The Red Bulletin June 2014 - US

JUne 2014 $4.50

beyond the ordinary

T im Howa r d

r e th o e th A W o r l d C u p s p e c i a l t o u p y o u r s o c c e r I Q

Ja m e s McAvoy F is t f i g h t s, f ig h te r je t s: I t ’s a l l i n a d ay ’s wo r k

footba ll

$4.50 US & Canada 06 June 14

T h e U.S. g o a l i e o n h is te a m’s c h a n c e s

FEEL THE RUN THE NEW NOT THE ROAD GEL-NIMBUS 16 速

Want to run on clouds? Equipped with GEL速 Cushioning technology, runners will float through each mile in the new luxuriously plush GEL- Nimbus 16.

Available exclusively in run specialty stores through June 30, 2014 and at ASICS.com

#BETTERYOURBEST

THE WORLD OF RED BULL

64 David Belle

The mastermind behind parkour shows the sport is just a hop, skip, and a 20-foot jump.

ole, ole, ole

In a matter of weeks, the world’s attention (OK, let’s say most of the world) will be focused on Brazil.

There, in front of some of the most passionate fans in the sport, the planet’s best soccer-ing nations will battle it out—including our never-say-die boys, who find themselves in a group of death with Germany, Portugal, and Ghana. We asked America’s top soccer export (and national team goalie) Tim Howard what Team USA’s chances are, and talked about what he’s managed to do for American soccer players abroad with his long, successful career in the Premier League (p. 26).

Also, X-Men star James McAvoy (p. 34) takes us through what it’s like to be run over by a Prius (in several takes), and we talk (and drop off ledges with) the inventor of parkour (p. 64). Happy reading, and go team.

04

“We’ll have to be playing 100 percent.”

Tim Howard, page 26 the red bulletin

June 2014

at a glance Bullevard 10 what is this Soccer thing?

The World Cup is coming! The World Cup is coming! We’ll tell you why you should care about the beautiful game.

50 Ken Roczen

getty images (cover), jim krantz, Everton FC/PA Images, Julie Glassberg, red bull content pool, getty images, miles donovan (cover) Ryan Taylor/Red Bull Content Pool, Klaus Fengler/Stefan Glowacz GmbH

The German rider tries to make his mark in the most American of sports.

11

Features 26 Tim Howard

The goalie of the U.S. Men’s National Team catches us up on soccer.

34 James McAvoy

The actor gets into some high-flying antics in the next X-Men installment.

38 Rafael Ortiz

Crossing paths with a jaguar en route to a waterfall? It happens.

46 Flying Bach

The Flying Steps dance crew strut their stuff to the music of Bach.

50 Ken Roczen

Sugared bread? Ugh. The rider adapts to living in the United States.

58 Cesilie Carlton

38 RafaEL Ortiz

The extreme kayaker travels to the jungles of Mexico to conquer one of the world’s most dangerous waterfalls.

Women debut at Red Bull Cliff Diving.

Jennifer Lopez

Most World Cup theme songs are terrible. Can J. Lo. break the curse of global disharmony?

62 Metronomy

Fresh off a new album, a new tour.

64 David Belle

I believe I can fly ... right across this gap onto the building across the way.

76 Glowacz /Sharma Going deep to climb to the top.

Action

46 Flying Bach

Combine breakdancing and Bach, and you get a high-flying dance spectacle coming to Chicago and Canada. the red bulletin

76 Stefan Glowacz/chris Sharma

When you decide to climb your way out of one of the deepest caves in the world, there’s no place to go but up.

86 87 88 89 90 91 92 94 96 98

get the gear Mountain bikes training Beach volleyball Music Nas’s top picks nightlife Elites meet in Shanghai My city Montevideo, Uruguay Watches Get some space Games Console yourself buyer’s guide Travel gear save the Date Get up and go magic moment A tight fit

05

Shot with Nokia Lumia 1020

Norwegian ice “First time here in north Norway and it has been really incredible.

We found some amazing terrain here and lots of ice, just ice falls everywhere. And the light is incredible. I have never seen light like this. Just like amazing sunset light all day long.

With the amount of gear I already have in my back for ice climbing, it is great to have the Nokia Lumia along, just to have it in a pocket, when you need to go light and get some shots.

So, after the climb the boys came down and I started packing my gear. I had a quick scan for the pictures and I found some amazing shots on there. Zooming in a picture after, I just couldn’t believe the details we saw in this white shot. Some great stuff, I think.”

– Ray Demski, Red Bull photographer

To learn more about Red Bull PHOTOGRAPHY in partnership with Nokia Lumia visit:

www.redbullphotography.com/partners

NOKIA LUMIA

Photo: Heli Putz

NOKIA LUMIA 1020

Contributors WHO’S ON BOARD THIS ISSUE

THE RED BULLETIN USA (Vol. 4 issue 1, ISSN: 2308-586X) is published monthly by Red Bull Media House, North America, 1740 Stewart St., Santa Monica, CA 90404.

Periodicals postage pending at Santa Monica, CA, and additional mailing offices.

ATTENTION POSTMASTER: Send address changes to THE RED BULLETIN, PO Box 1962, Williamsport, PA 17703.

General Manager Wolfgang Winter Publisher Franz Renkin Editors-in-Chief Alexander Macheck, Robert Sperl Editor-at-Large Boro Petric Director of Publishing Nicholas Pavach U.S. Editor Andreas Tzortzis

klaus fengler

raphael honigstein The London-based soccer journalist and author is best known for his columns about the Bundesliga, the elite German soccer league, as well as for podcast appearances for the U.K.’s The Guardian newspaper. When he isn’t being thrown out of TV studios for making rude gestures, he can be found in Premier League stadiums, reporting on matches for Süddeutsche Zeitung.

In advance of the World Cup, he chats up U.S. national team goalie Tim Howard on page 26.

“I was very impressed by the enormous dimensions of this place,” says German photographer Fengler, about the 525-foot-deep Majlis al Jinn cave in Oman. Fengler followed climbers Stefan Glowacz and Chris Sharma down into the world’s second largest cave chamber. “I had to raise the sensitivity of my Canon D1 X up to ISO 4000,” Fengler says about the shoot. You can take a look at his impressive work on page 76.

Over the course of two days in the small town of Lisses, France, writer Lisetz got a crash course in the “life philosophy” that is parkour from its inventor, David Belle. “I learned how you jump down, fearlessly, from 26 feet up, and leap across 20-foot gaps,” he says. Learning, of course, is not the same as doing, and Lisetz was happy to leave the execution of said moves to Belle and his crew of pros. He had, after all, a story to write, and you can read it beginning on page 64.

08

Copy Chief David Caplan Production Editors Nancy James, Marion Wildmann Managing Editor Daniel Kudernatsch Assistant Editors Ulrich Corazza, Werner Jessner, Ruth Morgan, Florian Obkircher, Arek Pia˛tek, Andreas Rottenschlager Contributing Editor Stefan Wagner Bullevard Georg Eckelsberger, Raffael Fritz, Sophie Haslinger, Marianne Minar, Holger Potye, Martina Powell, Mara Simperler, Clemens Stachel, Manon Steiner, Lukas Wagner Creative Director Erik Turek Art Directors Kasimir Reimann, Miles English Design Martina de Carvalho-Hutter, Silvia Druml, Kevin Goll, Carita Najewitz, Esther Straganz Photo Director Fritz Schuster Photo Editors Susie Forman (Creative Photo Director), Rudi Übelhör (Deputy Photo Director), Marion Batty, Eva Kerschbaum Repro Managers Clemens Ragotzky (manager), Karsten Lehmann, Josef Mühlbacher Head of Production Michael Bergmeister Production Wolfgang Stecher (manager), Walter O. Sádaba, Matthias Zimmermann (app) Finance Siegmar Hofstetter, Simone Mihalits Marketing & Country Management Stefan Ebner (manager), Elisabeth Salcher, Lukas Scharmbacher, Sara Varming Marketing Specialist Kevin Matas Distribution Klaus Pleninger, Peter Schiffer Marketing Design Julia Schweikhardt, Peter Knethl

Anne Ford alex lisetz

Deputy Editor Ann Donahue

Chicago-based writer Anne Ford has been published in the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Reader, and AFAR. For The Red Bulletin, she visited the city’s glorious Lyric Opera House to witness the B-Boymeets-classical-music stylings of the Flying Bach troupe. “Seeing the Flying Bach dancers perform,” she says, “was like visiting a planet where the concepts of ‘gravity’ and ‘body fat’ have never been introduced.” Learn how to fly with the troupe on page 46.

“Did I go home and YouTube ‘How to top-rock’? Maybe.” anne ford

Advertising Dave Szych dave.szych@us.redbull.com

Advertising Placement Sabrina Schneider Printed by Brown Printing Company, 668 Gravel Pike, East Greenville, PA 18041, www.bpc.com

The Red Bulletin is published in Austria, Brazil, France, Germany, Ireland, Kuwait, Mexico, New Zealand, South Africa, Switzerland, the U.K. and the U.S.A. Website www.redbulletin.com Head office Red Bull Media House GmbH, Oberst-Lepperdinger-Strasse 11-15, A-5071 Wals bei Salzburg, FN 297115i, Landesgericht Salzburg, ATU63611700 Mailing address PO Box 1962, Williamsport, PA 17703 U.S. office 1740 Stewart St., Santa Monica, CA 90404, Austria office Heinrich-Collin-Strasse 1, A-1140 Vienna, +43 (1) 90221 28800.

Subscriptions www.getredbulletin.com, subscriptions@redbulletin.com, Basic subscription rate is $29.95 per year. Offer available in the U.S. and U.S. possessions only. The Red Bulletin is published 12 times a year. Please allow 4 to 6 weeks for delivery of the first issue.

For customer service 888-714-7317 customerservice@redbulletinservice.com Write to us: letters@redbulletin.com

the red bulletin

/redbulletin

.50 JU ne 20 14 $4

beyond th

e ordinary

Ti m H o wa r d T h e U. S . g o a l i e o n h i s t e a m ’s c h a n c e s

r e h t o the tball foo

A W o r l d C u p s p e c i a l t o u p y o u r s o c c e r I Q

J a m e s M c A v o y

F i s t f i g h t s, fighter jets: I t ’s a l l i n a d a y ’s w o r k

ONLY $1 PER ISSUE

Subscribe NOW

12 copies

FOR

$ 12

Sign-up today: getredbulletin.com or call 888-714-7317

subscribe

nowls D et ai

Inside

20

14

It’s coming: 64 matches, 12 cities, Brazil, June 12-July 13.

soccer special

RD L u i s SU a R E Z

The Phantom of Rio The best forward in the world will be the most feared man this summer.

10

Ryan Inzana

The shock from 1950 still reverberates in Brazil. Uru­guay won the World Cup that year in Rio de Janeiro, beating the hosts in the final at the Maracanã Stadium in front of 200,000 weeping fans. Brazil burned their old white jerseys after the game and didn’t play another match for two years. That wound may heal with a win for the team, now in yellow and blue, in this year’s final—at the Maracanã. But Urugu­ay is in excellent form, ranked in the top 10, with an attack led by the man who is probably the world’s most dangerous striker right now, Luis Suárez. On the back of his fantastic season for Liverpool in the U.K.’s Premier League, leading his country to victory against Brazil would reduce the Maracanã, and an entire nation, to tears once more.

the red bulletin

W C RE W IN D

LAST TIME OUT Quick refresher on what happened in South Africa four years ago.

f i n a L This (above) was basically Holland’s tactic against Spain. The Spaniards’ response was to score the winner after 116 minutes and win 1-0.

s e m i f i n a l Spain’s Carles Puyol said “Pick that one out” after beating German manager Joachim Low’s team 1-0 in Durban.

Hey oh J-lo

getty images(6), imago(3), picturedesk.com, imago

The beautiful game has one, less-than-beautiful, tradition: official World Cup songs. This year’s is a trend-bucker. The catchy “We Are One (Ole Ola),”

by Pitbull, Claudia Leitte, and Jennifer Lopez, is sure to get into your head this summer.

Put your flags up in the sky

Show the world we are one

(put ’em in the sky)

(one, love, life)

And wave them side to side

Ole ole ole ola

(side to side)

Ole ole ole ola

Show the world where you’re from

Ole ole ole ola

(show ’em where you’re from)

Ole ole ole ola

1934

Winners are losers History tells us you can excel individually at a World Cup, but all for nothing.

Guillermo StAbile Eight goals for Argentina, lost the final.

1930 the red bulletin

matthias sindelar Austria’s finest could only lead his team to the semis.

q u a r t e r f i n a l The legendary Maradona, an ill-suited manager in an ill-fitting suit, watched as his Argentina fell 4-0 to Germany.

1950

leOnidas Top scorer with seven; Brazil lost in the semifinal.

1938

ademir Eight goals, but not in the final, where Brazil lost 2-1.

1958

sAndor Kocsis Scored 11; Hungary lost in the final.

1954

Just Fontaine Best-ever topscorer with 13. France came in third.

Josef Masopust Oldest living final netter, 83.

Czechs lost 3-1.

1962 11

A European team has never won the World Cup in South America. But Brazil has never won it in Brazil.

Pelé himself thinks his home country will win the World Cup. That’s the same Pelé who thinks the German team is better.

SEVEN REASONS BRAZIL WILL WIN And seven reasons why they won’t.

Everything points to a home win.

But, then again, everything points against it, too.

1966 12

gerd muller Came up short in a thrilling semifinal.

Julio Cesar is Brazil’s No. 1 goalie. Right now he plays for Toronto FC in MLS, which maybe doesn’t have much in the way of worldclass strikers.

Neymar scores at least one goal in every other game he plays for Brazil.

Which means Neymar is off target one game in two.

1 9 70

Eusébio Nine goals were not enough to win it for Portugal.

In 2013, Brazil won the Confederations Cup. No winner of that tournament has won the World Cup the following year.

Lionel Messi has never scored a goal in Brazil. Yet he scored three the last time he played against Brazil.

1 9 78

Johan Cruyff “Total football” wasn’t enough for the Dutch.

1 9 74

rob rensenbrink Hit the post and Holland missed out.

Brazil-born Diego Costa has scored more goals in 2014 than Ronaldo did at his best. Costa chose to represent Spain this year.

1986

ALain Giresse Part of all-star France side at a loss in semis.

1982

Zico Best Brazilian of his time missed a pen in quarters.

1994

Claudio Caniggia The Argentina star shone until a final defeat.

1990

roberto baggio Skied a penalty and Italy lost the final.

Ronaldo Brazil took a risk on the unfit striker and lost the final.

