journey by a woman, and the longest solo polar journey in history. Chandi’s heroics earned her an MBE, and she was named 2023 Explorer of the Year by the Scientific Exploration Society. But after whipping up a media storm with her shock triumph, she kept her recent speed expedition secret to limit the pressure. “I hardly told anyone,” Chandi says. “But honestly I didn’t think I would go back so soon. It took me a while to recover after the last expedition. But I want to push my boundaries. As I started to feel better, I thought, ‘What if?’” 55

Mission accomplished: (clockwise from top): Chandi poses at the South Pole at the end of her record-breaking expedition last December; a selfie in goggles on her first solo Antarctica trek, winter 2021-22; a snowbound sled on that first expedition; having her ‘polar thigh’ wound cleaned at Royal Derby Hospital in February last year

THE RED BULLETIN

Preet Chandi

Breaking boundaries

Chandi, who is of Punjabi Indian heritage, is accustomed to breaking boundaries. From joining the Army at the age of 19 to plotting polar expeditions, she has faced the opposition of family and friends who questioned her desire to swap a conventional life for a world of adventures. She was often called rebellious. “Why don’t you get married?” asked friends. But Chandi is happy to be different. “I’m proud that I pushed my boundaries, and I want to inspire others to do the same,” she says. “Seeing girls dress up as me for World Book Day – it doesn’t get better than that. One of my biggest motivations on the ice was the thought of inspiring others. If someone like me – someone who thought this world of adventure wasn’t for them – can do this, then you can do whatever you want, too. That’s a really powerful message. Hopefully what I did will encourage others to do things that aren’t the norm, things discouraged by their community or family. It is scary to do something when everyone around you disagrees. But I’m so glad I didn’t listen to the people who told me no.”

HARPREET CHANDI

Into the unknown

Before her first polar expedition, Chandi Googled logistics companies who could provide her with flights and fuel, and spoke to experienced adventurers such as record-breaking British explorer Ben Saunders. Her fiancé Dave Jarman, an Army reservist, helped to set up her ‘Polar Preet’ website, and she sought help from the charity Team Forces. “This isn’t something I dreamt about, so I needed to learn, and that’s OK,” she says. “But when I went on my first polar skills training course in Norway, I realised, ‘Actually, I know how to navigate and put up a tent.’ In life, there are always crossover skills.” Chandi packed on 15kg of body fat and muscle to survive the extreme cold and physical challenges she’d face. “I would actually drag tyres to work and put them in the parking spot at work, then drag them home,” she laughs. But when she first applied to Antarctic Logistics and Expeditions for help with her cross-Antarctic endurance mission, she was rejected THE RED BULLETIN

“Would I do it again even if I knew I wouldn’t make it? Yes, 100 per cent”

The 70-day trek was horrifically hard. “I was in so much pain on that final day,” Chandi recalls. “By this point, I’d got ‘polar thigh’ [a severe cold abrasion wound, so named because of its usual location] on my calf, and the skin had broken down. I’d had horrible neck pain since day five, caused by looking at my compass. And I was rationing my food, so I was starving. I’d lost 20 kilos. I saw the plane as this tiny dot in the distance, just 0.2 nautical miles [0.37km] away, but it took for ever to get there. At the finish I didn’t feel proud, just relieved.” Chandi had broken the endurance record of 1,469km, set in 2015 by former Army officer Henry Worsley. But she fell short of her original daring ambition to ski coast-to-coast across Antarctica. At first she was upset, but she now recognises that you can shift your goalposts and still triumph. “Emotionally it was hard, and there was this voice telling me I’d failed,” she recalls. “But would I do it again even if I knew I wouldn’t make it? Yes, 100 per cent. Because I’ve shown people how to chase your goals. And what are 70 days in a lifetime?”

Hot spot: on a tour in South Sudan, January 2019

Speed star

due to a lack of experience. So Chandi opted for a ‘simpler’ solo ski expedition to the South Pole to gain experience. That first 40-day expedition brought extreme highs and lows. “Some days you look around and think, ‘Wow, this is really amazing,’” she recalls. “But that trip also taught me how to manage my body. One day, I started hallucinating – suddenly there was a dog with me, and a little old lady. I was patting myself down and thinking, ‘I can’t wake up!’ That can get dangerous. So I put up the tent and went to sleep. I was exhausted.” Reaching the South Pole showed that rejection can be the start, not just the end, of a life goal. “I can’t explain how it felt to get to the South Pole,” she says. “I thought, ‘No way did I just make it!’” Now armed with experience, Chandi returned a year later for her longer transAntarctic endurance attempt. “It’s so hard spending 70 days alone,” she says. “But it’s good to step out of your comfort zone. It is daunting, but it becomes less so each time. And the growth you experience is unmatchable.”

On her return to England, the explorer had to undergo a skin graft to repair her cold-ravaged calf. This painful wound was still a concern during her latest speed expedition, so Chandi had an extra layer sewn into her base layer to protect it. But the biggest challenge on her speed attempt was, of course, how to maintain her record-breaking pace. “I had to constantly weigh up my effort and how long I’d ski every day,” Chandi says. “Too long or too quick and I would burn out; too slow or too early a finish and I’d miss the record. In dark moments, I just concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other.” Unlike other explorers, Chandi likes to talk about her wounds, doubts and fears, because it shows she’s normal. “I want to be relatable,” she insists. “I don’t want others to think, ‘I could never do anything like that.’” Since returning to England, she’s already craving new adventures. “I can’t see myself stopping,” Chandi says. “I have that fire in me. I just want to see what I’m capable of.” polarpreet.com 57

STAGING A REVOLUTION

Just as breaking is set to achieve recognition as a sport at this year’s Olympics, one man is pushing it in another direction – to be treated legitimately as high art. For Jonzi D, it’s been a struggle – and a joy – for two decades

Words ALICE AUSTIN Photography DAVID GOLDMAN

Rock steady: Gully South Block and (this page) MOVER at Breakin’ Convention 2023 in London

Breakin’ Convention

A 60

Strike a pose: Séréna Freira of French collective La Diva aux Pieds Nus

the bass music pounds out from the speakers, he transforms from human to superhuman, melding the grace of ballet with the brutality of breakdance. Later, Litambola explains how Gully South Block is an amalgamation of a few different dance troupes – some from London, some from Birmingham. He’s been dancing krump for well over a decade, having discovered the style at a pivotal time in his life. His brother had been murdered on his estate, and Litambola was on the brink of going down the wrong path. But he joined a dance troupe, Wet Wipes Squad – he describes them as his angels – and went on to become one of the UK’s foremost krump dancers. “So Gully South Block is like a reincarnation of these different troupes,” he says. “We’re like the next generation of krumpers.”

