a beyond the ordinary magazine
dec 2013 / Jan 2014
f Guitlion Ed
metal band
making music with robots
flip out the world's best stunt bike gang
JUSTDrive Eric Bana action-movie star, Real-life racing driver
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C O L U M B I A . C O M /O M N I F R E E Z E Z E R O
HELLY HANSEN CATWALK
Stranda skiresort Sunnmøresalpene Norway
Scandinavian Design is the cornerstone in all Helly Hansen gear. The optimal combination of purposeful design, protection and style. This is why professional mountain guides, patrollers and discerning enthusiasts choose Helly Hansen.
CONFIDENT WHEN IT MATTERS
THE WORLD OF RED BULL
60 Eric Bana
Fresh off the film Lone Survivor, Bana relaxes in Melbourne and reconnects with the car of his dreams
Welcome
It’s not often we have a Hollywood type on our cover, but then Eric Bana isn’t really the Hollywood type. The actor, who went from spoofing Tom Cruise on Australian TV to blockbuster film roles, spends most of his days with his family in Melbourne, near a small office and a track where he can take any one of his motorsports toys out for a spin. We spent some time talking with him about his four-wheeled obsession and why it’s harder to make good movies these days. We’ve also got the incredible tale of a daredevil filmmaking crew, who had to outrun an avalanche and an insight into the mind of record-breaking BMX star, Jed Mildon. Plus: polar opposites of motorsport, with a classic car rally in Cuba and the most advanced racing trucks on Earth. We hope you enjoy the issue. 06
The band of robots, page 68
“ Lemmy posted our video on Facebook and wrote, ‘You’ve got to see it to believe it!’” the red bulletin
December / January
42
at a glance Bullevard
the works team
A sporting cert is that Kamaz trucks will dominate the Dakar Rally. We went to their factory in deepest Russia to find out how they build to win
10 the year in review The Red Bulletin’s 2013 highlights
Features 30 Havana Drive Time
David Coulthard in the Cuban capital
30
38 Reborn In The USA
The Gaslight Anthem step out from Springsteen’s shadow with a new sound
42 Torque Of The Town Graham Shearer (cover), Norman Konrad, Denis Klero/Red Bull Content Pool, Balazs Gardi, David Black, Tim Zimmerman/Red Bull Content Pool, Graeme Murray
Building Dakar Rally-winning trucks
50 Where The Wild Is
coulthard’s cuba
David Coulthard and a loyal crew of mechanics took part in the most authentic classic car rally of them all
Making a ski film in remote Norway
15
60 The Car’s The Star
daft punk
68 Compressorhead
Eric Bana’s real-life adrenalin rush
They didn’t just get lucky, you know. How the kings of electronic music pulled off the comeback of 2013
74 87 Train like a champ
Low-tech tricks for high performance: slopestyle snowboarder Mark McMorris reveals his everyday secrets of success the red bulletin
a higher calling
Jed Mildon made action sports history with the first triple backflip on a BMX. Now he’s out to help others break records
Meet the world’s most metal band
74 A Higher Calling
Jed Mildon and the gang of BMXers jumping into the record books
Action 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 92 96 98
pro tools Make a bike film party Mumbai’s music scene travel Heliskiing in Kyrgyzstan training A snowboarder’s workout My City Melbourne’s best bits Playlist Aloe Blacc gaming Gran Turismo 6 buyer’s guide Indoor exercise kit save the Date Events for your diary time warp The good old days
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contributors Who’s on board this issue The Red Bulletin Gulf Edition, 2308-5851
The Red Bulletin is published by Red Bull Media House GmbH General Manager Wolfgang Winter Publisher Franz Renkin Editors-in-Chief Alexander Macheck, Robert Sperl
Heinz Tesarek
david coulthard In Cuba, for the Havana Classic Car Rally, the former Formula One driver was impressed by his 50-year-old Pontiac and the men who maintain it, in a country where auto parts are scarce, but the love of cars is strong. “My mechanics, who are all Formula One guys, were amazed by what they saw,” says DC. “It’s the flipside of F1, a different kind of innovation.” One thing baffled him, though. “Did the car have brakes? I’m not sure. Maybe bits of wood for brake pads.” There’s more on page 30.