1998 the red bulletin

picturedesk.com, GETTY IMAGES(7), imago(2)

home (dis)advantage

s o cce r p l a y e r q u i z

S U B S B E N C H

Thinking Man’s Game

GAME OFF, SWITCH ON

Think you know your tats as well as your stats? Solve these star player puzzles if you can …

A. Wayne Rooney B. Cristiano Ronaldo C. Hulk 2. Who devised soccer’s most awful yet ingenious haircut: a walrus ’tache, so his son could more easily identify him on TV? A. Ronaldo B. Roberto Carlos C. Rivaldo

3. Which nonsmoking Frenchman owns a hookah bar in the Channel port of Boulogne-sur-Mer?

5. Which shy dressingroom dancer isn’t currently romantically linked to a singer?

A. Karim Benzema B. Franck Ribery C. Mathieu Valbuena

A. Mesut Ozil B. Gerard Pique C. Neymar

4. Which notorious hard tackler had this sign tattooed on his calf to warn players from other teams?

6. Which fashion victim wears diamond earrings, though only off the field due to regulations?

A. Daniele de Rossi B. Sergio Busquets C. Pepe

Where to turn when there’s no game on. t he t w ee t spot

OPTA SPORTS twitter.com/OptaJoe will give you statistics till the cows come home.

A. Alessandro Diamanti B. Joshua Brillante C. Mario Balotelli

r e a d t he b o o k

2

6 4

ANSWERS: 1 B, 2 A, 3 B, 4 A, 5 C, 6 C

1. Which soccer player owned a Ferrari 599 GTB Fiorano (yes, the one pictured below) for about a year before he totaled it?

THE NUMBERS GAME: WHY EVERYTHING YOU KNOW ABOUT FOOTBALL IS WRONG Soccer works in ways beyond our comprehension.

Comprehend them thanks to this unpretentious analysis.

L i s t en t o t he a p p

Who is it?

Body parts and a trip to the body shop.

talkSPORT During June and July, the radio station will be a prime source of news, interviews, and live broadcasts.

CORBIS, GETTY IMAGES(5), PICTUREDESK.COM DIETMAR KAINRATH

1 2 0 02

oliver kahn German goalie’s only error was in the final.

w a t ch t he f i l m

2 0 10

Zinedine zidane His headbutt meant France finished 2nd.

Diego Forlan Five goals only took Uruguay to the semis.

“Which team do you support?

Bull-garia?”

SHAOLIN SOCCER The most underrated soccer film ever made.

It deserves a replay.

2006 the red bulletin

13

Wat c h i n g o n T V l i k e u s

the away team Some of the world’s best players represent countries that didn’t qualify for the World Cup. This side could give all the teams a game.

10

5 9

1 3 2 6 4

11 6

7

C 8

1

2

3

sa mi r H a nda n ov i c

A l eksandar Ko l arov

Dani el Agger

Position: Goalkeeper National team: Slovenia Club: Inter Milan Current value: $33 mil

Position: Right-back National team: Serbia Club: Manchester City Current value: $16 mil

Position: Center-back National team: Denmark Club: Liverpool Current value: $19 mil

4

5

6

7

8

9

b r a n i s l av iva novi C

davi d a l aba

nemanja mati C

Aaron Ramse y

Mare k HamSIk

Gare t h Bale

Position: Center-back National team: Serbia Club: Chelsea Current value: $22 mil

Position: Left-back National team: Austria Club: Bayern Munich Current value: $44 mil

Position: Midfielder National team: Serbia Club: Chelsea Current value: $34 mil

Position: Midfielder National team: Wales Club: Arsenal Current value: $27 mil

Position: Midfielder National team: Slovakia Club: Napoli Current value: $55 mil

Position: Forward National team: Wales Club: Real Madrid Current value: $110 mil

14

the red bulletin

imago, getty images(11)

10

o f f i c i a l G a d g e t r y

Don’t cry, Zlatan!

The Swede has been to two World Cups.

These greats never made it at all.

spray it, ref!

When association soccer began in 1863, refs relied only on whistle and flags. In the century and a half since, various inventions have made their lives a little bit easier.

Headsets

Bert Trautmann Alfredo di Stefano Never played for West Real Madrid star who Germany, and missed missed two finals for out on the 1954 win, Argentina (didn’t enter in 1950 or 1954) and two because manager Sepp for Spain (1958, didn’t Herberger wouldn’t pick foreign-based players. qualify; 1962, injured).

Since 2006, the referee on the field and the fourth official on the sidelines have been able to discuss refereeing decisions.

Or make jokes about the players.

DISPLAY BOARD

Eric Cantona France didn’t qualify for the WC in 1990 or 1994, and by 1998, when the French won on home soil, Cantona had been retired a year.

Looks like a 1980s iPad but there’s been less drama since it was first deployed, at the 1998 World Cup, to show how much extra time will be played after regulation.

George Weah Africa’s player of the century never made it.

The Liberian national team had to pull out of 1994 qualifying due to UN sanctions.

LINE MARKER SPRAY PAINT

“ O ne thing i s for sure , a World C up without m e i s nothing t o watch . ”

imago(2), Getty images, corbis

tom mackinger

10

Zl ata n I b r a hi m ov i C Position: Striker National team: Sweden Club: Paris Saint-Germain Current value: $20 mil

After it was tested to mark free kicks at last year’s Confederations Cup, the foam will be used on the field in Brazil. Or is it just a free advertising gambit by Gillette?

—I brahim ov ic

DIVE DETECTORS 11

C

R ob e rt Le wa n d ows k i

MORTEN OLS EN

Position: Striker National team: Poland Club: Borussia Dortmund Current value: $58 mil

Position: In charge of Denmark since July 2000, he is the longest-serving international coach.

the red bulletin

And here’s our suggestion. Sensors in players’ socks and boots determine whether a player is fouled or faking it. For a real infringement, the ref gets an “Ow!” signal in his ear.

“We don’ t need s atellites , G PS and a chip in the ball .”

—Michel Pl atini , UEFA president

15

D E C I S I O N M A K I N G O N T H E S P O T

TAKING THE PERFECT PENALTY Seven minutes into the 2006 World Cup final. France’s Zinedine Zidane chips a penalty just right of center.

The ball hits the underside of the crossbar. Italy’s keeper, Gianluigi Buffon, having dived away to his right, looks on helplessly as the ball bounces behind the goal line and it’s 1-0 to France.

After it crossed, the spin made the ball bounce back up onto the bar and out of the goal. That won’t happen again.

Aiming a penalty kick into the top corner is a certain goal. But it takes nerves of steel to go for it.

16

1 Only one in every 15 World Cup goals comes via a penalty: to date, there have been 150 World Cup penalties in regular time.

2 The first shootout in a World Cup was the 1982 semifinal between West Germany and France. The former won. As they often do.

3 Last year, 83 percent of penalties taken were scored in the Premier League; 70 percent of those taken were scored in the World Cup.

? Why doesn’t the

goalie just stay in the middle when facing a penalty? Because only one in 12 penalties is aimed there.

the red bulletin

getty images(2)

FA ST FAC T S : pena l ties

Photography Rock Climbing Backpacking Live Music

Be known for what you love Get started at Klout.com

I N AW E O F T H E S C O R E

Goooaaal!

The one that started it, the one to end them all and the purest: three goals that have rightly gone down in history.

I LL U S T R A T I O N : M a r t i n U d o v i c i c

T H E F I R S T G O A L

Montevideo, Uruguay, 1930 There were barely 500 fans present when Frenchman Lucien Laurent scored the first goal in the first World Cup, volleying in a cross from the edge of the penalty area against Mexico. A historic goal, of which there are no photographs or film footage, though newspaper reports said it was a gem of a strike.

France went on to win 4-1.

18

T H E G R E AT E S T T E A M G O A L

Mexico City, Mexico, 1970 Scored after a string of nine passes four minutes from end time. The play starts in their own half: Clodoaldo dances past four players; Rivelino to Jairzinho to Pelé, who flicks a final pass into the path of Carlos Alberto.

The full-back races to smash it first time into the far corner to make it 4-1 and seal Brazil’s third World Cup final victory.

T H E G R E AT E S T S O L O G O A L

Mexico City, Mexico, 1986 Diego Maradona had barely featured in the first half of Argentina’s quarterfinal clash with England. After 51 minutes, he scored the “Hand of God” goal that put Argentina ahead 1-0. Four minutes later, he dribbled past five defenders and went around goalie Peter Shilton for one of soccer’s greatest scores. Argentina went on to win the game 2-1 and the tournament.

s o c c e r b y t h e n u m b e r s

zero is better than one And why you should always celebrate a goal with both arms in the air.

Source: The Numbers Game, Chris Anderson and David Sally, Penguin Books

10 Games you’d have to watch to see one goal in the Premier League scored straight off a long corner kick. It’s no better at World Cups, so take a short corner.

44

Percentage of lucky goals, found in a study of 2,500 pro goals, where “lucky” is defined as something happening that the goal scorer hadn’t intended.

31

Australia beat American Samoa 31-0 in 2001, the biggest ever win in World Cup qualifying.

5

The best comeback ever.

In their 1954 World Cup quarterfinal match against Switzerland, Austria went from 3-0 down after 25 minutes to 5-3 up after 34 minutes, and they won 7-5.

60 Average minutes of play in a soccer match. Play is interrupted or the ball is out of play for half an hour. So how come there’s only ever about five minutes’ stoppage time?

28

Years of World Cup soccer before there was a 0-0. Brazil and England eked out the “groundbreaking” bore draw on June 11, 1958.

0

From 2001-02 to 2010-11, a clean sheet earned more points than scoring a goal in the Premier League.

2

If a player celebrates after scoring in a penalty shootout by raising both arms in the air, he unsettles the other team’s penalty takers demonstrably more than if he just pumps a fist.

dietmar kainrath

soccer IN KOMA*

* KOMA: Kainrath’s Œuvres of modern art

20

the red bulletin

DID WE MENTION IT WILL CHARGE YOUR PHONE?

WORLD’S BEST LANTERN There are lanterns, and then there’s the Lighthouse 250. The perfect light for hanging out also comes with the power to keep phones, cameras, and tablets charged.

Get out, stay out, and enjoy every adventure along the way with solar power that works.

Learn more at /redbull redbull

S u r p r i s e pa c k a g e s

“We will take you down” No World Cup has ever had as many dark horses as this year’s.

Five unexpected teams that could do great things in Brazil:

The dark horses What have they got going for them?

Nickname by fans: Soccer experts say:

B E LG IU M

USA

C O LO M B IA

B O S N IA

E N G LA N D

They’re young, hungry

Close-tohome advantage.

They’re better than European talent forge Croatia,

talented.

U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!

It’s the first time since their victory in 1966 that no one expects anything of them. At long last, the perfect opportunity to play without any pressure.

The Red Devils

The Yanks

“In the last couple of years, teams have spent

“Head coach Klinsmann is

and scarily

$347 million on Belgian internationals.”

Possible best player?

Trump card?

Eden Hazard: outmaradonas Maradona

Goalkeeper

Thibaut Courtois is probably the best man between the sticks in the world right now.

Achilles heel?

Increasing pressure to succeed.

a great motivator, but not much of a tactician.”

Jozy Altidore: powerful, tireless,

a handful

Big tournament experience Five first-team regulars have more than 80 caps each.

Too many easy games in qualifying give a false sense of ability.

Colombian fans have never had such a short commute to attend the tournament.

but about as unknown as Iran.

Los Cafeteros

The Dragons

(the coffee growers)

“A whole mess of

young talent.

Including the excellently named Radamel Falcao.”

Jackson Martínez: the skinny Ronaldo

The defense

The Three Lions “If more

“Technically the players are

on a par with the Brazilians.”

Miralem Pjani´c:

the new Zidane

The attack

English players played abroad,

the national team would be better.”

Steven Gerrard: the inspirational captain’s got it all

Youth

No other South American backline let in so few goals during World Cup qualifying.

Edin Dzeko and Vedad Ibisevic scored 18 goals between them in 10 qualifying games.

Ross Barkley, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Raheem Sterling bring fresh ideas.

Radamel Falcao’s left knee.

Ibrahimovic! The top striker, eligible to play for Bosnia, plays for Sweden.

Only won one of seven penalty shootouts in international tournaments.

TRINIDAD & TOBAGO Smallest nation to reach the World Cup. In 2006, T&T earned a 0-0 draw against Sweden but lost 2-0 to Paraguay and England.

22

WALES Surprise package in 1958, only going out to eventual winners Brazil in the quarterfinals by a score of 1-0.

Beat that, Gareth Bale.

HAITI In 1974, the Caribbean side led 1-0 against Italy but lost 3-1, then lost 7-0 to Poland and 4-1 to Argentina. Third worst finals record. the red bulletin

getty images(3)

One-hit wonders: THEY MADE IT TO FINALS BUT HAVE YET TO GO BACK

k i n g s o f s o c c e r

who’s the best?

Brazil, with a rating of 2,113 points, and Spain, with 2,086, are the two best teams in the world.

Getty Images

This is according to Elo Ratings (as of April 1), which, unlike other ranking systems, calculates a team’s strengths with the precision of a chess computer. Backdated scores have been calculated for all countries, and only Hungary has managed greater: Ferenc Puskas’s magical Magyars notched 2,166 points, after beating Uruguay in the semis of the 1954 World Cup. David Ruiz and Iker Casillas can be glad they don’t have to face them. eloratings.net

the red bulletin

23

HOLLYWOOD

BuLLEVARD

Q & A

Taryn Manning

F i r s t P e r so n

Manning is the only actress to ever co-star with Eminem, Ashton Kutcher, and Britney Spears. Now 35, she’s hit a new high in Orange Is the New Black, as meth-addict evangelist Pennsatucky.

John Ridley The Oscar winner’s next project is a biopic of Jimi Hendrix. To portray him, he selected a superstar: Andre Benjamin of OutKast.

Words: Geoff Berkshire

the red bulletin: You really have to throw your vanity away for the role— no makeup, prison jumpsuit, awful teeth. manning: If I was in my mid-20s I probably would’ve been horrified, but I really was like, ‘Oh nice, let’s take her to the limit!’ She’s gonna look terrible, she’s gonna be terrible. I went with it. It really lends to me completely transcending myself. For me as an actress I think I reached a new understanding, almost like an athlete when they push their abilities and can run faster or jump higher. I feel like I found something that had been untapped in me.

Are you able to keep up with your music career?

I’m into DJing and I’m always in the studio. I love to write [songs] for other people too.

The second season of Orange Is the New Black premieres June 6 on Netflix.

“I was like, ‘Oh nice, let’s take Pennsatucky to the limit!’ She’s gonna be terrible.”

“Andre talked about how he wasn’t sure what he wanted to do next musically. He wanted to really explore. He talked about traveling overseas and learning how to weave rugs. I asked him why and he said, ‘I’d love to learn how to do it myself.’

That sense of exploration and curiosity, to me, that’s where Jimi was in his life. He was not a guy who wanted to do one thing musically.”

Jimi: All Is By My Side opens this summer.

Tom Cruise’s history of big-time summer releases includes War of the Worlds, The Firm, and the first three Mission: Impossible movies, but his last was 2010’s disappointing Knight & Day. He’s got another shot this year with time-bending sci-fi extravaganza Edge of Tomorrow.

1981

The year of his film debut. (It was a minor role in 1981’s Endless Love.)

24

1

Number of years spent in seminary school, training to be a priest.

2,000%

The spike in sales for Ray-Ban sunglasses after 1983’s Risky Business.

$695 million

Highest grossing movie to date: 2011’s Mission: Impossible– Ghost Protocol.

$48.5 16 years The age million difference with

Lowest grossing movie to date: 1999’s Magnolia.

ex-wife Katie Holmes.

the red bulletin

picturedesk.com, corbis, Warner Bros.