Breakin’ Convention, the annual hip-hop dance festival that Litambola and his crew are rehearsing for, is a breeding ground for next generations. This spring weekend in 2023 it’s the 20th anniversary, so the festival’s creator, Jonzi D, has gone all-out. Over the course of three days, around 30 acts will perform across three stages. A lot are homegrown, but others are jetting in from South Korea, the US, the Netherlands, France and Brazil. There are rap workshops, beatbox battles, breakdance acts, a park jam, and two grand performances on Saturday and Sunday night, showcasing mind-boggling body-bending in a multitude of styles. A lot has happened since that first festival two decades ago. Many of the original acts have gone on to win Olivier Awards, or broken world records, or starred in national TV shows. Back then, THE RED BULLETIN

PAUL HAMPARTSOUMIAN

few members of Gully South Block are huddled beside the main stage of Sadler’s Wells Theatre. The rest of the 30-strong dance crew are busy rehearsing at the famous London venue; this group, meanwhile, are caught up in the specifics of where in the city each of them is from. “I’m East.” “South-west.” “East. Canning Town.” “Canning Town’s far, man,” says South-west. “Yeah, but it’s not like Dagenham,” says Canning Town. “When man says they’re from Dagenham, I’m like, ‘You fine, bro. You chillin’. But you ain’t London, you Essex.'” At this point, his name is called over the microphone, and a few seconds later he’s doing a full-body routine so complex it looks like stop-motion animation. “That’s krump,” says East, aka Bill Litambola. “It’s from the US, and it’s kind of graceful and beast-like at the same time.” It’s an apt description. The young men and women throb in unison, speeding up then slowing down like they’re powered by the same remote control. Each body part moves separately, seamlessly, rippling with the subtlety of pebble-skimmed water. Then Litambola’s name is bellowed over the loudspeaker and he jogs to the front of the stage. He’s broad, with the poise and presence of a leader, and when

Jonzi D’s name is synonymous with Breakin’ Convention

You may be ready physically, but if you aren’t ready mentally too, you THE RED BULLETIN

Breakin’ Convention

It’s the festival’s 20th anniversary, so creator Jonzi D has gone all-out Radical movements: (opposite) La Diva aux Pieds Nus; (this page) east London crew Boy Blue, who performed at the inaugural Breakin’ Convention back in 2004

a festival dedicated to hip-hop theatre was groundbreaking enough, but getting it hosted by Sadler’s Wells – a 340-yearold theatre that had helped birth the Royal Ballet and English National Opera – well, that was unheard of.

onzi D is as synonymous with Breakin’ Convention as Michael Jackson with moonwalking. On Friday afternoon, Sadler’s Wells is in the process of getting ‘hip-hopped’. A man in a protective mask spray-paints ‘BREAKIN’ CONVENTION’ in purple, gold and brown letters on a wall near the theatre entrance. Jonzi bounds over. “You alright, mate?” he says to the artist. “Thanks a lot for coming. Really appreciate it.” The man lowers his mask, revealing a bright smile. Despite the pair never having met before, there’s an instant connection. The artist tells Jonzi he’s from the Netherlands and met his wife

on Facebook through an online breaking community. They fell in love and had a long-distance relationship between Sydney and Utrecht before finally getting married. “Hip-hop culture changed my life, man,” he says, earnestly. “It doesn’t discriminate. This culture is sacred.” Jonzi nods, wearing a smile so big it could split his face in two. Around five foot eight tall and permanently delighted, the Breakin’ Convention founder doesn’t walk so much as bounce, chatting to just about everyone he encounters, with the pronunciation and diction of a performer and the accent of a cockney. Born David Jones in Bow, east London, Jonzi – the youngest of six siblings – was 12 when his big brothers played him a track by electro-funk crew Soulsonic Force. His next exposure to hip hop was a documentary showing young guys spinning on their heads and spitting bars into a mic. “What was amazing was they

Crews control: Breakin’ Convention’s omnipotent director Michelle Norton

looked just like me,” Jonzi says. “I saw a reflection of myself doing something groundbreaking, and I felt so proud.” From that moment, he was empowered to dance. “At the time, it was literally street culture: we were putting cardboard on the pavement and dancing on it.” As Jonzi’s interest grew, he felt torn between the studios and the streets. “Dancing in a studio was corny,” he says, “so I felt guilty when I trained in contemporary dance and classical ballet. I felt like I wasn’t real.” But his training made him question why hip hop wasn’t in these studio spaces. “That’s when I started to accept that the term ‘high art’ is divisive, hierarchical and exclusionary,” he says. So he set to work disrupting it. It was the late ’90s, and Jonzi began using the contacts he’d made during his studies to kick down doors. His first event was a spoken-word/hip-hop dance show at The Yard Theatre in Hackney Wick, east London, then he invited South African crew Soweto Skeleton Movers to perform at Euston venue The Place, and in the early 2000s he assembled dancers for annual cultural celebration The London Festival; he also set up Open Art Surgery, a hip-hop dance-theatre professional development programme. By 2004, these initiatives had culminated the first Breakin’ Convention. “We were the first in the country to devote a whole festival within these ‘high art’ venues directly to hip-hop culture,” Jonzi says. “Not just dance, but graffiti, rap and all of hip hop’s artistic elements.” For Jonzi, Sadler’s Wells felt like the obvious choice. The central London venue, typically dedicated to ballet and contemporary dance, married his two worlds: the studio and the streets. Michelle Norton, Breakin’ Convention’s director, is an omnipotent presence over the weekend. She’ll greet a dance troupe at the main entrance and, seconds later, be in a heart-to-heart with a marketing coordinator. She’s like Breakin’ Convention’s scaffolding, and she’s been there since day dot.

Many of the acts from the first BC went on to win Olivier Awards THE RED BULLETIN

Breakin’ Convention

Norton first met Jonzi in the ’80s on Soho’s hip-hop club circuit, where she danced with such fervour she was signed up by an agent and went on tour with Soul II Soul. She’d just graduated from South Bank University as a mature student when Jonzi called to say he was staging a hip-hop dance-theatre festival and could do with an extra pair of hands. “When we did the first Breakin’, it was the first time anything like that had happened in theatre on that scale,” she says. “We took over the whole building – it’s hard to imagine how different that was back then.” The biggest challenge, says Norton, has been keeping the event accessible to its target demographic. “It’s hard to reach people,” she says. “I live in south London and I do fitness training, and I ask people who are into dance if they’ve heard of Breakin’ and a lot of them haven’t.” Sadler’s Wells is so far removed from hip-hop culture that the community don’t think to look for it there. The event is recognised in the international dance world as one of the best in the game, but Norton wants a church dance troupe in Tottenham or a youth centre in Croydon to know about it, too. “People might read Sadler’s Wells and automatically see it as a barrier,” she says. “But walk around this building when it’s Breakin’ Convention and the whole place just comes alive. It’s such a buzz.”

t’s Saturday afternoon, and the buzz Norton mentioned is making Sadler’s Wells’ walls vibrate. Every race, age, ethnicity and ability is represented. Accessibility is a priority, inclusivity a given. On a balcony, a beatboxer in thickrimmed glasses and a flat cap replicates the entirety of The Weeknd’s Can’t Feel My Face using nothing but his lungs and a mic. Just a metre away, a graffiti artist abseils down a wall, orange paint dripping down after him. At 6pm, the crowd files into the main hall. Jonzi’s entrance on stage is met with applause and friendly heckles. He does some fancy footwork and someone in the standing section yells, “Still got it!” Jonzi laughs and launches into a poem full of memories that span the course of the past 20 years: “Hip-hop culture the premise is. Racism is our nemesis. Peace, love and unity for ever is. Until the end of this. Let’s remember this. 2004: posh vibes exorcised by enforcers. Skills from around the world and around the corner. Who remembers Salah with the Vagabond

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Flipping the script: Samuel ‘Samuka’ da Silveira Lima of ILL-Abilities

Every race, age, ethnicity and ability is represented Crew? The Electric Boogaloos? Tommy the Clown? Zoo? And the mighty Boy Blue?” The audience, deeply familiar with Breakin’ Convention’s legacy and the artists it has championed, respond loudly to every name. Then the lights dim and Echo enter the stage. All dressed in white, the dance troupe move as one organism, first quickly then slowly, like they’re on fast forward or rewind. The music is so bass-heavy, the theatre seems to shake. Not that the audience notice – they’re too mesmerised by the performance.

Echo are a newly formed dance company, part of Breakin’ Convention Youth, a group set up for 10- to 21-year-olds. Youth manager Shay Rafati, aka rapper Shay D, grew up in Hornsey, north London, where, she says, “people were stabbin’ each other up for no reason”. Rafati got involved with youth work in her early twenties, around 15 years ago, when a singledecker bus owned by drum’n’bass artist Lady MC rolled onto her estate. The bus was decked out with a self-powered recording studio with nine MacBook Pros and a performance space. “I remember going up to them and asking if I could volunteer,” Rafati says. “Then I got a job with The Complete Works Independent School [an east London school specialising in flexible, inclusive teaching and the creative arts] and they asked me to run workshops in rap. I was like, ‘Does this even exist?’” Rafati’s workshops had instant impact. “I’d had trouble in school,” she says. “I 65

The music is so bass-heavy that the theatre seems to shake Spin city: this B-boy and his MOVER crewmates have travelled all the way from South Korea to take the spotlight at Breakin’ Convention

Breakin’ Convention

graffiti and DJing. This will coincide the breaking’s debut at the Paris Olympics. “We only formed our youth dance company this year, but we’re already dancing at the festival,” Rafati says. “They’re so talented, man. They’re sick.”

Guiding light: Shay Rafati, manager of Breakin’ Convention Youth

was a bit naughty and didn’t really have my dad around. So I could connect with a lot of the young people. I could teach them how to avoid the mistakes I’d made.” When she talks about the young people she works with, Rafati’s compassionate nature shines through, and she’s devoted to her current role managing Breakin’ Convention Youth. She joined eight years ago after an unconventional interview process. “Jonzi started beatboxing, then I started rapping,” she says. “I got a call the next morning to say I’d got the job.” Throughout the year, Rafati runs workshops teaching kids how to rap, dance, create music videos and perform, and she gets very attached to them along the way. “We know their parents, we know who’s felt suicidal, we know who’s linked with who,” she says. “We’re very invested in their lives and progress.” Bringing these young people into spaces like Sadler’s Wells helps them acclimatise to professional dance spaces, though at times they don’t feel altogether welcome. “Companies want diversity, but when they get it they’re scared of it,” Rafati says. They don’t have a specific THE RED BULLETIN

space to rehearse, and Rafati remembers having to wait in the lobby one afternoon with one of her youth groups. “There’s, like, 30 young people, the majority of them Black boys, and they’ve come in wearing hoodies because it’s cold – it’s February. They’re loud, joking around and having fun, and people keep coming up to us like, ‘Please can you move?’ And I’m like, ‘This is our home, too.’” Very soon, Breakin’ Convention Youth will have a place of its own. In 2024, Sadler’s Wells will open the Academy Breakin’ Convention (ABC) at its new venue in Stratford. They’ll offer aspiring hip-hop artists a two-year intensive training course in the fields of dance,