BY THE NUMBERS: TOM CRUISE

the ambassador Of all the unknowns for the U.S. National team as it takes on one of the toughest groups in the World Cup this Summer, its goalkeeping won’t be one. Tim Howard on his success in one of the world’s top leagues, and whether Americans get short shrift abroad.

WORDS: raphael Honigstein

26

Everton FC/PA Images

28

After starting his overseas career at Premier League powerhouse Manchester United, Howard moved to Everton in 2006.

isiphotos.com

P

laying at a position known for its longevity, goalie Tim Howard is nevertheless one of the marvels of American soccer.

The New Jersey-born former MLS star and frequent starter for the U.S. national team made the leap across the pond to the British Premier League 11 years ago, to tend goal for Manchester United and now Everton. While American players find occasional success abroad—Clint Dempsey’s run at Fulham, Landon Donovan’s bright moments at Bayern Munich and Everton—Howard’s consistent play in Britain’s top league makes him arguably the top American soccer export in the history of the game. His candidness about playing as a sufferer of Tourette’s syndrome also makes him one of the most personable. Known for his safe hands and high pain threshold, Howard will be tested in a few weeks when the U.S. faces Germany, Ghana, and Portugal, one of the toughest groups in the World Cup. He sat down with The Red Bulletin near his home in Cheshire, near Manchester, to talk about the pressures on U.S. players in England, the changes under new coach Jürgen Klinsmann, and what he expects out of Brazil.

The U.S. national team goalie will be tested against germany, ghana, and portugal in the world cup.

Howard began his career in the United States, playing for the North Jersey Imperials in 1997; the next year he joined the New York/New Jersey MetroStars. During the 2003 season, Manchester United paid $4 million to transfer Howard overseas to become their starting goalie.

“I often feel that the U.S. playing Style actually suits the Premier league. We are strong. We make powerful runs.” the red bulletin: You’ve played in England for 11 years. Is there a particular pressure to being a pro soccer player there? tim howard: Absolutely. As a goalkeeper you have to be so mentally strong to deal with the ups and downs, to deal with a game where you get 20 shots on goal, and with one where you only get one.

Which kind of game do you prefer?

Keeping your focus when there’s not a lot to do is one of the hardest lessons to learn.

You might not see any shots for 30, 40, or 50 minutes, then get sprung into action.

That’s when you have to come through for your team. That’s something you can’t gain over a short period of time. It only comes with experience. But if you can deal with that, you’ll find it’s way better than getting peppered. At this level, strikers are so good that if you’re taking a barrage of shots, chances are one of them will go in. They’re just too talented.

Did you ever feel as if there was a stigma attached to you as a U.S. player in the Premier League?

Not really. [Goalies] Marcus Hahnemann and Brad Friedel were here before I came over; they prepared the ground. It helped me because they had a reputation as good keepers and hard workers. They had proven themselves, so I never came up against a lot of prejudice.

Why have American outfield players not enjoyed the same sustained level of success in England?

Good question. Clint Dempsey was a key player for Fulham for five, six years. But other than him, we haven’t really had that longevity from other players. I don’t know the answer. I often feel that the U.S. style actually suits the Premier League. We are strong, we make powerful runs, some of our players have quite good technical ability. Across the board, we probably need to improve on the technical side of things; we can run all day, we have a good engine. Heart, fight, determination —we have all those key elements, but the technical side needs to get better. It might be one of the drawbacks for us.

Is the situation changing through the new academy system?

Look at our first team now: Jozy Altidore, Michael Bradley, Jason Donovan, Clint Dempsey, Jermaine Jones—these are all top players with very good technical ability. But as we develop with our national team and the academy system, that’s where we have to make the effort, that’s where the emphasis needs to be.

isiphotos.com

Let’s put the question another way: Why has it been easier for U.S. keepers to succeed in the Premier League?

If you think about the athletic ability of American soccer players, it lends itself very well to the demands of the Premier League. We have agility, power, explosiveness—all the attributes that you would think about when it comes to goalkeepers: That’s the American athlete.

31

Howard has played in more than 90 matches for the U.S. national team, appearing for the first time in 2002.

“I’ve been to the world cup twice.

I’ve seen what it’s like, how it can inspire a team.” where the evolution of keeping started. I grew up playing baseball and basketball all the way up until I was 20. That was my first love. I played almost every sport, but soccer stuck for some reason.

In the 2010 World Cup, held in South Africa, Howard earned Man of the Match honors— soccer’s version of being named MVP—for his goaltending effort in a game against England.

The two teams finished in a 1-1 tie.

isiphotos.com(2), getty images

We have done well in that department.

I’ve also found that the goalkeeper coaching is very good in the U.S., from the youth system straight to the top.

Some goalkeeper coaches use gimmicks, but it’s about catching, diving, and saving.

That’s what the U.S. coaches do really well: all the simple things, the basic principles.

How come there is so much know-how on the coaching side?

It goes back to hand-eye coordination. All big sports in America demand great handeye coordination; that’s the most important aspect. My dad took me to the park, and he would always throw a ball at me. It could be a soccer ball, a football, a baseball. That’s just natural to us. That’s the red bulletin

Dempsey and midfielder Michael Bradley returned to the MLS recently.

Coach Jürgen Klinsmann has said that he wants his players to play at top level. Is the MLS at “top level”?

I don’t see any contradiction in what these guys are doing and what Klinsmann has said. Each individual player has one career and they’re solely responsible for that career, and for their livelihood. You know when you look at some of the American players who have gone back— it’s not been a ton of them—Landon Donovan is very well paid, Clint Dempsey, Michael Bradley, Maurice Edu, who’s back on loan ... the contracts that they have signed are life-changing contracts, from a financial point of view. MLS is a good league. Our players can excel playing every day; they’re keeping themselves fit at a high level. Clint Dempsey is scoring goals, Michael Bradley is the engine in midfield in his team ... we’ll see. I guess the proof will be in the pudding when it comes to the World Cup and even the next World Cup qualifying cycle. We’ll find out then if we’ve fallen off the pace, or got better or maintained our level. It’s hard to tell right now.

How do you feel going into Brazil?

I’m excited. I’ve been to the finals twice; I’ve seen what it’s like, how it can inspire a team. We have a tough group—but my personal feeling is that we’ll pretty much have to be playing “lights out,” 100 percent in all three games to get out of any group anyway, let alone this one.

How do you guys match up?

I think we match up well against Ghana, and we did at the last World Cup as well.

It will be a physical and intense game.

The Germans have technical ability, history, they have strong runners—

machines, really. The Portuguese are similar. The important question is: Can we implement our game plan on the pitch?

Klinsmann has said the first game against Ghana will be “like a final.”

Do you agree?

I quite like the layout of the games. The way the group goes, the way I see it, we get three points against Ghana, the two draw their match, and we get into the second game on top of the table.

[Laughs.] Whether that will happen or not, I don’t know, but it’s definitely a possible scenario. The way the group has been laid out works for us in a lot of ways.

Under Klinsmann, the defense plays a higher line. Does that mean you have to be more proactive in goal?

Absolutely. The same has happened at my club team under Roberto Martínez. I have learned to adapt to these new demands— you have to come out of goal a lot more, for example—and use it to my advantage.

Jürgen wants us to be more up-tempo; not only quicker passing but also crisper passing. And when the ball turns over, he wants us to press teams and go at them faster. In the past, we used to drop off without the ball. We have found success by pressing teams, by not allowing them to find their rhythm and their tempo.

What would you say are the main differences between Klinsmann and former coach Bob Bradley?

Jürgen has given us new ideas about nutrition—he is very open-minded and creative in that regard. It’s good to be always moving, thinking, changing, and adapting. Generally speaking, however, I’d say that tactics are important but not nearly as important as mutual respect and teamwork. You can have the best tactics in the world, but it won’t work if the players aren’t behind you. Jürgen and Bob have both commanded that respect. www.evertonfc.com

33

“ Th e re is a fa ir a mount of

fi stic uffs ”

X-Men: Days of Future Past star James McAvoy on real-life superhero fights and the right way to be run over.

I 34

t’s a good time to be James McAvoy. He’s winning awards for his role as the most depraved cop in movie history, in Filth. He’s just finished filming a version of Frankenstein in which he plays the dissecting doc and Daniel Radcliffe is his assistant, Igor. With immediate past and future bright, it’s the perfect moment for his new film, X-Men: Days of Future Past. The 35-year-old Scot is back as Professor Charles Xavier, after X-Men: First Class, and doing his best to prevent the world from ending. If he’s half as heroic on screen as he is switched-on and funny in real life, everything should be OK. THE RED BULLETIN: What’s different about the X-Men movies compared to the other superhero films?

JAMES MCAVOY: There’s always been a real thematic

backbone to them. They’re about ghettoized characters, persecuted people who are cast out from society. Or, if they haven’t been cast out, they’ve been closeted. There are allegories and metaphors there for people who don’t feel safe in the world, or who feel judged. X-Men is about superheroes, but they’re the least “super” of all. Even Wolverine—he is a great superhero, but because he’s just so tough. Especially my character, who is the most human of them all.

Professor Xavier has powers of the mind, though?

Yes, but for me, he is a diplomat. Saying that, in the last film, I was a such a cad, and in this one I’m such a … mess. An alcoholic, drug-abusing dropout.

There are about 20 heroes and villains in this film. How do they all fit in? the red bulletin

Matt Holyoak/Camera Press/PictureDesk.com

Words: Paul Wilson

Hit man: McAvoy is on top of his game, excelling in a range of film roles, from superhero to cop.

Superfly guy: McAvoy loves stunt work. He’s been run over by a car and now wants to be a jet pilot.

36

at 5 miles an hour, then we go up to 8, then to 10, then to 12, 14, to 16 and ultimately we got up to 18 and 20 miles an hour. Basically, as soon as I could see the car in my peripheral vision, I jumped off the ground just a tiny bit, and then the car swipes me and puts me relatively gently over the top. I love stunt work—I’ve just done loads on Frankenstein.

Is there anything else exciting you’d love to try?

I always wanted to be a Harrier jet pilot. What I do want to do is fly a Spitfire before I die. There’s some weird reason that it’s really hard—I’ve looked into it.

At one point, I was going to play a prominent World War II pilot, and if I was going to do that, I would learn to fly. But it didn’t happen. Then I looked at just getting a ride in a Spitfire, but the insurance is ridiculous. There was one for sale, in good condition, for just over $3 million. I thought they’d be $40 million.

Your hardcore fans are known as McAvoyeurs.

What are they like?

They’ve been so loyal. I’ve kept a couple of drawings and pictures I’ve had sent. One where I’ve been turned into a Japanese manga character. I’d pay for that, like the guy who draws you in the street on holiday.

This year, there’s a third Marvel superhero team movie, Guardians of the Galaxy. So, after another Avengers film next year and the next X-Men the year after, will we see all of these teams team up?

Actually, I think it should be called X-Men Rules and Is Better Than Guardians of the Galaxy and Avengers and Everyone Else Can Kiss My ... no, what would be brilliant is if you got all of us together in a hotel room and made us fight.

Not the superheroes—the actors. Just made us fight.

That would be genius.

X-Men: Days of Future Past is out worldwide on May 22: x-menmovies.com the red bulletin

Matt Holyoak/Camera Press/PictureDesk.com

Until X-Men: First Class, Wolverine is the beating heart of every X-Men movie, and his relationship with Jean Grey has been the thing that pumps it.

Then we took over in First Class and there was no Hugh [Jackman], no Wolverine. That film was Magneto’s genesis story and also the backbone of his and Charles’ relationship. But now Wolverine comes in, and so what me and Michael [Fassbender, playing Magneto] had, Hugh is added to.

Do you get to flex your muscles, like the other two?

A bit. Charles isn’t really an action dude. But there is a fair amount of fisticuffs. I beat up Michael a couple of times. But he gets me back. We have argy-bargy on a plane, and the plane dives and we get thrown around.

But in your next film, The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby, you get run over for real.

Yes, and I loved it.

How does a person get run over?

You start off slow, and rehearse for ages. We used a Toyota Prius, which has a raked front that goes quite low to the ground. So we start with the car

“What I do want to do is fly a Spitfire before I die. There’s some weird reason that it’s really hard.

I’ve looked into it.”

/redbulletin

Adrenaline

y that Photograph eathless leaves you br

Ingenious

ho are The people w e world changing th

Extreme

Red Bull Records Š Trent Mitchellartist Blitz Kids I Credit: James Embrey Hall

at Adventure th aries d n u breaks bo

Your Moment.

Beyond the Ordinary

FREE DOWNLOAD

the trail jaguar

of the

Big cats, roadblocks, the descendants of the Maya: just three encounters on a journey through Mexican jungle to kayak off incredible waterfalls. words: ARMANDO AGUILAR photography: ALFREDO MARTÍNEZ FERNÁNDEZ

39

T

he road from San Cristobal de las Casas to Ocosingo, in the Mexican state of Chiapas, is blocked by people protesting against public transportation reforms. “In Chiapas, if you want to get from one place to another, you really have to want it,” says Rafa Ortiz, Mexico’s top extreme kayaker and possibly the best in the world. “It’s part of the adventure that makes this state so wonderful. This might be part of its magic.”

Ortiz and his team are trying to get to Agua Azul, five waterfalls 30 to 50 feet high, and one of the great spots on earth for extreme kayaking. They plan a new route, avoiding the roadblock, and it will wind them throughout the wilds of southern Mexico to the town of Tumbala, the closest place to the falls. It’s a long trip, more than 10 hours, so they decide to stop in Lacanja, a town in the heart of 40

the Lacandon Jungle near the border of Guatemala.

The area has thousands of years of history and is home of the hack winik, the “real men”—direct descendants of the Maya. Legendary in Mexico, they see themselves as guardians of the balance between nature and mankind.

People here are used to tourists, which is why, when the truck with the kayaks rumbles in, Mario Chambor, one of the real men, comes closer to greet the visitors with a smile, followed by a group of excited children. “Me and two of my kayaking buddies were wearing almost all of our gear,” says Ortiz, “and we stood out because of all the bright colors.” The kids look at these strange, colorful men with a mix of astonishment and fear, and the strong

Big Banana Kayaking down the Agua Azul falls is the second challenge in the project Rafa Ortiz calls Red Bull Chasing Waterfalls. In the first, he successfully navigated down the 155-foot Big Banana waterfall in Veracruz.

the red bulletin

“The falls are a monster that watches you and waits to duel with you.�

urge to touch the visitors to see what they are really made of. “It was very cool,” Ortiz says. “When they finally dared to get closer, they wanted to wear our helmets, climb onto the truck to touch the kayaks.

They were very excited, and so were we.”

Ortiz explains the reasons for his trip to Chambor, who immediately proposes a walk around a nearby waterfall, in an area usually kept secret to outsiders.

The next day, Chambor leads the visitors and some locals into an area thick with ferns and orchids and trees 165 feet high, full of animals and soundtracked by the songs of invisible birds—yet another example of Mexico’s incredible biodiversity. “I always want to get to waterfalls and just throw myself down them in my kayak,” Ortiz says, “but ultimately, the trip to the falls is almost always the coolest part.” He could feel his hosts’ connection to nature. “We walked through the wilderness without analyzing what was going on in our surroundings, thinking we were going to post it all on Facebook when we got back to the city, and so on. They are really inside the wilderness—they listen, they smell, they feel.”

the “real men” see themselves as guardians of the balance between nature and mankind.

42

DIFFERENT RUSH

Ortiz is one of only two men to descend the Palouse Falls in Washington state. They are 187 feet high. The highest fall in the Agua Azul is only about 50 feet, but Ortiz experienced a different rush there. “Some trips stand out because of the challenge. I came back from this one with a replenished soul.�

“ nothing will ever top this. winning the lottery? that means nothing to me.�

“we pulled him out of the river and gave him CPR for four minutes.” brown, and you can’t paddle in that kind of water.” But, rounding the bend that brings the Agua Azul in sight, the team lets out a collective gasp. The waterfalls, whose name means blue water, are a beautiful shade of turquoise.

The beauty here is only skin deep.

“Rivers are classified from 1 to 6 in terms of difficulty, where 1 is still water and 6 is death,” Ortiz says. The Agua Azul falls, he explains, are ranked 5 or sometimes 5+, requiring a high level of technical ability and even more courage. “In that moment, right at the mouth of the fall, sometimes I doubt myself a little and I think, ‘Why am I here again?’ But then I grab the oar, and I tell myself that this is a challenge I must conquer.

life lesson Ortiz feels that kayaking down waterfalls equips you with the tools to deal with life’s other difficulties. “Your first reaction is: Don’t do it!

But you take a risk, everything turns out OK, and the feeling of having overcome a challenge is the most satisfying feeling a human being can experience.”

Suddenly, Chambor stops, and with a single outstretched arm he forbids the others from advancing. He crouches down, touches the earth, looks ahead and around, then sniffs the air. “A jaguar just passed through here,” he says. There, fresh and obvious to those who know what to look for, are the prints and the traces of a creature whose species is on the verge of extinction. “In moments like these,” Ortiz says, “you realize how little we care for nature.

Whereas the natives don’t just get involved now and again: They live it every day, and they suffer much more than we do, because it’s their wilderness that is disappearing.”

The group reaches the falls, and although it’s not the pulse-skyrocketing kind Ortiz would kayak over, it’s perfect for having fun in the water with the native children who came along. They paddle, try on helmets and are thoroughly entertained, as is Ortiz. “Everyone wanted to climb onto the kayak at the same time. They were very excited, and they jumped into the water with no fear at all. The children spoke very little Spanish, but to introduce someone to kayaking and share the fun with them, you don’t need a verbal language. Smiles are more than enough.”

Back in Lacanja, the team bid farewell to the real men and get back on the road to the Agua Azul falls. They are worried that recent rising river levels may ruin their plans. “When the water rises too high,” says Ortiz, “it’s turbulent and turns muddy

F

ear is justified. Last year, Ortiz reached the Agua Azul falls with three other kayakers.

One of the three decided to go down the left part of the river and steered his kayak confidently to the edge of the falls. He was underwater for three minutes. Ortiz saw him floating down the river below. “We pulled him out of the water, and right there on the rocks, we gave him CPR for four minutes. We took him to the hospital in Palenque, where they saved his life.

The falls are a monster that watches you and waits for a chance to duel with you.”

This is a challenge all extreme kayakers are eager to receive and accept.

Ortiz and people like him live for those few seconds during the fall, before being submerged in the water, to fight against the turbulence that tries to rip away their oars, their kayak, their head from their shoulders. When they overcome the power of the water and manage to float away, it’s a moment of true glory. “That’s the moment when you turn back, get a look at the monster, and you think, ‘Nothing will ever top this. Winning the lottery? Means nothing to me.’ ” This time, Ortiz wins the duel with the magnificent, turquoise beast and paddles away down the river below with a smile on his face, like the children of the real men. rafaortiz.com

45

Left: KC-1 performs at the Lyric Opera House in Chicago. Below: Mikel, Lil Ceng and Anna Holmström prepare to take the stage.

Ryan Taylor/Red Bull Content Pool

Bach to the Future When B-Boys first heard the music of Bach, they were puzzled. How could they dance to classical music? The answer: D o n ’ t j u s t d a n c e — f l y. W o r d s : A n n e F o r d

47

K

haled Chaabi, 27, is a chivalrous enough young man, with plenty of “please”s and “thank-you”s on his lips. But after he jumps out of a lofty SUV, he zips away without offering to help down any of his fellow passengers. Why would he? In his world, everyone can fly.

The Syria-born Chaabi—known in the B-Boy scene as KC-1—is a member of the Flying Steps, the Berlin-based breaking crew that, over the past two decades, has flipped, swiped, spun, dropped, and toprocked its way to global fame. Founded in 1993 by Vartan Bassil and Kadir “Amigo” Memis, the Flying Steps have won four world championships, including two Red Bull Beat Battles (B-Boy competitions pitting crews against one another); been immortalized in Sony’s B-Boy games for PlayStation; and even won recognition in the Guinness Book of World Records (the crew’s choreographer, Benny Kimoto, once held the record for head spinning).

And all that came before 2010, when the Flying Steps decided to try something so odd that few other breaking teams have attempted it: performing to classical music. As the crew’s artist manager and choreographer, the 37-year-old German Michael Rosemann (B-Boy name: Mikel), explains, “The normal-people show is not enough for us. We must do something really special.”

The result: Red Bull Flying Bach, an evening of furiously masterful moves set to one of the world’s greatest works of classical music, Johann Sebastian Bach’s “The Well-Tempered Clavier.” Now in its fourth year, the show has proven to more than 210,000 spectators in more than 20 countries that in the right hands (and feet and heads), breaking and Bach go together.

In the process, the Flying Steps are helping to demonstrate that—in Mikel’s 48

Mikel, above, and Flying Bach will perform in Chicago June 20-22 and 27-29; in Toronto Oct. 15-18; and in Montreal Oct. 23-26.

clear if slightly disjointed English— “Break dance is not any more a street dance. It’s an artful dance, with basics like all other dance styles.”

This morning finds some of the Flying Steps in Chicago, where they’re preparing for Flying Bach’s first U.S. performance.

In front of a scattering of media folks, Mikel, KC-1, and their fellow Flying Stepper, 22-year-old Gengis Ademoski (a Macedonian known as Lil Ceng), are rehearsing parts of the show with Anna Holmström, 23, a contemporary dancer and former gymnast from Sweden who joined the cast of Red Bull Flying Bach about a year ago. All of them are dressed in jeans, T-shirts, and hoodies; none of them shows signs of having stepped off a plane from Austria the night before.

When KC-1 floats all four limbs in the air and spins like a human top on his curly head, the crowd gasps. When Lil Ceng flips from palm to palm as easily as if he were jumping from foot to foot, they gasp again. But the dancers pay no attention, not when the applause comes, and not even when the temporary dance floor slips like a banana peel. You don’t defy gravity by letting your focus wander.

Holmström, the only woman in the

show, jetés across the room and lets KC-1 lift her skyward, as elegantly vertical as if she were a member of the Bolshoi Ballet.

But it’s a safe bet that none of the Bolshoi ballerinas typically do what she does next: flip over KC-1’s back, duck to avoid the leg he whips over her head, and start top-rocking like a bona-fide B-Girl. “I’m getting bruises everywhere,” she says, panting. But two minutes later she’s ready to go again: “We try? One time?”

Given the moves in Flying Bach, it’s a wonder the entire cast isn’t one big bruise. During performances, when he’s not on stage, Mikel loves to lurk out of sight behind the curtain and listen for the audience’s reaction to particularly aerodynamic maneuvers.

Red Bull Flying Bach got its start about five years ago, when Bassil got the idea of creating a show set to classical music. He turned for help to Christoph Hagel, an internationally renowned opera and concert conductor.

Trained by Leonard Bernstein, Hagel is best known for staging musical performances at nontraditional venues

The Flying Steps perform at the Esplanade Theater in Singapore during the Red Bull Flying Bach World Tour in January 2014.

Ryan Taylor/Red Bull Content Pool, Mark Teo/Red Bull Content Pool

The “normal people” us. we must be show is not for special.

such as subway stations. Though unfamiliar with breaking at the time, he was taken with the passion and power of the Flying Steps’ work and promised to give them a call. “Normally this means, ‘Go home, my friends,’ ” Mikel laughs.

“But two weeks later, we got a call.” Hagel suggested Bach’s “The Well-Tempered Clavier,” an 18th-century collection of preludes and fugues, each of which explores a different musical key.

With Hagel on board as musical director and pianist, Bassil and Japanese choreographer Yui Kawaguchi created a show loosely centered on the narrative of the emotional ups and downs of a dance crew as it rehearses for a big performance. Background visuals by VJ, art director, producer, and set designer Marco Moo include a short film that shows the crew’s fastest, most visually intense movements in slow motion, the better for audiences to tell what the hell’s going on.

As for Mikel and the rest of the Flying Bach crew—a global bunch consisting of KC-1, Lil Ceng, and Holmström, plus Aldo Style (Alan da Silva) of Brazil and Frenchmen Nono (Nordine Dany Grimah), Yamine Manaa, and Punisher (Pierre Bleriot)—they found themselves taken with, but a bit stymied by, Bach’s work. “Normally we dance to funk music.

You have beats, you dance the beats,” KC-1 explains. “Classical music has melody.”

Right out of the gate, audiences went crazy for the 70-minute show. 2010’s sold-out run in Germany led to a European tour. Worldwide tours followed in 2012 and 2013. This year’s international tour includes first-time stops in Singapore, Qatar, and, of course, Chicago.

That’s where, as part of their media preview, KC-1 and Lil Ceng are now heading downtown to guest-teach a dance class at Columbia College. Stepping to the front of a studio filled with about 15 anxious undergraduates, KC-1 puts on The Sugarhill Gang’s “Rapper’s Delight” and starts top-rocking away as the students do their best to keep up.

When he casually suggests they practice full-body flips, the students all look at each other and laugh nervously, so he thoughtfully demonstrates something simpler by sinking to the floor and whirling on one foot like a gyroscope.

A chorus of mystified “Whaaaaaat?” fills the air, and he looks up apologetically.

“Too hard?” he asks politely. “We try something different.” www.redbullflyingbach.com

49

t e k c i T Ride to oor son revs d t u T h e o c ro s s s e a a n d t h e m oto i s m o n t h , m at i c up th f a charis able. r i s e oi e i s i n e v i t J e s s n e r ro o k s: W e r n e r W o r d g r a p h y: P h otoG l a s s b e r g Julie

50

Rookie Ken Roczen, above, flies high thanks to the advice of his coach, Aldon Baker, left.

F

ord Field in downtown Detroit is sold out, with 60,000 spectators. But it’s not the Lions on the bill; tonight it’s the AMA Supercross gasoline gladiators.

There are jumps of over 100 feet and wicked washboards to look forward to, but it’s really the jump combos that make this spectacular indoor form of motocross so appealing. Should the first couple of jumps be doubles, then triples? Or should you take the first three hills in one go and then do two doubles one after the other?

The riders have 10 minutes to familiarize themselves with the course before things get going. The spectators want action.

Among the American supercross elite we find Ken Roczen from Mattstedt, Germany. It’s only his rookie year, but the 20-year-old is already making noise— beating the field in his debut in January.

When motocross’s top riders transition from indoor supercross racing to outdoors, for the Lucas Oil Pro Motocross series that kicks off in Glen Helen, California, this month, it’ll be Roczen who most will be watching.

52

the german wants to win in a sport ruled by americans.

Leaving his new home in Florida, Roczen drives his tricked-out Toyota Tundra half an hour to train at a course owned by his competitor, Ryan Villopoto. the red bulletin

53

The 450cc four-stroke engines rev up, the gate comes down, and it’s fireworks as 22 riders storm into the first corner.

Cole Seely is sensational as he ends the first lap in the lead before being reeled in

by James Stewart, who has the second most wins ever in supercross history.

Roczen passes someone for 8th and goes for a wild attack on the two guys directly in front of him when all of a sudden he comes to a standstill at the point where the track leads up to the stands. He jumps off his KTM, tugs at and fumbles with the lever, and kicks the brake disc. The rest of the field reappears and laps him before he can carry on. A stone had got wedged in the brake caliper and ruined his race.

Later on, at 8:37 p.m. that night, @KenRoczen94 tweeted: “Suuuper bummed.”

I

t’s a traveling day for Roczen.

Flight DL2028, Delta Airlines from Detroit to Orlando, Florida.

Departure time 12:15 p.m., ETA 2:51 p.m. An incredible 17 races over four months with not a single weekend off takes its toll and requires both steely discipline and a setup that may sound luxurious but whose sole purpose is to make sure the rider gets through the season safe and sound. He travels business 54

class; a window seat to lean back in and a film on his iPad as he tries to get a few minutes’ sleep. He has two homes—in California and in Florida—so as not to spend even more time on the road in a season that covers the entire continent.

When Roczen gets off the plane in Orlando, he runs into fans who recognize him even though he’s in a hoodie. He knows the score. He stands patiently between the terminal and the baggage claim and has his photo taken.

“I talk to all of them,” he says. “OK, if I’m sitting and having dinner, I might refuse to sign an autograph. But I once stood in front of [motocross legend] Ricky Carmichael myself with my eyes open wide and a pen in my hand. I haven’t forgotten that.”

It’s taking a while for the baggage in Orlando to come through. His Ogio Rig 9800 gear bag, personalized with his start number of 94 and name, is the third item eventually spat out onto the conveyer belt. He’ll be home within the hour.

“I couldn’t have imagined doing all this by myself as recently as a year or two years ago,” he says. “Now I travel alone. I live alone most of the time. And I enjoy it too, to a certain extent.” His girlfriend, Mariah, still lives in California. They mainly see each other on race weekends. the red bulletin

precision is essential. every jump must land on target.

The KTM is considered the strongest motorcycle in the supercross field, and it is also the only one with a hydraulic clutch. the red bulletin

55

Roczen’s regimen is strict.

Clermont, Florida, 11:30 a.m. A huge, dull-gray-wrapped Toyota Tundra with a raised chassis sits outside the second house on the left-hand side of the street.

It has the No. 94 emblazoned on one side, way more conspicuous than any house number. Its owner is half an hour late. His morning racing-bike session went on a bit longer than expected. When Roczen rolls up on his black-and-white Specialized Tarmac, the display shows that he’s done a little over 36 miles.

“Sorry for the mess,” Roczen says. “I only moved in five weeks ago.” The front door is covered in notes from missed deliveries. Yesterday the huge flat-screen TV for the open-plan living room arrived.

All the room has in it now is an armoire, a beanbag, and a PlayStation 4, where NBA 2K14 is his favorite game.

The kitchen, though, is already in working order, and Roczen gets down to business. He chops vegetables, puts them in the oven, steams a fish fillet and serves it with guacamole. His diet is strict, “all the more so because it’s so hard to get decent food in America.” In his case it 56

the red bulletin

an outdoor chassis on a washboard.” And once on the track it soon becomes clear why everything has to be the way it is.