“We’re invested in the lives of these kids” Shay Rafati

cho set a precedent for the rest of the evening’s performances. After Gully South Block tear krump a new one, MOVER from South Korea glide onstage, tying themselves up in knots while rotating on their heads and hands for a good 10 minutes. Ghetto Funk Collective from the Netherlands combine ’80s New York nostalgia with forwardthinking funk dance, while UK trio Threading Theatre treat the audience to a brand-new dance form, moving, gliding and sliding through each other’s looped arms, never once disconnecting. Kevin and Keith Smith – aka The Legendary Twins who, as part of DJ Kool Herc’s original B-Boys and B-Girls in the Bronx in 1972, essentially invented breakdancing – present a tearful Jonzi with an honorary award from the New York State Assembly, thanking him for his contribution to hip-hop culture. Then French collective La Diva aux Pieds Nus (The Barefoot Diva) show Sadler’s Wells just how powerful women can be, while ILL-Abilities, an international troupe of dancers with disabilities, demonstrate how a limited number of limbs is no barrier in breaking. Max Revell, winner of the 2019 BBC Young Dancer Award, performs a poignant solo piece on the struggles of success, undulating his body around a floating briefcase, his suit, shirt and tie worn backwards. And finally France’s Les Twins and their crew Criminalz round off proceedings. The group, who regularly back Beyoncé, almost bring the house down with their humour-filled, whip-sharp moves to a glitchy remix of Britney Spears’ Baby One More Time. Jonzi D bids farewell to deafening applause, leaving the audience with a clear message: no matter who you are, where you come from, whatever challenges you face or hurdles are in your way, Breakin’ Convention’s got you. This is a festival for the community, by the community, and no matter how many years go by, that’s a convention that will never break. Breakin’ Convention 2024 is taking place at Sadler’s Wells Theatre, London, on May 4-5; breakinconvention.com 67

You’ve probably heard JACOB COLLIER’s music even if you don’t know his name, and the award-winning composer and producer already has all of your favourite artists on speed dial. Here, the 29-year-old Londoner talks about his musical journey, creating a 100,000-strong choir, and playing footie with Stormzy Words STEPHANIE PHILLIPS Photography BENEDIKT FRANK

LIFE IN COLOUR 68

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Bright spark: Jacob Collier, photographed for The Red Bulletin in London in November 2023. He wears a jumper gifted by a fan after a show in Sydney, Australia

Centre of attention: legendary producer Quincy Jones, jazz icon Herbie Hancock, SZA and Stormzy are among Collier’s many big-name fans in music

Jacob Collier

n an east London studio in late November, multi-instrumentalist, composer and producer Jacob Collier is being given a piggyback across the room by his manager. It’s not the scene you might expect when meeting an awardwinning musical talent so unusually gifted he can count industry behemoths such as Quincy Jones and Hans Zimmer as fans and collaborators. But that’s almost the point. The 29-year-old Londoner is about as far from the stereotypical, ego-fuelled A-lister as you can get. Instead, he’s warm and wide-eyed, bounding around in the brightly coloured attire he’s known for. Today it’s a jacket with fur sleeves, star-emblazoned trousers, and mismatched aqua and yellow Crocs. It’s an apt visual introduction to the wonderfully unique Collier, whose inquisitive nature and open-hearted approach to the world have seen him win five Grammys and become one of the most sought-after collaborators in music today. The young talent was raised in a musical household: his mother Suzie Collier is a violinist, conductor and teacher at the Royal Academy of Music in London, meaning he began his journey at an early age. “I came at music almost like a second language as a kid, because my mother is such a resplendent musical force,” Collier says with an ever-present smile. “When I was coming into the world, it just made a lot of sense to express shapes, forms and sensations through sound.” Collier is largely self-taught and, over the years, has turned his hand to a multitude of instruments – the piano, guitar, mandolin and double bass, to name just a few. As a teenager, he began uploading his experimental one-man, multi-instrumental, multi-harmony covers to YouTube. Then, in 2013, one video – his take on Stevie Wonder’s Don’t You Worry ’Bout a Thing – went viral and changed his life for ever. The clip caught the attention of music legend Quincy Jones, who signed Collier to a management deal and became his quasimentor, saying of his protégé, “I have never in my life seen a talent like this.” Following the release of his debut, In My Room, in 2016, Collier recorded the three-volume Djesse series of albums – the title is a pun on his initials – working with a wild array of stars including Laura Mvula, Oumou Sangaré, Daniel Caesar and

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T-Pain. With each album, Collier explored new musical territory, ricocheting from laid-back jazz and bombastic funk to orchestral arrangements and pop-centric R&B. His deep harmonic explorations and experimental compositions have led some to view Collier as a wunderkind. Legendary jazz pianist Herbie Hancock likened him to a young Stravinsky, and when Hans Zimmer asked Collier to help score the 2017 movie Boss Baby, the German composer said of him, “There’s musicianship and then there’s genius, and then way, way, way above all that, out in the stratosphere, is Jacob Collier.” Collier has also earned the respect of artists such as Stormzy, SZA, John Mayer and Coldplay’s Chris Martin, who have all brought the prolific artist into the studio to add a touch of ‘Jacobean’ magic, as it’s been termed, to their sound. His deep understanding of harmony was taken to new levels while on tour in 2022, when Collier recorded his audiences and made them central to his aural experiments. The results can be heard in his cover of Elvis Presley’s Can’t Help Falling in Love, a deeply emotive piece that incorporates a choir of 100,000 voices and demonstrates not only Collier’s impressive composing skills but the innate musicality in all of us. Despite touring the world, amassing millions of social media followers and earning accolades from practically everyone, Collier has yet to enjoy a mainstream hit in his own right. But his ambitions aren’t those of most mainstream artists. “The popular idea is that you measure success by how many people you reach,” he says. “I would measure success by how many of the people I reach that I move.” As he prepares for the release of a final, fourth instalment in the Djesse series, featuring artists including Yebba, Kirk Franklin and Shawn Mendes, Collier shares his thoughts on using music as a form of expression, playing footie in Crocs with Stormzy, and where he wants to go next as an artist… the red bulletin: What’s your earliest musical memory? jacob collier: It’s a fun one. I remember sitting on my mother’s lap, looking up and seeing the violin above me. It was like a ceiling, because she played it with me on her lap, so