The wheels only touch the crest for a short moment on the mogul-like whoops and the narrowly spaced smaller bumps of the washboard, like a stone skimming the surface of a lake.

What is almost more impressive is how little time there is after they land to brake, shift down, and hurtle into the bend. The final jump is 100 feet long, with Aldon Baker standing on the landing ramp and a panel showing the lap times.

Even the tiniest mistake will lose you three tenths. Roczen rides so perfectly that you can see those three tenths with the naked eye, like a picture that’s hung slightly crooked. Lap after lap, he lands the huge jump in a spot three feet square.

“Absolute precision is the secret to supercross,” he says. “Once you’ve got that down pat, it’s less demanding physically and of course you’re quicker, too. It takes a while for you to be able to do that. But I’ve been doing it since I was 5 years old.”

Photographer

Editor

Illustrator

A lap time of 58 seconds on the training track, with 28 of those in the air.

means making sacrifices. No milk, no cheese, no sugar, no cheap fats, no white flour, almost no meat, and omelettes made with three egg whites for every yolk. Chocolate is out of the question, as is ice cream. Once a week he’s allowed a frozen yogurt. “They even add sugar to the bread here,” Roczen says with a sigh and remembers his granny’s cooking.

“Meatballs in white sauce with capers.

Duck with dumplings and red cabbage.

Bratwurst.” It’s all making him hungry.

But the strict regime his trainer, Aldon Baker, enforces reaps its rewards. Roczen is pure muscle. He’s athletic. There’s not an ounce of fat on his body. He’s agile and fit. “I came off hard at the race in Indy but on the Monday I was back on my bike. It’s definitely tough but I’m still not feeling any pain,” he says.

Baker, a former road racer from South Africa, is seen as an authority among motorcyclists. He only works with the best: Carmichael, Stewart, last year’s champ Ryan Villopoto, former MotoGP world champion Nicky Hayden. And now Roczen. the red bulletin

Baker is not the type of guy you discuss things with. You do what he tells you to. As he explains: “At this level you have to strike the right balance between three things: endurance, strength/ mobility, and training on the bike itself.”

It’s 2:20 p.m. on a gated farm half an hour away from Roczen’s house. There are two supercross courses, a couple of regular motocross tracks, a flooded gravel pit, and an indoor area. There are five diggers of all shapes and sizes, a truck with a water tank, and a workshop with two workstations. This is paradise. Who does it belong to? “RV. But he lets me train here.” RV is Ryan Villopoto, the overall AMA Supercross leader and the man Roczen hopes to remove from his throne by next season at the latest.

“There are only a handful of riders all over the world who can do supercross,” he says. “We help each other. It’s not easy to buy land in the U.S.” The chassis on Ken Roczen’s 450cc KTM is tuned so hard that normal people wouldn’t be able to ride it. “You’d go straight over the handlebars if you used

H

is thoughts wander back to Germany and the parents who made the life he is living today possible.

“They would stand there in the mud by the track,” Roczen says. “They put all their hopes in me. We had to watch every penny we spent. Now it’s paying off. They work for me. I want us all to have good, nice lives.

Money comes with good results and character and now I’m the guy that a lot of people want a piece of.”

This year was meant to be a learning curve. No one would have thought that Roczen would be up there, battling it out for victory right from the start. The plan for next season is all-out attack. His contract with KTM is due to expire and so now the other factory teams are fighting to get their hands on the German hotshot.

He’s thinking about who will offer him the best setup, the best support crew, the best marketing opportunities too. “We’re not just sportsmen. We’re show stars, too,” Roczen says as he sits by his bike.

There’s a blank look on his face after a long day: two hours on his racing bike, three hours on his motorbike, an interview, and a photo session behind him. Baker will be waiting for him again at his front door with the racing bike tomorrow morning at 8 a.m.

It’s sushi for dinner. Maybe he’ll play a quick game on his PlayStation.

Twitter: @KenRoczen94

57

With the new women’s competition at the Red Bull Cliff Diving series, high diver Cesilie Carlton —and her sport—have a chance to soar.

Words: Ann Donahue

Flight Plan 58

/redbulletin

Š JÜrg Mitter

Li k e What you Li k e

Your Moment.

Beyond the Ordinary

t

hink of the diving boards you know from watching the Olympics: The springboard— the bouncy, seemingly easy one—is 3 meters high, almost 10 feet above the water. The much taller solid platform that invites anxiety attacks in viewers and snippy commentary about splash volume from judges is 10 meters high, or 33 feet up.

Cesilie Carlton is the best female diver in the world from a distance of twice that, at 20 meters or 66 feet—approximately the same height as a seven-story building.

From that distance, divers reach 22 mph in the two seconds it takes to break the water. It’s a queasy, vertigo-inducing height, and one that hasn’t been available for women to regularly compete in—until now.

For the first time in 2014, the Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series will host a threeevent women’s competition, with stops in Forth Worth, Texas, on June 7; Kragerø, Norway, on July 12; and Rio de Janeiro on October 19. Five women, including Carlton, will compete at each stop, with several wildcard entrants also participating at each event.

For Carlton, 33, it’s a long-awaited expansion of a sport she’s practiced since she was a teenager. As a child, she was a

60

competitive swimmer and elite-level gymnast—and realized one day during swim practice that she could combine the two.

Her first dive was a front 1.5 pike—one and a half forward somersaults, with her upper body folded over her extended legs— literally child’s play to what she can do now.

Carlton’s high-diving skills were mastered as a performer in The House of Dancing Water, a $250 million aquatic stage show at the City of Dreams Casino in Macau. During practice and two 90-minute performances daily, she high-dives into a 3.7 million gallon tank from a variety of platforms—including a daredevil standing leap from a swing where she can practice the dives she uncorks in competition, like a triple half: three complete somersaults in pike position, then an extension into a twist to orient her body feet-first into the water.

“I am a muscle-memory diver,” she says. “I can often see most of the dives in my mind, but I am confident that my body knows what to do.”

Emboldened by her stage experience, in 2013 Carlton took first place in the high-dive division at the World Aquatic Championships in Barcelona, the first time the competition—sponsored by FINA, the Federation Internationale de Natation, diving’s Switzerland-based governing body—included a 20-meter platform. “The competition was huge, much larger than I anticipated, but so much fun. Who doesn’t like to compete and test their skills against others?” she says.

Now that there is a global series for women this year—one that piggybacks off the success of the men’s Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series, which has had more than 25 stops around the world since it was founded in 2009—Carlton has lofty ambitions for high diving.

“I’m hoping that having an official competition for women will not only bring more publicity to the sport of cliff diving, but I also hope it establishes high

CESILIE CARLTON Last year, Cesilie Carlton won the women’s competition at the FINA world championship for high divers, finishing ahead of fellow American Ginger Leigh Huber and German Anna Bader.

The three will face off again at the Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series, alongside competition from American Rachelle Simpson and Brazil’s Jacqueline Valente.

Hometown: Birthdate: Height/Weight City of residence: Profession:

Family status: Started cliff diving in:

San Antonio, Texas March 27, 1981 5’5”/119 lbs.

Macau Performer in The House of Dancing Water Married 2009

My secret passion “I don’t think that I have a secret passion. I can never keep a secret, so there would be no way for me to have a ‘secret’ passion.”

Favorite cliff diving spot “I haven’t yet dived from a cliff but Italy looks amazing.”

Favorite dive “Although I don’t do it, the inward double half [two somersaults and a rotating twist] is my favorite dive to watch.”

My (cliff diving) hero “My husband, Jason Carlton. To this day I am still in awe of his beauty and fitness in the air. He is a beautiful diver, and it is not because I’m biased. He competed in Red Bull Cliff Diving a couple of years back. I first learned about high diving and cliff diving from him.”

Achievements •FINA High Diving World Champion, 2013 • NJCAA Springboard Champion, 1 and 3 meters • EFSL Swimming Championships, youngest competitor My goal for this season?

“To have a consistent Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series, and bring in some new dives.”

diving as a sport that could possibly be in the Olympics,” she says.

The first step of that expansion into mainstream acceptance comes with the Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series event in Forth Worth, just a couple hundred miles from Carlton’s hometown of San Antonio. It will be the first time that her four sisters—and 11 nieces and nephews—will see her dive. “I think that my mom has told every person she has come across in San Antonio that her daughter is a world champion,” Carlton laughs. “Whether they want to hear it or not.” www.redbullcliffdiving.com the red bulletin

AP Images

Carlton’s win in Barcelona was unexpected—it was her first competition.

I AM WATER POLO Laguna Beach personality. Californian.

Surfer. Cameron Brinkman is water polo.

Water Polo provides skills and experiences that last a lifetime, preparation for achieving your dreams... whatever they may be.

Are you water polo?

Join the Cap Campaign.

Learn more at: iamwaterpolo.org

Image by Larsen&Talbert Photographed at Milk Studios-LA

metronomy

In the Mix

Metronomy’s main man on the meaning of success, missing MySpace, and adoring electronic music.

Joseph Mount remembers the moment he officially became a professional musician. Sometime around 2002, the Devon, England-bred architect of nimble electro-pop outfit Metronomy was fresh out of university with $33,000 in student debt and the itch to find an income source. Mount met with a career counselor to discuss job prospects.

“I was like, ‘I just finished a degree. I’m a musician.’ They were like, ‘Oh, so would you be interested in working in retail?’

I was like, ‘No, I’m 30 grand in debt. I’m a bloody musician now,’ ” the 31-year-old good-naturedly recalls. “I just decided I wouldn’t take a crappy job again, and I didn’t.” Thanks to a mix of skill, luck, and networking, Mount kept himself busy doing soundtracks for animated projects and remixing familiar hits while Metronomy’s indie-pop, electronic psychrock sound gained steam. As Mount recalibrated tunes by Gorillaz, Klaxons, Britney Spears, Franz Ferdinand, Kate Nash, and others, Metronomy transitioned from a one-man-show to a full band. We caught up with him before Metronomy embarked on a spring tour across Europe in support of March 10’s Love Letters, the act’s latest full-length. the red bulletin: After declaring that you were a professional musician all those years ago, was there a crowning moment where your decision felt justified?

Joseph Mount: It was probably the first time I was doing my interviews, and I was able to go into record shops and find a CD or read very small things about Metronomy in magazines. For my parents and a lot of people, when you first get written about by a broadsheet newspaper—a real newspaper—that is like, “Oh, OK. So you’re a musician now, are you?”

62

[Laughs.] Up until that point, they don’t believe you.

You imagined the sound of Metronomy’s 2011 album The English Riviera as “music made next to the seaside.” Did you have a similar concept in mind when you created Love Letters?

A lot of the tracks were written while I was touring the last album and between places, so I think it has the feeling of a bit of exploring something or somewhere. If there is a concept of this album, it was just that it was recorded in an incredibly basic, analog way. If it’s supposed to sound like anything, it’s a record recorded in an old studio.

Elements of several styles figure into

“You’re aware you have this bigger audience and bigger expectations. It made me push myself.”

Metronomy’s sound, but above all, the project has always been rooted in electronic music. Why is that?

I expect it’s something to do with drumming, really—the fact that I started [making music by] playing the drums. To learn about other instruments, I was using a computer to program stuff and play along. When you’re using that equipment, you’re relying on electronic [foundations]. There’s something I like about drum machines and the world those sounds make. I find that as pleasing as classic guitar pop.

The idea of using remixes to elevate one’s profile, as you did, seems easy to do since there are all these other,

bigger artists who could help you should a track take off. On the flip side, it also seems difficult to stand out since the Internet is nowadays glutted with remixes and covers of pre-existing artists. What did you think of the remixing process?

At one point, it was very easy and enjoyable. At another point, it got to where Metronomy was a cool name to have a remix by, so I was able to ask for more money, but it was still something I enjoyed. Then I started to feel like I was part of the problem. Nowadays, like you’re saying, there’s this glut of remixes and cover versions, and they don’t really serve any purpose, unless you’re doing a big house or clubby remix. They just feed the blogosphere. For me, that world is not as interesting anymore as the world of genuine collaborations and genuine singles and things like that.

Imagine starting out in 2014 instead of when you did. Because of that glut, would you still use remixes as a way to boost your profile?

I don’t know what people use anymore.

When I was starting, MySpace was quite a good thing. Now, you have Bandcamp and SoundCloud and all this stuff, but to me, it doesn’t present a musical community in the same way that, strangely enough, something like MySpace used to.

[Laughs.] I’m quite nostalgic about MySpace. [Nowadays] I would still send stuff to record labels. When I was young, I actually went and did work experience at a record label. You really can’t beat meeting people and talking to people and communicating your passion in person.

When I moved to Brighton and started going to the clubs, that was the only way I ended up getting anything released.

Trying to network in the old-fashioned way as well as the new does the job. www.metronomy.co.uk the red bulletin

Gregoire Alexandre

Words: Reyan Ali

Metronomy, from left: Oscar Cash, Gbenga Adelekan, Anna Prior, and Joseph Mount

D av i d B e l l e a n d h i s friends invented pa r ko u r . N ow, sta r r i n g in the sport’s highest profile movie and more pas s i o n at e t h a n e v e r about his incredible invention, he wants the world to live a n d p l ay by h i s r u l e s .

make the

l teo tah e pn e x t level w o r d s : a l e x l i s e t z  p h o t o g r a p h y: j i m k r a n t z

64

Parkour is a sport and, to its practitioners, a way of confronting fears and conquering obstacles in all aspects of life.

66

“ my fea r t el ls me ex act ly

how far I ca n go .”

FIR ST RUL E OF PAR KOUR :

FIN D yo ur B A L A N C E .

The basic goal for every move is achieving stability, physically and mentally.

68

the red bulletin

W David Belle (front) invented parkour as a teenager. Now he wants to share his experiences with youngsters all over the world.

the red bulletin

hen David Belle is invited to a barbecue on a roof terrace, a switch will flip in his head.

He will divert his attention away from the smell of grilling steaks and the sound of the other guests’ small talk. Instead, his brain will be scanning the support column leading to the scaffolding leading to the truck-loading bay leading to the pavement. As the host offers ketchup, he will be working out the best way to get everyone to safety should the barbecue burst into flames. If a 3-year-old clambers onto the fire escape on the sixth story of the building opposite, he will take only a matter of seconds to stop the kid from falling. He thinks this way because he invented parkour.

It’s thanks to Belle that, in cities around the world, you see people in tennis shoes and tracksuits practicing for hours at a time trying to perfect a jump over a handrail or working out how to get over a wall. Parkour is the art of efficient motion in urban space. The aim is to find the fastest, most efficient and most elegant way from A to B on foot, without means of transport.

But for many of those who do it,

69

“Parkour isn’t dangerous,” says Belle, “because the people who do it for real know exactly what their bodies are capable of and what they’re not.”

DANGEROUS? ONLY IF YOU DON’ T KNOW WHAT YOU’RE DOING. Belle (left) sees himself as a guardian of his sport’s pure teachings. “Not everything that looks like parkour,” he says, “actually is parkour.”

“everything

THAT I AM TOD AY I AM BEC AU SE OF

parko u r . ”

71

use

fear

to wa rn you of dan ger and it bec om es Difficult jumps require mental preparation: a visualization of every stage of the move in the finest detail. Only then can they be pulled off successfully.