“I continue to find new ways of seeing and listening to the world” 71

Jacob Collier

I was right inside the music. That, as a sensation, doesn’t really leave you. Do you view music as a form of expression, or a means of communication? Both, I think. It’s like a language, in a sense. You can reach into the world, into yourself, and find ways of expressing and explaining the way you see things. Music is best learnt how language is learnt: surrounded by masters of that language. I grew up surrounded by people who were playing, talking about and expressing music, and that felt like a way of finding myself in the language. Your mother is a violinist, a conductor and a teacher. How important was she to your musical development? Massively. She was one of the founding pillars [for me] of how music could feel. I remember going to see her conducting – she’s an extraordinary conductor – and watching her stand in front of a group of about 50 students at the Royal Academy of Music in London, watching her move her body and initiate the sound. It’s an amazing thing to see as a child. When I think about my musical development – and I’ve gone on to do all sorts of things across many different kinds of music – a lot of the expressions that feel right begin and end with that vision of a person like my mum, who can be so positive, giving, warm and knowledgeable about her craft. She’s able to not just communicate to the people but get it out of the people themselves. You’ve said your mum taught you that, if you listen, everything in the world is singing to you. That’s such a beautiful concept. How did you interpret that advice? I continue to find new ways of seeing and listening to the world. As a child, a lot of the world can be quite big and unknown. In a sense, anything that sings to you is your friend, not an enemy. Knowing that even these big, scary things I don’t understand are singing… to me, it’s like an encouragement that everything in the world can be spoken to and listened to as a confidant. Going to school – and school is filled with all sorts of weird people – you’ve got the kids who want to be big and strong, kids who are going to be bullies and want attention. Going through all of that and it all being a song is really powerful, because it teaches you to alchemise the world into your own goals – to live life the way you see it. You got your break performing covers on YouTube as a teenager. Does that help you relate

“My mind is full of crazy colours and crazy ideas” to younger artists who are now finding an audience on TikTok? Ten years ago, when I came up, internet culture was very different from how it is now. When I found YouTube as a tool to share some of these multiinstrumental, multi-vocal, pretty unusual renditions of popular songs that were highly crafted and intentional, I used [the platform] as a way to express that. Now, I think that creators are used by the social media platforms a little bit more, so TikTok kind of eats up creators – it’s a business. Sometimes I see these young creators and I think, ‘I couldn’t be more different from you, because I’ve never tried to compete with other people.’ That’s not to say that I don’t exist within other people’s worlds and that I haven’t been inspired by tonnes of [other musicians]. But TikTok is not necessarily equipped, or doesn’t seem to prioritise, people who are making quiet, gentle work on their own terms. You launched a collaboration with Crocs in 2023. Why do you love them so much? Because they’re super-comfortable. I’ve worn nothing but Crocs for the last five years. I can think of probably 10 to 20 times I’ve worn any other shoes – like when I was taking driving lessons. You can’t do that in Crocs, but basically everything else you can. Actually, I once took a penalty against Stormzy in Crocs, and that was disastrous: the ball went extraordinarily wide. So I also wouldn’t recommend playing football in them. You’ve said previously that Djesse Vol 4 would be a space for untapped ideas you haven’t yet found a home for. What kind of ideas were you playing around with? Vol 4 is the culmination of all the things I’ve learnt in the last five or six years while travelling the world and collaborating with all these different kinds of people. I went on a world tour, and one of the things I’ve been getting into is recording my audiences singing some of my favourite sounds. [In 2022] I captured every audience singing and I used those recordings to create a choir that’s 100,000 voices tall. That, as a feeling, a sound and a statement, has really motivated this album in a big way. The audience experiments you’ve conducted (in both senses of the word) demonstrate there’s an

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Pick and mix: fun, eclectic and unconventional, Collier’s sense of personal style mirrors his unique approach to music

Jacob Collier

– that doesn’t exist. All people need is to feel part of a group, part of a community, and just be given permission to give it a try. Collaboration is central to your music, and you have worked with an enviable list of artists. How do you choose who to work with? I didn’t necessarily go into it with a very solid plan. There was definitely a dream list of collaborators, but I didn’t plan how I wanted all the music to sound. The only criteria are like, “Do I love and respect you? Yeah. OK, let’s work together.” You’ve been around so many amazing artists – were there times you wanted to pinch yourself? Every day. I think one of the privileges of being friends with some of these legends – people like Quincy Jones, Herbie Hancock and Hans Zimmer – is the stories these people tell you. You wouldn’t believe them. Quincy’s sitting there saying he was having lunch with Picasso and then Igor Stravinsky walked by, and you’re thinking, “That’s inconceivable – you were around my age when these people were kicking it in Paris.” It’s wild.

Star-spangled banter: fans often gift the musician items at his gigs, such as the custom-made ‘Djesse’ bracelet he wears here

innate sense of musicality in everyone. Did you know it would work? I don’t think, “Right, I’m going to get the audience to sing in three parts.” I just find myself on stage, I find things that work, and then I’m done. When I played Glastonbury [in 2023] it was my first time, and there were 30,000 people. I’d trained for that moment, to get the audience to move in certain ways, knowing that none of them are musicians, just people of the world. The beautiful thing was that I got them in three parts without saying a word to them. That was one of the moments when I really realised like, “Wow, this is for everyone.” Music is for everyone. There’s no line between “I’m a musician; I’m qualified” and “You’re a person; you’re not qualified”

“I took a penalty against Stormzy in Crocs. Disastrous” 74

Looking back, how does the 20-year-old Jacob Collier differ from the person you are now as you approach your thirties? The main change from 20 to 30 for me is not a musical one but a human one. By the time I was 20, I knew quite a lot about music, but I hadn’t necessarily lived it out. I remember being obsessed with Brazilian music, with samba and the way the groove feels like it’s rolling like an egg. It’s beautiful, but I hadn’t been to Brazil. So it’s like, you go to Brazil and you feel that music in your body and you collaborate with Brazilian artists, speak to them, and then you really know how samba feels. You’ve achieved so much at a young age – what do you foresee in the next stage of your life? I think one of the biggest challenges will be just creating some space for life to take me by surprise. The last 10 years have been extraordinary by anyone’s standards, but they’ve also been very constant and full-on. I haven’t really had a break once in that whole time – well, a couple of holidays here and there, but really it’s just been constant vision and constant work. It’d be really important and fun in the next few years to experience life that doesn’t feel so urgent. How do you relax during downtime? I can’t think of the last time I chilled out for a while. My mind is full of crazy colours and crazy ideas, so part of the decompression process for me is just letting those ideas come out. But a good game of badminton will always do me right. Jacob Collier’s new album, Djesse Vol 4, is out on Decca/Hajanga in February, and he’ll be performing in Manchester and London in December; jacobcollier.com THE RED BULLETIN