72

yo ur fr ien d.

the red bulletin

parkour is more than that. Getting over obstacles, mastering challenges and taming fears makes parkour a school of life that to the rest of us looks like a really cool thing to do. “Everything that I am today,” says Belle, “I am because of parkour.”

S P R E A D I N G BY L E A P S A N D B O U N D S The capital of the parkour world is Lisses, a small town with a population of 7,000 20 miles south of Paris.

This is where 41-year-old Belle lives and where, 17 years ago, he and his Yamakasi Crew, which took its name from a word meaning “strong men” in the Congolese language of Lingala, began with a couple of acrobatic moves that grew into a globally recognized subculture. A good portion of that fame comes from their movies.

In 2001, seven of the crew’s nine founding members starred in the action film Yamakasi: Les Samourais Des Temps Modernes. The two Yamakasi missing from the cast list had already left the group to pursue their own careers in cinema. Sébastien Foucan developed the acrobatic art of freerunning—a parkour variant that promotes flair and worries less about the rule about most efficient movement—which he showcased in an incredible chase sequence for the 2006 James Bond film Casino Royale.

Belle, too, had a solo career, which began in earnest in 2004 with the action drama District 13, written by Luc Besson and directed by Pierre Morel (Taken). He was also getting work as a stuntman in films, such as Crimson Rivers 2: Angels of the Apocalypse and Transporter 2, and refining the parameters of parkour.

Being able to move efficiently was not an end in itself, he began telling an everincreasing number of fans and students.

Parkour is about être fort pour être utile— being strong to be useful, being ready for when others might need help.

For young potential traceurs, as the practitioners of parkour are known, Belle became an idol. Millions would click on his YouTube videos and watch in awe as he jumped with ease from one block of apartments onto another, a distance of 20 to 22 feet with a drop of 130 feet below.

But Belle, 41, with the musculature of a boxer, doesn’t care much for personal fame and recognition. His burning desire is to have the whole world go mad for parkour. “Parkour’s potential has barely been tapped,” he says, “because anyone, anywhere can learn it, and they don’t need any equipment.” the red bulletin

73

Traceurs from around the world meet to train together at this housing estate in Lisses, near Paris.

The “Private Property” sign serves a mostly decorative purpose.

A R T I S T S O F S U R V I VA L This year could be the most important one for parkour since 1997, when the Yamakasi Crew formed. Belle wants to start a foundation to make the parkour scene more interconnected and promote up-and-coming talent. He hopes to publish a book on the history of his sport, along with Yamakasi member Charles Perrière. And he wants to help parkour break out from its Western roots. First stop will be China, where he aims to spend the next few months building parkour training areas and holding workshops for up-and-coming traceurs with the help of local promoters.

“Parkour’s future is in China and Russia,” Belle says. “People there are growing up in a society that demands a lot of discipline and hard work of them, but they still yearn for some freedom and self-fulfillment. With parkour they can combine the two.”

Belle knows what he’s talking about here. He is the son of a soldier who served with the French army in Vietnam, and his own childhood was one where self-development and discipline were equally important educational goals. He is still inspired by his father, Raymond, who died in 1999. “ ‘You can do anything you want,’ he told me, ‘as long as you do it with complete commitment.’ ” 74

The younger Belle knew exactly what it was that he wanted to do. He wanted to pick up on an idea of his father’s and fine-tune it. Raymond turned the Méthode Naturelle—the French army’s standard training practice—into a system of attack and escape for the jungle. Raymond came up with a name for his obstacle-course training, which involved negotiating ditches and fallen trees under a hail of bullets: le parcours.

“ F E A R I S YO U R F R I E N D ” Belle is now a father figure, both to the guys from the Parkour Origin crew, whom he trains for up to eight hours at a time, and to the hundreds of traceurs from all over the world who descend on Lisses every year to get a glimpse of his tricks and learn from them.

The fact that the neighbors don’t

complain comes down to another parkour core value: respect. Any urban space used for training purposes has to be left as it was found. Traceurs repair any obstacle they damage.

With its open stairwells, railings, and low walls, Belle’s public housing complex, the Résidence du Mail de l’Ilede-France, is the perfect place to try out some of the basic moves of parkour. You can practice passements, the vaults over obstacles, as well as your saut de precision, or precision jump, and the tic tac, launching off an obstacle.

“The most important thing to remember is that you build up very gradually,” says Charles Perrière. The 39-year-old heads a parkour school, Culture Parkour, in Paris, and he knows how to give his pupils the confidence the red bulletin

there is so m uch potent ial in thi s sport . it ’s now here

near been tappe d.

Using this technique, Belle has mastered drop jumps from heights up to 26 feet.

To him, the basics that every parkour beginner has to internalize until they become second nature, and which enable him to do what he does, are nothing unusual and within the grasp of everyone who does or wants to do parkour. “You start training for parkour with balance exercises,” explains Belle. “If you can keep your balance, everything else will come naturally.”

R E L U C TA N T H E R O

they need to succeed. “You have to work with your fear,” he tells them. “If you don’t know yourself well, you’re a slave to your fear. Use fear to warn you of danger and it becomes your friend.”

Perrière is a master of one of parkour’s most spectacular moves, the saut de fond, a drop jump from a great height. First, he visualizes every phase of the move in his mind’s eye: “The more experience you have, the more detailed your imagination becomes.” Then he jumps neatly—“you have to jump, not fall”—straightens himself out, keeps his eye on the ground, lands with knees slightly bent and cushions the impact with his whole body.

“If you’ve got room, you can add a roll.

If you jump from a height of anything above about 5 feet, you have to.” the red bulletin

Evocative comparisons come thick and fast when Belle talks about parkour.

The mind of a traceur is a knight, he explains, and his body his horse.

A traceur, he says, is like a samurai: calm on the outside but always ready for action on the inside. Or they’re like pianists because their brains make the right decisions without them thinking.

Belle is so convincing in conveying parkour’s emboldening and inspirational guiding principles because he is their own most eager follower.

“I was a shy kid. I was wary and solitary,” he says. “And I was impatient too. If I didn’t get something straight away, I’d forget about it.” Belle reinvented himself thanks to parkour.

He says that every successful move increased his self-confidence. Training with other traceurs on a daily basis did away with his anti-social behavior.

Repeating the same exercise hundreds

of times over and over again, he says, taught him discipline and patience.

“Hmm, OK,” he says, rethinking, with a smile. “Maybe not so much patience.”

A PA R KO U R B L O C K B U S T E R Last summer, Belle underwent a serious test of self-discipline and his ability to rise to a challenge. He had let his training slide over the previous winter, was 20 pounds overweight and had been feeling unhappy with his life. Then the phone rang. It was Luc Besson.

“David,” he said, “you still remember that film project we talked about a couple of years ago, don’t you?”

“You mean the Hollywood remake of District 13?”

“Exactly,” said Besson. “We start shooting in two months.”

Brick Mansions, in cinemas worldwide now, has every chance of giving parkour its biggest boost in awareness since Casino Royale. Belle stars as an ex-con who teams up with a cop, played by the late Fast & Furious star Paul Walker, to take down a criminal gang in a dystopian future Detroit housing project.

“I studied English for four hours a day and trained for the stunts with Paul for three hours,” says Belle, who also devised the choreography for the fights and the chases. In the opening scene, he leaps through a closed window and into another one. During another pursuit, he shows off a combined drop jump and gap jump (saut de détente), leaping from a height of almost 16 feet over a chasm 23 feet wide.

“My fear,” says Belle, “told me exactly how far I could go.” facebook.com/brickmansionsmovie parkour.com

75

How do you climb an underground rock face that’s never been conquered when the clock IS ticking and there’s No margin for error?

Just ask these guys ...

out of tHe words: Alex Lisetz photography: Klaus Fengler

darkness

77

SUMMIT MEETING. Stefan Glowacz, 49, (above right) and Chris Sharma, 33 (below right) climbed a remarkable rock face in Oman: the second biggest cave chamber in the world.

Below left: Glowacz and Sharma at one of the entrances to the Majlis al Jinn cave.

MAJLIS AL JINN The giant cave chamber in Oman was discovered by geologist Don Davison and his wife Cheryl Jones in 1983. Jones christened the cave Majlis al Jinn, Arabic for “the meeting place of the spirits.”

0 ft.

–164 ft.

M 158.2 m deepest part of cave - 178 m

–328

393 ft.

–492

Majlis al Jinn

–656

78

Statue of Liberty 300 ft.

ore rope!” shouts Stefan Glowacz. “MORE! ROPE!” But Chris Sharma can’t hear him. Sharma is a couple of feet below the beam of light from Glowacz’s headlamp, swallowed up by the darkness of Majlis al Jinn, the second biggest cave chamber in the world. The vastness of this underground cathedral breaks down Glowacz’s words into separate syllables, bounces them off the walls and turns them into a dull reverberation. His face is wracked with pain. It is February 28, 2014, with little more than a week left to make a success of a near-impossible mission. He would like the acoustics to be the worst of his problems.

MID 2012, GARMISCH-PARTENKIRCHEN, GERMANY glowacz: “My friend Heli Putz put the idea into my head. He told me about this cave in Oman, the Majlis al Jinn. Felix Baumgartner jumped into it in 2007, and a few other BASE jumpers had been there since. The cave is nondescript from the outside: three crevices a few feet across at the bottom of a slope covered in small rocks. But in actual fact, you’re standing on the roof of an enormous vault.

At 525 feet deep, 1,020 feet long and 740 feet wide, it could almost accommodate Wembley Stadium.

‘Wouldn’t it be amazing,’ Heli said, ‘if someone abseiled down to the bottom and then climbed back out via the rock face?’ I wanted to be that the red bulletin

The underground vault’s dimensions are huge, as were the trials and tribulations of the climb. The route was always overhanging and often more than 45 degrees steep.

somebody. But this was not a job for one man alone.

I would need a partner. The best one I could get.

I thought Chris Sharma would be interested.

We had met at a couple of events and hit it off straight away. He is the most creative climber of his generation, one I look up to in the same way I admire my idols from the 1970s and ’80s.”

LATE 2012, SANTA CRUZ, CalifORNIA sharma: “The phone rang. It was Stefan Glowacz.

The same Stefan Glowacz I’d admired for years.

With every new project he reinvents climbing, even though he’s now been active for decades.

I said yes before he’d even finished his question.”

In December 2012, Glowacz drove to the Selma Plateau in Oman in a 4x4, stirring up clouds of dust that hung in the air for minutes. The Majlis al Jinn cave is only 20 miles from the coast, but to get there meant driving on bumpy gravel tracks and reaching altitudes of up to 5,000 feet above sea level.

Glowacz realized that he wouldn’t just be facing technical climbing challenges on this expedition.

There would be logistical challenges as well. There wouldn’t be any drinking water for the base camp he’d want to set up here.

Back in Oman’s capital, Muscat, he met with high-ranking officials to get approval for the endeavor.

They agreed to grant him permission to enter the cave, but they did have one demand: He had to make sure to come back out alive. Glowacz gave them his word. He had his hands on the official permit to embark on the adventure relatively quickly by local standards—just six months later.

On the Limit. Rope tore Stefan Glowacz’s hands open in a fall (above). Although the injury had a negative impact on his every move, he fought on to the bitter end.

sharma: “Today I stood for the first time at the chasm where our adventure awaits us and looked down. You can’t see anything. It’s just blackness.

I threw a rock in and waited for the impact. And waited. And waited. It seems pretty deep.”

80

Credit:

FEBRUARY 18, 2014, MUSCAT, OMAN

“ L I V I N G C R E AT U R E S AREN’T WELCOME DEEP BELOW GROUND. I T ’S TO O FA R DOWN, TOO DARK, TOO DANGEROUS.”

FEBRUARY 19, 2014, MAJLIS AL JINN glowacz: “We abseiled down to the bottom of the cave. Our first climbing attempts showed that the quality of the rock was better than we hoped, but the weak light meant it was hard to see in all directions. You could hardly see the holds on the rock in front of you. You’re climbing blind.” sharma: “Right from day one, I understood how differently Stefan and I wanted to approach the project. I’d like to just climb straight off, but Stefan studies the rock face first, plans the pitches and coordinates the logistics, which is necessary because our project has turned into something huge. There are 20 of us total on the team,

and we have 1,500 pounds of equipment, six lighting balloons and a mile and a half of rope. And we’re in a hurry: We’ll have to climb all the routes in just two and a half weeks because the authorities won’t let us stay in the cave any longer than that.

What I can learn from Stefan are analytical thinking and having a commanding overview.

I have to learn these things. We have a project full of questions ahead of us. The biggest question of all is whether we we’ll be able to free-climb such a steep rock face at all.”

The narrow beam of light from Sharma’s headlamp scours the rock in front of him. He is hanging upside down about a third of the way up the rock face. Even 81

Extreme overhangs, crumbling rock and weak light meant that progress was slow and difficult.

FEBRUARY 25, 2014, MAJLIS AL JINN sharma: “Stefan is one tough guy. He wrapped tape around his exposed palms, which must have stung like crazy. But as bad as it was, that fall could have ended very differently. Now I understand why Majlis al Jinn translates as ‘the meeting place of the spirits.’ We living creatures aren’t welcome here, deep below ground. It is too dry, too dark, too far down, too dangerous. There aren’t any animals here, apart from a few tiny black bugs.

But I’m beginning to enjoy the challenge. As you have to improvise so much when you’re climbing, you can let your intuition take over. Climbing is actually like meditating for me. A peak sporting performance is the way to find yourself.”

BACK ON EARTH. After two and a half weeks, the conquest of the Majlis al Jinn was complete. Local goatherds came to offer congratulations at the cave’s exit.

“ C L I M B I N G I S L I K E M E D I TAT I N G .

P E R F O R M I N G AT Y O U R P E A K L I K E T H I S I S T H E W AY T O F I N D Y O U R S E L F. ” he, perhaps the best competitive climber in the world, has his limits.

Inserting each bolt is a challenge. He moves from one to the next quickly.

“That’s great!” Glowacz shouts out from below.

The echo reverberates off the walls.

FEBRUARY 20, 2014, MAJLIS AL JINN glowacz: “I was climbing differently from the way I normally climb. I wasn’t falling back on my routine and was more unsettled than usual, which is why I made a mistake. I wanted to hook in my second ascender rope, but when released, it went into a sudden spin. This caused the other ascender to come loose, and I was flung down about 30 feet. I automatically grabbed the rope with both hands, which is the worst thing I could have possibly done.

The rope ripped the skin off my hands to the point that flesh was exposed. I screamed out and dropped a bit further. Shit.” the red bulletin

Sharma is hanging in the fourth of the 13 separate sections, known as pitches, that he and Glowacz have mapped out. He’s climbed 330 feet so far. The stresses and strains of organizing the pitches over a total of 1,000 feet are enormous.

Many pitches are on overhangs of at least 45 degrees from the horizontal. No natural light.

No days off. And now he has the toughest section of the whole rock face ahead of him.

Sharma dips into the chalk bag once more.

He will later rate this pitch as one of the hardest he has ever undertaken.

MARCH 1, 2014, MAJLIS AL JINN glowacz: “ ‘If you do this,’ I say to Chris, ‘then in my view you’re the best climber in the world.’

I can see the ambition in his eyes, but just as he’s a couple of millimeters away from triumph, he has to give in because we don’t have enough time to devote a whole day to a single pitch.

So we organize a way around, even if Chris is a little unhappy about it.”

MARCH 5, 2014, MAJLIS AL JINN sharma: “Yes, it is possible to free-climb in the Majlis al Jinn. Today we managed the final pitch and climbed every single red point, which means that we only used the natural rock structures. We spent six days climbing in all. The rest of the time went to organization.

It was rough going. We peeked out into the glaring light of the desert. Our crew celebrated, and a couple of goatherds gave us toothless grins. We hugged. But Stefan, with his hand injuries, stayed out of the high-fives.”

After they packed up their equipment, Sharma and Glowacz flew to Europe. While celebrating at a small party in Spain, where Sharma has chosen to make his home, they hear that the Majlis al Jinn is to be opened up to tourists.

Perhaps, in three or four years’ time, other climbers will be climbing different routes back out into the light of day.

“Every rock face,” Glowacz explains, “is easier once someone has shown it can be climbed. The hardest thing is imagining the impossible.” glowacz.de

83

TUNE IN SATURDAY JUNE 7TH 2:30PM ET / 11:30AM PT REDBULLSIGNATURESERIES.COM

See Neil Young’s digital music player.

MUSIC, page 88

Where to go and what to do

ac t i o n !

T r a v e l / G e a r / T r a i n i n g / N i g h t l i f e / M U S I C / p a r t i e s / c i t i e s / c l u b s / E v e n ts

Life’s a beach impress everyone on your next vacation by working out like a beach volleyball pro.

Rutger Pauw/Red Bull Content Pool

Training, page 87

Brinkmanship: Follow Julius Brink’s tips to gain a strategic advantage.

the red bulletin

85

Action!

get the gear Star Trek: The bike that helps Macdonald to podium finishes.

4 3

1

2

Gear up to get down MOUNTAIN BIKING In the ultracompetitive world of downhill, gear that shaves seconds off race times is vital. Here’s some you can use.

facebook.com/BrookMacdonaldMTB trekworldracing.com

To e to he a d Brook Macdonald’s must-have gear

86

Five Ten Impact VXi Clipless

the ride thing why this bike makes you better

1 OFF THE SHELF

the Bontrager rims are designed to dent instead of break,” says Buckle.

“Hopefully that helps him get to the bottom of the course without puncturing.”

“Anyone can walk into a bike shop and buy an exact replica of this frame,” says Trek’s Brian Buckle of the Session 9.9 650B. “We want people to be able to ride the same frame as our elite riders.”

4 RUBBER GOAL

2 SPRING LOADED

The Fox RAD DH Shock on Macdonald’s bike is custom-built for him. He’s one of a handful of World Cup riders racing with the prototype part.

“Tires are nearly as important in mountain biking as in Formula One,” says Buckle. “Brook can choose from seven different Bontrager tires depending on the conditions.”

3 ROCKY ROAD

“As Brook bombs down mountains and bounces off rocks,

Oakley Airbrake

Bell Full-9 Downhill helmet

“I’ve used Five Ten shoes since I started in the sport, but the change to clipless should help me be more consistent and hopefully faster.”

“These have been called the Swiss Army knife of goggles. They’re customized to fit my face and have great breathability around the nose and an incredible field of vision.”

“It’s designed for motocross, but it’s been adapted for mountain biking. It’s light and durable and it makes me feel safe.”

fiveten.com

oakley.com

bellhelmets.com

the red bulletin

robert tighe

Brook Macdonald: On the up-and-up in downhill mountain biking.

“The competition is so fierce now,” says Brook “Bulldog” Macdonald, a rider in the UCI Downhill World Cup. “Everyone is going faster and you’ve got to try everything you can to get an edge.”

The 22-year-old from New Zealand has made several changes to his setup this year to help him in his quest to be the best in the world. The biggest change is the bike he’s riding, an upgrade from the Trek Session 9 with 26-inch wheels to the Trek Session 9.9 650B (above) with 27.5inch wheels. “With the bigger wheels, I’ll have faster roll-in speeds. It will help smooth out some of the rougher sections and hopefully it will help me gain lots of time,” he says. Macdonald is hoping a switch in footwear will help, too: He is changing from flat shoes to clipless, which, despite the name, attach to the pedals. It’s a significant change for a rider known for his fast and loose style.

Action!

training

Deep sand, great takeoff power: Julius Brink

Shore thing Beach volleyball Olympic gold medalist Julius Brink on how to play—and look—like him.

Rutger Pauw/Red Bull Content Pool, HochZwei/Red Bull Content Pool, Markus Berger/Red Bull Content Pool, vario sling.de

Golden sands: Julius Brink is reigning Olympic beach volleyball champ.

Through a varied schedule of endurance training, weights and technical and tactical practice, Julius Brink spends about 25 hours a week honing his body.

The team-tactics element is all the more important, because the 31-year-old German beach volleyball pro has a new partner this season, in the shape of Armin Dollinger, a 23-year-old fellow German. Brink says that would-be beach volleyballers—you, for three hours a year, on vacation—can certainly learn from the pros. “Play indoor volleyball, which is quicker than the beach version, on a regular basis to improve your basic technique. Do weight training two or three times a week and work classic exercises such as squats, deadlifts and pullovers into your program, to strengthen your shoulders, because they come under great strain.”

Fu ll b o dy w o r k o ut Take a shot at sling training

Core improvement

The sling trainer is a simple piece of gear used for warm-up, strengthening and rehabilita­tion. One of Julius Brink’s uses of the sling is an effective exercise to improve core stability (below left). Hook your feet into the straps and stretch your body. Push yourself backwards and forwards while keeping your body tense.

G E T V O L L E Y B A L L e r s ' S h o U L D E RS “Pullovers with a barbell are a basic exercise when it comes to improving shoulder stability,” says Brink. “I recommend five sets of 8 to 12 reps each, leaving at least a minute’s break between sets.”

brink-dollinger.de

1

A session with the sling trainer is part of Julius Brink’s regular workout routine.

the red bulletin

Lie flat on the bench. Hold the bar above your chest with your arms bent slightly. Carefully lower the bar behind your head, maintaining full control.

2

As you move to the end position, with your elbows still slightly bent, push your lower back into the bench and exhale as you return to the start position.

87

Action!

Music

listen real well Nasir bin Olu Dara Jones grew up in Queensbridge, a rough part of New York City. His father left; he dropped out of school—the classic CV for a hard-luck life. Instead, he became Nas, and in 1994 released his debut album, Illmatic, at the age of 20. It was groundbreaking: No one had told the tough-life tales in such a poetic and musical way before.

The album is still lauded as a hiphop touchstone by critics, fans, and fellow musicians, and a 20thbirthday re-release includes demos, remixes, and unreleased tracks.

Here, Nas remembers the music that fired him up back then.

Nas’s Illmatic is 20 this year.

“It sounded like a rhino” Playlist To mark the special edition of one of the great hip-hop albums, Nas picks the songs that fired him up when he made it.

www.nasirjones.com

Upgrade your digital music quality now

Woo Audio wa7 Digital-analog converters turn music files into audible sound.

This vacuumtube headphone amplifier does so at higher quality. wooaudio.com

1

Public Enemy Rebel Without a Pause

“I saw them live for the first time at an anti-racism rally in Harlem in 1988. With samples of speeches by Jesse Jackson and Chuck’s razor-sharp rap, hip-hop never sounded more forceful. Chuck D roared, ‘Soul, rock and roll, co­ming like a rhino,’ during this song, and it really sounded like a rhino was running through the club.”

2

Stevie Wonder Master Blaster

“I was a kid when I heard this song for the first time, and I thought, ‘Whoever this guy is, he is the greatest musicmaker of all time.’ He recorded this song as a tribute to Bob Marley’s ‘Jamming.’

That Stevie would care to do a reggaeinfluenced record like that is incredible.

It was pivotal in me later working together with Marley’s son, Damian.”

3

Boogie Down Productions My Philosophy

“When I was a teenager, I used to wonder if rappers could be philosophers.

KRS-One of BDP answered my question with this track.

He showed what an MC can do, what being a rapper is all about. This song was mind-blowing and still is, musically as well as lyrically. KRS-One was a teacher for me. He was like Malcolm X, the Marcus Garvey of our generation.”

dfx Audio Enhancer Software that gives music a fuller sound on your computer, phone or tablet, with 3D-surround simulation. fxsound.com

Michael Jackson Human Nature

“The way Michael describes meeting a girl in a city in this song is magical. I still wonder what synthesizers he used for it—respect to Quincy Jones, who is the best producer who ever lived.

I used a sample from it for my single, ‘It Ain’t Hard to Tell.’ Sadly, I never got to meet him in person, but we spoke on the phone a few times.”

5

A Tribe Called Quest I Left My Wallet in El Segundo

“My favorite early ATCQ tune is this one. The story is amazing: Q-Tip and the guys take a road trip across America in his mother’s car. When they get back he realizes that he lost his wallet in El Segundo. It was the first time I heard the word ‘grub,’ meaning food. Q-Tip is the coolest of the cool, and we ended up working on Illmatic together.”

s o u n d b ox the orchestra around you

Ototo

Crowd-funded on Kickstarter, this mini-synth turns everyday objects into musical instruments. Bana­nas, pan lids, items of furniture ... anything can be used to generate a sound once it’s hooked up. Sounds are emitted via a built-in speaker. dentakulondon.com

Ponoplayer Rock legend Neil Young says that listening to hi-res music on this forthcoming digital player (he’s a company founder) sounds 30 times better than standard MP3s. ponomusic.com

88

the red bulletin

pressherenow.com

4

Action!

nightlife Jump around: Bar Rouge is the place to be in Shanghai.

not just noodles Shanghainese must-eats

Xiao Long Bao Delicate, soupfilled pork dumplings are a staple of the city’s cuisine. You can find them everywhere from street corners to the finest restaurants.

Living the Hai life

Dave Tacon, Kai Wang, Artbeat Studio(3), shutterstock(3)

shanghai A first-rate nightclub with a superb view of China’s second city. Just stay happy in the line.

It’s hard to stay on trend in a city as fastpaced as Shanghai. Yet here, where conspicuous consumption is a competitive sport, one club has endured. This year, Bar Rouge will celebrate a decade servicing a well-turned-out crowd with a high proportion of expats. Location has been key to this place’s longevity. You’ll find it in the Bund, the city’s historic waterfront, and on its splendid terrace you can sip cocktails to the backdrop of a spectacular 180-degree view of Shanghai’s skyline—a sight that has changed much in the last 10 years.

Like many high-end clubs, Bar Rouge has its own caste system, where VIPs occupy tables groaning with prestige alcohol and everyone else waits at the permanently packed bar. The door policy is strict. “But if you arrive with positive energy and a big smile,” says Deniz Otman, the club’s operations manager, “you just might get in.” bar rouge 18 Zhongshan East 1st Rd., Huangpu, Shanghai, China bar-rouge-shanghai.com

the red bulletin

Bar Rouge offers views, drinks and expat pandas.

rooms with a view watch the world worldwide

Gansevoort Park Rooftop, New York Clubby twin-level hotel bar, 20 stories above Park Avenue South in the city’s NoMad district, with one of NYC’s best roof pools.

People by Crystal, Dubai Thanks to its 360-degree view of the skyline, from the top of the Raffles Hotel, it draws top DJs like Steve Aoki. Less great: Super-strict door policy.

Rooftop Bar, Melbourne Astroturfed venue that hosts everything from DJ events to open-air movies.

A laid-back vibe and great views of the city’s Central Business District.

Shao Kao Shanghai’s street barbecue is popular and a cheap late night snack. Choose from the vast array of vegetables, meat and seafood on sticks and watch them get grilled in front you.

Chòu Dòufu You can’t avoid getting a whiff of this pungent fermented tofu. A Western equivalent is, sort of, salty blue cheese. To find your nearest vendor, just follow your nose.

89

Action!

MY City

lmira n u e v a p a

Montevideo

e a v

v.

d

Montevideo, uruguay

o . r

os

e

t

.

WHAT TO DO IN MONTEVIDEO c

r

br

e ta

ju

lio

stit

av

.

A v. g e n . f. r i v e r a

uyen

te

do

5

artigas

maldona an

o

general

4 gr

p

3

con

la.

es

l a pa z

de 18

rb

surf & S w oo p

lia

bu l eva r

r

bl

f. d a.

l ve

.f

a a it

City Surfing

bu Ña

rgentin rambla a

a

2

le

va

r e sp

to sarmien av e n i da

aÑ

OK, so perhaps Montevideo’s beach isn’t the world’s most attractive surfing location.

But the steady, smallish waves and mild climate make it a good spot for beginners.

a

1 r i o d e l a p l ata f.

TOp Five when juan’s in town

Native son: Musician Juan Campodonico

Where’s the beef? montevideo The clash between old and new—and great steaks—are what makes the capital of Uruguay great, says one of its most famous sons.

Juan Campodonico has formed successful bands Bajofondo and Campo, produced albums for Jorge Drexler (who became the first Uruguayan to win an Oscar, for the soundtrack to The Motorcycle Diaries) and composed music for international TV ads for the likes of Honda. The 42-year-old is a bona fide star in Uruguay and one of the biggest champions of his hometown. “What is it that I so love about Montevideo? The magnificent dichotomy between progress and nostalgia,” he says. “We Montevideans like what’s new, but we also like to wallow in the past. You can feel that in the city’s music, culture and image.” Here’s a to-do list for your next swing through the capital, including a good place to spot Uruguay’s famously laid-back president. juancampodonico.com; www.campomusic.net

90

1 La Otra Tomas Diago 758 “There’s no factory farming in Uruguay, which means our meat is high quality, and this is the city’s best steakhouse. I recommend the vacio [flank] steak. You mainly get it here and in Argentina.”

s.

ga

rc

ía

r

b

la

.

g

a

n

d

h

i

records by old Uruguayan singers such as Romeo Gavioli and Alfredo Zitarrosa. I also go there for the fruit, the books, the wonderful secondhand clothes and live tango music on every corner.”

4 la ronda & El Santa Ciudadela “You might not find a Starbucks in Montevideo, but you will find bars steeped in folklore. Like La Ronda (above) or El Santa. You’ll often see President Pepe Mujica in the latter—as always, without a tie.”

3 Feria de T Narvaja Dr. Tristán Narvaja “Legendary flea market. On a Sunday, I rummage through

SandboardinG Megapopular in Uruguay, not least because of places like Valizas and Maldonado. For sand-sport fanatics, the huge dunes they offer are the best anywhere on the continent. sobrelasdunas.com

City Gliding

2 La rambla

Am Rio de la Plata “The seafront promenade is 14 miles long, with sandy beaches, sunbathing areas and a pink granite footpath. You have to go for a walk here.”

olasyvientos.com

5 Parque Rodo Barrio Parque Rodo “People tend to either love or hate this area of the city, which has somehow got stuck in the past. There are 1960s buildings, romantic parks, and an ancient fairground. It’s a reflection of Montevideans’ nostalgic soul.”