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JESS CLARK, PHILIP LARKIN

JESS CLARK

Enhance, equip, and experience your best life

SHRED THE MED

Island crossing by bike and ski, Corsica

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“The cloud thickened, swallowing the 2,352m-high peak in a milky haze and making navigation by sight impossible. It was clear this trip would be no walk in the park”

eaving the couloir – a narrow, sheltered gully – I track left, opting for a more exposed but solid scramble up the ridge. Ice axe in hand, I move carefully. My expedition partner and boyfriend Philip Larkin follows closely behind. Our target: the summit of Monte Cinto. At 2,706m high, it’s Corsica’s tallest peak, and the culmination of our 11-day early-spring traverse of the mountainous Mediterranean island. Basing our route on the GR20 – the 180km trail that traces Corsica’s granite spine and is renowned for being Europe’s toughest long-distance hiking path – we’d aimed to avoid the summer crowds and experience the trip in solitude, swapping walking boots for touring skis on the snow-capped peaks. Our backcountry exploration would be linked by bike on the lesser-known GT20 cycle route, creating a unique and untested adventure combining 300km of skiing and riding and 12,000m of elevation gain. We knew the out-of-season, multi-modal crossing wouldn’t be without logistical challenges, so my mum Jane was enlisted to help by transporting our ski gear or bikes in the car between transitions. Our journey had begun 110km south – as the crow flies – of the Cinto massif in the ancient clifftop citadel of Bonifacio. A maze of narrow, cobbled streets, it was the perfect playground for nimble gravel bikes. Leaving the harbour with the warmth of the mid-March sun on our backs, it was hard to imagine we would ever need our skis. For three days we made our way inland, up hills dappled with terracotta roofs and through hibernating villages. Our bikes ferried us north along the smooth tarmac to our first swap in the car park of the Val d’Ese ski resort, where it felt like we’d switched seasons – from spring to winter – as well as bikes for touring skis. Venturing into the unknown on our skis, we were treated to stunning panoramic views, from the beaches of Corsica’s capital, Ajaccio, up to the snow-topped mountain of Renoso – our first summit. 78

Stored energy: (from top) outside the oldest shop in Corte; Clark treks down to Canaglia THE RED BULLETIN

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JESS CLARK, PHILIP LARKIN

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MATT RAY

JESS CLARK

Switching gear: Clark tours up to Monte Renoso; (below left) Larkin on the ride from Vizzavona to Corte; (opening page) a rewarding descent of Monte Rotondo on skis

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The snow’s consistency was somewhere between cream cheese and granita, with patches of earth still visible above 2,000m. The cloud thickened, swallowing the 2,352m-high peak in a milky haze and making navigation by sight impossible. Worse still, our skis’ skins began to slip on wind-buffed ice. Struggling to hold an edge, we reluctantly transitioned to crampons. It quickly became clear this trip would be no walk in the park. Emerging from a blanket of cloud, we were greeted at the isolated summit by a large iron cross bathed in golden light. Daylight at a premium, we mapped our descent to Ghisoni. Icy and disappointing as it was, we couldn’t help but smile at the novelty of skiing down while watching the sun setting over the beach. The following days brought more of the same: long hikes to the tree line with

too much gear, only to find that the melt beyond had been extensive, making skiing impossible. With our spirits at rock bottom, a local friend shared news of a 2,000m peak still in condition near Corte. Interest renewed, we got on our bikes and headed north to the clifftop citadel nestled amid the craggy mountains of central Corsica. Once the capital, this enclave remains a symbol of the island’s resilience. We took the opportunity to immerse ourselves in Corte’s rich culture before bedding down for an early start. The 3am alarm told us it was time to set off for Monte Rotondo (2,622m) on our (so-far unsuccessful) quest for Mediterranean skiing. As we scrambled by headlamp in the valley, the sun rose to expose a backdrop of rugged white peaks. My heart sang – perhaps our plan was not in vain. Rotondo served as a 79

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How to get there

stronghold for resistance fighters during World War Two and is a snapshot of the island’s untamed beauty. Soon, we were on our skis and in T-shirts, sweating beneath the already beating sun. Reaching the peaceful summit, we had the whole range to ourselves – coming from Chamonix, this was an unfamiliar luxury. We were rewarded with soft spring snow for the ski down, too, and celebrated that evening with a feast of local cheese and figatellu (smoked sausage) before our final and most anticipated ascent, Cinto. Two days later, bathed in twilight again, our head torches guide us up a remote 4x4 track beyond the bergeries of the village of Lozzi to Cinto’s snowline at 1,500m. It would be a long day, but our eagerness to sit atop Corsica drives us on. Ice axes in hand, crampons at the ready, my composure is challenged by 80

Island life: picture-perfect villages nestle amid Corsica’s towering granite peaks

Jess Clark is a Chamonix-based sports model and environmental scientist with a passion for multi-sport adventures. She is part of the British Adventure Collective and recently launched a nonprofit, Summit Safe, to raise awareness of exposure to the radioactive gas radon in the Alps. Instagram: @jess.k.clark THE RED BULLETIN

JESS CLARK, PHILIP LARKIN

Slope and glory: Clark skis down Monte Cinto – the pinnacle of her Corsican adventure

wet snow: one slip could be fatal. A false summit forces a nerve-racking downclimb. I look back anxiously as Philip balances on the toes of his ski boots. It’s clear he wasn’t an ibex in a past life, and doing this ropeless is pushing his confidence to the limit. Minutes feel like hours, but we reach solid ground and locate the right route to the summit. The pitch mellows. I raise my gaze to the sound of prayer flags fluttering on the crest’s cross marker. This is it: the pinnacle of our adventure. Snow-capped peaks surround us, with turquoise waters lapping the coastline far below. Smiling at the lunacy of it all, we share a well-earned embrace before signing the summit register and focusing on our descent. The southern face towards Asco reveals nothing but rock, dirt and inevitable misery, so we double back and are rewarded with the best skiing of the whole trip. While not the deepest snow or fastest pitch, it’s undoubtedly one of the most memorable descents of our lives – skiing alpine terrain with views of Mediterranean beaches on the horizon is a real first. Boarding the ferry to the mainland, I reflect on our mission. Corsica’s turbulent history and untouched landscapes have left an indelible mark on my heart, igniting a desire to keep skiing in even more peculiar places. But the trip has also been a testament to the beauty of adaptability and the richness of exploration.

JESS CLARK

The Mediterranean’s fourth-largest island, Corsica is easy to reach from mainland Europe and has four airports, although direct flights are less frequent outside the summer months. It also has eight ports – we loaded up the car and took the ferry from Livorno in Italy to Bastia

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Running at night presents unique challenges for the urban athlete. From eye-catching technical layers to fluoro kicks, this is kit you’ll want to be seen in

Going dark Photography DANIEL CHEETHAM 82

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Prep like a pro “Marco has found a way to perform at the highest level through routine, even in the most stressful situations,” says York-Peter Klöppel (pictured), head of mental performance at the Red Bull Athlete Performance Center in Thalgau, Austria. “Now find your own anchor.”

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Stay grounded

World Cup champion and Olympic gold-medallist ski racer Marco Odermatt has found a winning formula. Here, the 26-year-old reveals how to train your mind for victory

“In Switzerland, when we learn to walk we learn to ski,” says Odermatt (pictured). “As a kid I dreamt of becoming a ski racer, but I was never good at the important races. At the point where you really have to perform, I couldn’t do it. “Changing that was a process. I started early on with mental training and found for me it’s about the preparation: every training day or race is different, but I have the same routine for the 10 minutes before the start of every race. “I start with the warm-up: we inspect the run, then I go through it in my head many times and really visualise the track. I usually get into my bubble – race mode – maybe three or four minutes before I start. Then it’s just pure 92

focus and good memories, good thoughts, which are important things to have in my mind. “[The Beijing Olympics in 2022] was the most important race of my career to date. I’d had a really disappointing first week, and it all came down to my last chance in the giant slalom, where I was the favourite. I felt the pressure of not yet having a medal. It was meant to be cold and sunny, but we woke to bad weather – 20 centimetres of fresh snow. “After the first round, I was leading, which was good but also the most difficult [starting position] for the final runs. Then the fog came in and the race got delayed. I’d slept badly, so I took a nap between those two runs. I stayed in the

“I have the same routine before I start every race” Marco Odermatt, Olympic skiing champion

restaurant, and the other athletes were telling me, ‘You have to go to the start!’ I said, ‘No. I’m taking it easy today.’ “I inspected the run as usual before the race. In the starting area, the weather was dark and ugly. Everybody was nervous. But I was super-calm somehow. I entered the start gate, my one goal to win this medal. I just knew I had to do everything the same as always. I thought good thoughts and got my mind ready. “The race was very difficult – you couldn’t see the bumps. But I’m an athlete who goes all-in. I put my whole mind and my body into the race, and I found the flow, started taking risks. When I got to the finish and saw the number one, the relief and the emotions [were huge]. Every situation is different, but I found I can still perform. That gives me a lot of confidence today.”

Listen to Odermatt’s full interview on the Mind Set Win podcast; redbull.com

“Think about something that helps ensure you can perform at your best each day. It could be a coffee in the morning, the kiss goodbye to your partner… Then use that the next time you face some adversity, to ground yourself and get back into your comfort zone.”

No change “Stick to it, avoiding new behaviours. For example, if I usually have cereal for breakfast I should still have that on the morning of, say, a job interview. And if I don’t drink a lot of coffee, just because I’ve slept badly I shouldn’t then drink three cups, because that could upset my whole system. Things can go wrong and there can be adversity. It’s about finding the anchors you can keep the same.”

Scan the QR code to hear the Mind Set Win podcast THE RED BULLETIN

SANDRO BAEBLER, DAVID MARTINEZ

Racing thoughts

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VENTURE Equipment ELECTRIFY

Sub-zero speed Swerve the snowmobile on the mountains this winter – climb aboard the MoonBike, the world’s first electric snow bike

If the e-bike has taught us anything, it’s that strapping an electric motor and battery to a traditionally humanpowered machine instantly amps up the fun, accessibility and adventure potential of any ride. In the world of snow sports, things haven’t been quite so simple, however, as the performance of electric batteries is hampered by sub-zero conditions. This was an issue Nicolas Muron kept on encountering in his quest to create a noise- and emissions-free way to traverse resorts and backcountry at speed.

It was during a visit to his grandparents’ home in the French Alps in 2014 that the idea took root in the aeronautical engineer’s brain. After months spent drawing, plotting and prototyping at the kitchen table, in 2018 the MoonBike was born. Thanks to an innovative propulsion system powered by a 2.5kWh battery and offering 170Nm of torque, the machine’s monoski and 25cm track can handle any terrain, gliding over fresh pow that would leave cars and snowmobiles stranded. And it’s not only for flat or downhills – weighing just 87kg, the MoonBike can tackle inclines with ease. It’s also able to reach speeds of 42kph for up to three hours at a time (with a second battery). Snow sports just got electrified.

moonbikes.com

CHARLIE ALLENBY

Power play: the battery’s temperature is regulated at 10°C by an integrated heat pad, keeping you moving in freezing conditions

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VENTURE Fitness

GETTY IMAGES

CHARLIE ALLENBY

he fitness industry is a non-stop carousel of new trends, techniques and technology, always seeking to improve how we work out, fuel our training, and rest and recover between sessions. What was hot just a decade ago has become a bit of a fitness faux pas (yes, Zumba, we mean you), and the focus is firmly on what’s on the horizon. But maybe it shouldn’t be. Turn the clock back 2,000 years and you’ll find athletes at the peak of their powers, with fitness regimes that could rival those of any of today’s professional sports stars. And even more surprisingly, they used techniques superior to the routine of the average 21st-century gym-goer. Just ask Alexander Mariotti. An expert in gladiatorial combat and a historical consultant for TV and film – including Ridley Scott’s Gladiator sequel, set for release in November – he has spent a career researching how combatants in ancient Rome trained and fought, and has passed this insight on to actors, personal trainers and stunt performers. “There’s a misunderstanding that because this happened 2,000 years ago, we must have progressed since then,” says Mariotti. “But if you look at all of human history, [the Romans are] the people we’re most like. And they had a lot of the things we take for granted, like gyms, saunas, and arenas housing 80,000 spectators.” There’s a misconception about gladiators, too, says Mariotti: they weren’t slaves thrown into the arena to fight to the death, but rather physically superior individuals similar to modern-day MMA fighters, housed, fed and trained in a ludus – a special gladiator school – to beat opponents into submission. From functionality-focused fitness regimes to specialised diets, here’s how gladiator know-how can strengthen your own exercise routine…

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and bunnies, gladiators were big on functional fitness – exercises that strengthened the body for the task at hand. But they utilised another trick to help them feel lighter and move quicker. “To get their stamina and reaction speed up, they would use swords and shields that were heavier than those used in combat,” says Mariotti. A similar benefit can be achieved today by wearing a weighted vest.