Want a bird’s-eye view of the Uruguayan capital?

Go straight from Montevideo’s beach into the air on a hang glider.

We recommend the nighttime trip for spectacular sights. arribauruguay.com

the red bulletin

shutterstock(2)

A

nid

Action!

watches

th e N ASA Test Three of the 11 hoops the omega had to jump through to reach the moon.

HEAT/ HUMIDITY

Through space and time: The current Omega Speedmaster ’57 chronograph.

High temp: 48 hrs at 160° F, then 30 mins at 199° F. Low temp: 4 hrs at 0° F. Ten days in 95% humidity at 68-160° F.

Out of this world

Vibration Three 30-minute cycles, with the watch in different positions and the vibration frequency varying from 5 to 2000 Hz.

omega (4), nasa, shutterstock

Alexander Linz

Omega Speedmaster How a piece of Swiss precision engineering became vital gear in the exploration of space.

Dressed in plain clothes, NASA staff descended on Houston’s jewelry stores in 1964 on a specific mission: Pick out the perfect watch for outer space. They bought timepieces by Bulova, Elgin, Gruen, Hamilton, Longines, Lucien Piccard, Mido, Omega and Rolex, then put each one through an 11-part precision test in extreme conditions. The only survivor of that process was the Omega Speedmaster. NASA designated it as “flight-qualified by NASA for all manned space missions.” Astronauts Gus Grissom and John Young were the first men to wear the watches in space, on the Gemini 3 mission, on March 23, 1965.

Legend has it that Omega, based in BielBienne, Switzerland, only found out about this a year later, after seeing a photo of an astronaut wearing a Speedmaster. Today, it’s the preferred timepiece of the Russian and American space programs.

SHOCKPROOF Top: The centrifuge used in the test program. Left: Buzz Aldrin wearing a Speedmaster on the moon in 1969.

www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/omega.html The only watch “flightqualified by NASA for all manned space missions.”

the red bulletin

The Speedmaster with a NASA strap, on a NASA test log. The strap allowed astronauts to wear the watch under or over a sleeve.

Six shocks of 40G, lasting 11 milliseconds each and in one of six different directions.

Buzz Aldrin wearing his Speedmaster in Eagle, the Apollo 11 Lunar Module.

91

Action!

games

P l ay Again?

Packing a punch: Ultra Street Fighter IV

How often do gaming’s icons appear?

Mario Mario Kart 8, out on May 30, after Mario Golf: World Tour. With these, there have been about 200 games (plus format variants) featuring Nintendo’s mascot.

Hadouken!

The thing about a new Street Fighter game is that it’s not really new.

It’s still essentially the face-to-face, fast and frantic super-powered beat-’em-up it was back in 1987, and that’s why the fighting-game series is one of the most popular of all video games. Gaming-tech advances have only led to improvements in a winning formula, rather than a throwing-out of the Bison with the bathwater.

So, Ultra Street Fighter IV is 2D fisticuffs in a kinda 3D environment, just like the Super Street Fighter games that preceded it. There are five more playable characters in this latest version, including Decapre, a leggy Russian wearing a blue ninja suit and a hat last seen on Concorde stewardesses, making a total of 44 combatants.

Street Fighter nerds either love or hate the fact that Decapre is a clone of Cammy, a veteran Street Fighter character, also playable in USF IV, made flesh by Kylie Minogue in the Street Fighter movie.

The passion of those nerds has also led SF’s maker, Capcom, to tweak this new game based on feedback from the last one, ironing out the gameplay kinks that led to much online discussion. In early June, those who own the last game can upgrade to the new one; the rest of us have to pay up in full.

For Xbox 360, PC and PlayStation 3. streetfighter.com

92

up next

Your games dreams come true

Make a million-dollar game for nothing

You can download and use the same tools that leading games developers use to build games such as Unreal–some of them for free. Unreal Engine 4 costs $19 per month, while the CryEngine from Crytek, maker of Far Cry and Homefront 2, is only $9.90 per month.

All those times you shout at the screen, “If only ...”? Put your money where your mouth is.

Sonic There are 30 main games on the blue hedgehog’s CV, plus as many again in cameos and team-ups, including the Mario Olympics games (see above).

unrealengine.com cryengine.com

sonicthe hedgehog.com

Showtime

At E3, know gaming’s future

On June 10, social media will be busy. That is the first day of E3 2014, the 20th and biggest Electronic Entertainment Expo yet, the trade show at which new games are traditionally unveiled. About 50,000 people are expected over three days at the Los Angeles Convention Center. When is Halo 5 out? Is Nintendo making a new console?

These, and more questions, will be answered.

e3expo.com

“T” First seen in 1984, along with I, J, L, O, S and Z, and since in a grand total of 54 official Tetris games and countless other unofficial homages and rip-offs. tetris.com

the red bulletin

paul wilson

Ultra Street Fighter IV Fireballs fly in the return of gaming’s most beloved beat-’em-up.

mario.nintendo.com

REACH THE NEXT LEVEL Free Magazine at Walmart Stores and for iPad

Get the latest news, previews, and video game playing tips from Walmart GameCenter magazine!

Available FREE at select Walmart stores or download now for iPad速!

WILL THROW YOU FOR A LOOP

Apple, the Apple logo, iPad, and iPhone are trademarks of Apple Inc., registered in the U.S. and other countries. App Store is a service mark of Apple Inc.

Action!

buyer’s guide

Fly away Whether it’s a big-city meeting or getting away for a quick weekend, here’s the right travel gear for the right destination.

City Jaunt the bag Like two bags in one, the Eagle Creek Morphus 22 zips apart to morph into a pair of carry-on size bags—doubling your packing capacity. The base is a spartan roller bag with an ultralight polycarbonate back shell, while the fullfeatured front gear bag can be zipped on or off to be carried as backpack or messenger bag. $395, eaglecreek.com

the headphones Beats Studio Wireless head­phones effort­lessly connect via Bluetooth to your iPhone or iPad, providing a range of about 30 feet to roam. $380, beatsbydre.com

94

the cam Leave that DSLR camera at home and opt for a pocket digital camera, like the 10-megapixel Leica D-Lux 6. Camera nerds will appreciate the f1.4 lens and ability to shoot in manual mode with RAW files. $800, us.leica-camera.com

the shoes It’s hard to believe Chucks have been pounding pavement around the world for nearly 100 years now. First manufactured in the 1920s and worn by everyone from pro basketball players to WWII soldiers, these timeless canvas and rubber shoes are still comfy, and they’re still cool. Our favorite new Chucks are the Converse Chuck Taylor All Star Tie Dye. $60, converse.com

the case The Mophie Space Pack snaps onto your iPhone 5/5s like an external case, adding just 2.8 oz. in weight while providing enough extra juice to double your phone’s battery life.

Best of all, it also provides 16 GB of extra storage capacity (32 GB for $180), which equates to 7 hours of video or 4,500 more songs you can bring along for your travels. $150, mophie.com

mark anders

the watch With a second watch dial, this Tag Heuer Carrera Calibre 8 GMT makes it easy to keep track of the time both where you are traveling and back home at the same time. Like all other Tags, this one features a sapphire crystal face that is so durable and hard that only a diamond can scratch it. $3,900, tagheuer.com

dimitri newman

the bottle Some plastic water bottles can leach BPA, phthalates, and other toxins into your drink. It’s not pretty—or tasty. So carry one of these. Klean Kanteen makes this 100 percent stainless-steel bottle that holds 27 ounces of your favorite beverage, doesn’t leach harmful toxins, and won’t hold flavors, so today’s water doesn’t taste like yesterday’s sports drink. $30, kleankanteen.com

the red bulletin

Weekend Adventure

the headphones Wired headphones are annoying; that’s why we’re stoked on the BlueAnt Pump Bluetooth HD Sportbuds. The earpieces fit comfortably over your ear and connect by a thin cord behind your head while Bluetooth zaps music from your smartphone to your ears. $129, blueantpump.com

the watch Keeping a close eye on the tides is key to maximizing your fun, and at times, staying safe. With tide data preprogrammed for 150 beaches worldwide, the Freestyle Mariner Tide makes it easy. A comfortable yet durable silicone band keeps the watch in place, while the polycarbonate case makes the Mariner water resistant to 330 feet. $100, freestyleusa.com the cam Most rugged waterproof point-and-shoots are disappointing when it comes to image quality. Not so with the 16-megapixel Olympus TG-850. In addition

to being shockproof, crushproof, freezeproof, and waterproof to 33 feet, the wide-angle 21 mm lens produces very good images, high-def 1080p video, and even features a 360-degree panoramic mode, which is perfect for capturing big views in wild places. $250, getolympus.com the shoes Simple and comfortable, Vans Slip-Ons come in a dizzying assortment of styles, but our pick is a new take on the iconic checkerboard Vans that Sean Penn rocked in Fast Times at Ridgemont High. $47, vans.com

the speaker The durable, water-resistant Logitech UE Boom fits easily into the side pocket of a backpack or even the water bottle cage on your bicycle so you can bring your music anywhere. The Bluetooth-enabled speaker pairs quickly and easily with your smartphone, and its sound quality is much better than most portable speakers we’ve tested. $200, ultimateears.com the bag For off-the-beatentrack adventures, ditch the roller bag and pack this medium North Face Base Camp Special Edition Duffel instead.

It’s equipped with wide backpack straps and leather haul handles and is made of a durable PVC fabric. $185, thenorthface.com the charger The Goal Zero Sherpa 100 Power Pack is a weather-resistant lithium-ion battery pack with enough power to charge a MacBook Pro twice. $350, goalzero.com

the red bulletin

95

Action!

save the date

At one point, that UCLA dude did have pants on.

June 14-25, 2014

Get your fill of Americana to the max: watching college ball in the summer in the Midwest. The College World Series takes place at TD Ameritrade Park in Omaha, and besides the nation’s top undergrad talent, it includes all the auxiliary pro baseball goodies, including a home run derby, speed pitching—and autograph sessions.

Last year, UCLA beat Mississippi State for the title. www.cwsomaha.com

June 9-22, 2014

U.S. Open Championships

June 11-Aug. 3, 2014

Vans Warped Tour The lineup this year includes Red Bull Records’ Beartooth, which will take the stage fresh off a European tour. www.vanswarpedtour.com

96

The Pinehurst Resort & Country Club in North Carolina will host the second of golf’s major tournaments in 2014. And new this year for the stats geeks— not that there are any stats geeks among golfers, oh no— the men and women will play on the same course one week apart. The men tee up June 12-15; the women June 19-22. www.pinehurst.com

May 28, 2014

Red Bull Music Academy Festival New York 2014 Red Bull Music Academy’s month of lectures, performances—and, let’s face it, parties—wraps up in New York in May. Of particular note is the performance on the 28th of RBMA class of 2007 alum Hudson Mohawke, who will play at Webster Hall. His new album is due on Warp Records later this year. nyc.redbullmusicacademy.com

the red bulletin

Cameron Baird/Red Bull Content Pool, getty images/red bull content pool, Christian Pondella/Red Bull Content Pool, Forest Woodward

College World Series

June 6-8, 2014

Formula One Canadian Grand Prix

June 7, 2014

June 14, 2014

Shadow of the Giants 50K Trail Run

Adidas Grand Prix

If you are intent on doing something as mad as running 31 miles for fun, you might as well do it in one of the most majestic spots on earth. This race starts just outside the southern entrance to Yosemite National Park, then winds through the Sierra National Forest, past 3,000-year-old giant sequoia trees in Nelder Grove. shadowofthegiants50k.com

One of the elite meets of the track and field season takes place in Icahn Stadium on Randall’s Island in New York. World champions and gold medalists have already signed up: Jamaica’s Yohan Blake, former world champion in the 110 m and the 4 x 100 m relay returns after a 2013 plagued by injuries. On the women’s side, Jenn Suhr will compete in the pole vault—she already has the 13 highest jumps in U.S. history. www.diamondleague-newyork.com

time ta b le more dates to save this Spring

17 May

Music Want a career in hip-hop, but have no idea how to get your music heard? Try good old-fashioned networking at TeamBackpack’s Mission Underground Los Angeles.

Until whatever is going on with the potential New York–New Jersey Grand Prix gets straightened out, the Canadian Grand Prix in Montreal is the best bet for those craving an urban race experience in North America. The track contains the snarkily named Wall of Champions, which has been the brunt of crashes by Sebastian Vettel and Nico Rosberg. www.formula1.com

www.teambackpack. net

June 5-8, 2014

X Games Austin It’s the first time that the Summer X Games will take place in Austin at the Circuit of the Americas—the home, at other times of the year, to Formula One’s United States Grand Prix and the Austin MotoGP. Athletes already invited to attend include skaters Bob Burnquist, Bucky Lasek, Leticia Bufoni and Nyjah Huston. www.xgamesaustin.com

13 june

film Oh, yes, it was so juvenile—but 21 Jump Street was hilarious.

Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill reunite for book learning in 22 Jump Street, which takes place at a college. www.sonypictures. com

30 june

June 6-8, 2014

Governors Ball Music Festival Via subway, Uber or ferry, get thee to Randall’s Island Park along the East River to experience one of the summer’s most eclectic festivals in New York City. Headliners include Outkast, Jack White, local boys Vampire Weekend and The Strokes. If those are too tame for you, Diarrhea Planet is playing on one of the side stages. www.governorsballmusicfestival.com

the red bulletin

TV CBS rolls out the second season of Under the Dome, CBS’s Stephen King sci-fi adaptation. Oh, it’s summer. Like you were going to curl up with your favorite copy of Kafka. www.cbs.com

97

Greece, March 26, 2014 The Corinth Canal is about 70 feet wide at its narrowest point. Enough to rush an Extra 300S through there, thought Hungarian aerobatics legend Peter Besenyei. The plane has a wingspan of 25 feet.

Besenyei has a hell of an eye.

“ Claustrophobia?

When you’re jetting at 185 mph there’s no time for it.”

Peter Besenyei, world aerobatics champion and Red Bull Air Race pilot

The next issue of the Red Bulletin is out on june 10, 2014 98

the red bulletin

Predrag Vuckovic/Red Bull Content Pool

Magic Moment

SAVE TODAY. SWEET AIR TOMORROW. See how much you could save on motorcycle insurance.

geico.com | 1-800-442-9253 | local office Some discounts, coverages, payment plans and features are not available in all states or all GEICO companies. Motorcycle and ATV coverages are underwritten by GEICO Indemnity Company. GEICO is a registered service mark of Government Employees Insurance Company, Washington, D.C. 20076; a Berkshire Hathaway Inc. subsidiary. GEICO Gecko Image © 1999-2014. © 2014 GEICO

01

03

4Runner is one of the last holdouts of body-on-frame, keeping true to a heritage of off-road excellence. It’s the perfect companion for those brave few who still venture into the wild.

02

JOIN THE OFF�ROAD MOVEMENT AT FACEBOOK.COM�4RUNNER

37° 45' 48" N / 119° 00' 36" W

Prototype shown with options. Production model may vary. Payload includes the weight of occupants, cargo and options; limited by weight distribution.

Don’t overload your vehicle. See Owner’s Manual for weight limits and restrictions. ©2014 Toyota Motor Sales, U.S.A., Inc.