Recovery zone

EXERCISE

Pushing it to the Maximus Skip the latest fad workout for that of the gladiator – a mixed-intensity routine perfected over a millennium

Fantastic four

Gladiators’ training was based on the tetrad system – a repeated four-day cycle of toning and short, high-intensity efforts; long, strenuous workouts where you push yourself to your limits; complete rest, and medium-intensity work. “What’s great about this system is that it has huge applications – you could use it in any form of sport,” says Mariotti. “Your body gets a great variety, and you’re not just focusing on one thing like weight training.” The first day acts like a warm-up, he says, which gets the body and mind ready for what’s to come – something missing from popular modern-day workouts such as CrossFit: “Today, we go straight to

“Gladiator training could be used in any sport” Alexander Mariotti, historian

the gym from work and hit these incredibly intense workouts without any preparation between the two, which can cause injuries.”

Worth the weight

Rather than focusing on aesthetics like the Ancient Greeks and today’s social media-obsessed gym bros

A quarter of a gladiator’s training schedule was spent resting, and they certainly knew how to put their feet up. “Romans understood fitness was important – [so much so that] they had free public baths and gyms everywhere,” Mariotti explains. “On their rest day, gladiators would use a caldarium [a very steamy room, similar to a sauna, with a hot bath] and a frigidarium [the cold equivalent].” The fighters would switch between the two, “raising their body temperature before some cold shock therapy”. They were onto something, too: a 2017 study by researchers at the Netherlands’ Radboud University Medical Center found that repeatedly alternating between hot and cold surroundings can help reduce perceptions of fatigue 24 hours after exercise.

Pearl of wisdom

An athlete’s diet was required to fuel all this, and while the gladiators favoured lean protein such as fish, and lots of vegetables, it was another staple that earned them their nickname, hordearii (Latin for ‘barley men’). “They made a stew-like dish with barley, similar to what’s given to sumo wrestlers,” Mariotti says. “[Barley is] better than rice – a great form of energy.” Also an amazing source of protein, this ancient grain is said to lower cholesterol and help you feel full for longer.

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CA L E N DA R

February to 2 March INK

13 February to 19 October BANFF MOUNTAIN FILM FESTIVAL In the world of adventure, the mountain is perhaps its most defining image and the most powerful metaphor for overcoming all odds. The films shortlisted on this tour show it to also be something far more personal. From skiers tracing the footsteps of Kyrgyzstan’s nomadic people to blind climber Erik Weihenmayer using echo location to scale the US’s Sierra Nevada, from accountant-by-day Katie Graham cave-diving in Canada to French MTBer Kilian Bron (pictured) letting rip on the trails, there’s something here even for those of us whose greatest ascent is a staircase. Across UK and Ireland; banff-uk.com

The creative director behind the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2004 Athens Olympics, Dimitris Papaioannou can be described as many things: choreographer, visual artist, experimental visionary... Add elemental force to that CV, as his latest performance-art spectacle floods the stage with hundreds of litres of water. Papaioannou himself takes to the stage alongside German dancer Šuka Horn in this kinetic, dreamlike and body-horror-ish piece of dance theatre, which revolves around a surreal tale of a battling father and son but will mainly leave you with images of a golden wheat field and octopi, and likely needing to go for a pee. Sadler’s Wells Theatre, London; sadlerswells.com

February onwards WALLS ON SILK ROAD Turkey, Iran and Tajikistan share a connection – they’re all on the Silk Road, the overland trade route of antiquity. They were also the locations of three summits Stefan Glowacz wanted to scale within a three-month weather window. The 58-year-old German climber has achieved many first ascents, from Antarctica to Greenland, but this trip was different. In the truck were just two other trusted mountaineers and Glowacz’s son Tim, who doesn’t share his father’s passion for climbing but is an avid filmmaker and documented the expedition. The result is an intimate journey, not just through uncharted terrain, but through the eyes of a father and his son. Watch it on Red Bull TV. redbull.com 96

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TOM GUISE

8 March COPA 71 The first Women’s World Cup took place in 1991 – or so FIFA would have you believe. This film charts the unofficial 1971 Cup, held in Mexico City, when women’s football was banned around much of the world. Narrated by Serena Williams, who co-produced it with sister Venus and USWNT striker Alex Morgan, it’s the extraordinary tale of a tournament dismissed by the sport’s own governing body. At cinemas nationwide

to 27 March BEN FOGLE: WILD Clearly taking after his mother – acclaimed thespian Julia Foster – Britain’s favourite TV adventurer treads the boards at theatres across the UK to share tales of his inspiring outdoor exploits. Touring nationwide; nothird.co.uk THE RED BULLETIN

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Semi-Rad Adventure philosophy from BRENDAN LEONARD

“I rarely step in dog faeces when out for a run – something I’m quite grateful for. I have also not often stepped on a dead animal… maybe never. A friend of mine, Josh, was once running a 340-mile [547km] relay on a paved highway. Josh likes doing it in sandals – sort of like the famed Tarahumara runners – and he was running alongside another guy at night, both of them lighting their way with head torches, when they decided to turn them off and run by the light of the Moon and stars. Which was fine because the road they were on was relatively flat, so you didn’t have to worry about kicking a big rock or something like that, as you might with trail running. But partway through their segment, mid-stride, Josh felt his bare toes touch something that was not road. He clicked on his head torch and looked back at the road behind him. Josh’s foot had just grazed the top of a fairly but not completely flattened dead raccoon.”

The next issue of THE RED BULLETIN is out on April 9 98

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Articles inside

Pushing it to the Maximus

Racing thoughts

CHARGING AHEAD

TRUE GRIT

HIGH SCORER

Lightning, camera, action