Norman Konrad This crispy duck-loving photographer had another thing coming when he reckoned shooting a band of robots would be easy. “I thought the subjects would stand still so I’d have loads of time to arrange the pictures,” says Konrad, “but Bones the bassist had been pumped with too much compressed air, so he wouldn’t stop moving.” But without pneumatics and electricity, the members of Compressorhead would be dead. See how the German brought the heavy metal trio to life on page 68.
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An awardwinning reportage photographer who has worked in war zones, Tesarek was delighted to shoot in the Kamaz factory, in the Russian republic of Tartasan, where the world’s best racing trucks are made. “I used to live in Moscow, so it was good to be back in the country,” he says. “U-turns on the highways and the smell of freedom.” Kamaz are perennial winners at the Dakar Rally, where Tesarek shot the course makers for a story in The Red Bulletin in 2012. His new work begins on page 42.
Editor Paul Wilson Creative Director Erik Turek Art Directors Kasimir Reimann, Miles English Photo Director Fritz Schuster Production Editor Marion Wildmann Managing Editor Daniel Kudernatsch Chief Sub-Editor Nancy James Deputy Chief Sub-Editor Joe Curran Assistant Editors Ruth Morgan, Ulrich Corazza, Werner Jessner, Florian Obkircher, Arek Pia˛tek, Andreas Rottenschlager Contributing Editor Stefan Wagner Contributors Lisa Blazek, Georg Eckelsberger, Raffael Fritz, Sophie Haslinger, Marianne Minar, Boro Petric, Holger Potye, Martina Powell, Mara Simperler, Clemens Stachel, Manon Steiner, Lukas Wagner Design Martina de Carvalho-Hutter, Silvia Druml, Kevin Goll, Carita Najewitz, Esther Straganz Photo Editors Susie Forman (Creative Photo Director), Rudi Übelhör (Deputy Photo Director), Eva Kerschbaum Repro Managers Clemens Ragotzky (manager), Karsten Lehmann, Josef Mühlbacher Head of Production Michael Bergmeister Production Wolfgang Stecher (manager), Walter O Sádaba, Christian Graf-Simpson (app) Printed by British Industries, Kuwait; www.britishindustries.net Finance Siegmar Hofstetter, Simone Mihalits Marketing & Country Management Stefan Ebner (manager), Stefan Hötschl, Elisabeth Salcher, Lukas Scharmbacher, Sara Varming
Graeme Murray Before taking pictures of Jed Mildon and his record-breaking jumps on a BMX, Murray got his hands dirty helping him with the digging of dirt jumps. “I just wanted to get the shot,” says Murray. “I was excited to see what he could do.” Murray has represented New Zealand in downhill mountain biking, but nothing could prepare him for Mildon’s feats. “It was nerve-racking waiting for him to drop in to this huge ramp. Jed never tells you what trick he is going to attempt; you just have to be ready to shoot.” The results are on page 74.
“ Driving a car in Havana feels like you’re in a time warp” david coulthard
Distribution Klaus Pleninger, Peter Schiffer Marketing Design Julia Schweikhardt, Peter Knethl Advertising Enquiries Richard Breiss +96 5 660 700 48, richard@kw.redbull.com
Advertising Placement Sabrina Schneider O∞ce Management Manuela Gesslbauer, Kristina Krizmanic, Anna Schober
The Red Bulletin is published in Austria, Brazil, France, Germany, Ireland, Kuwait, Mexico, New Zealand, South Africa, Switzerland, UK and USA 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 Austria office Heinrich-Collin-Strasse 1, A-1140 Vienna, +43 (1) 90221 28800 UK office 155-171 Tooley Street, London SE1 2JP, +44 (0) 20 3117 2100
The Red Bulletin (Gulf region) Boushahri Group W.L.L., Ardiya Industrial Area, Block 2, Section 107, Kuwait, +96 5 660 700 48 Write to us: letters@redbulletin.com
the red bulletin
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Sport and Culture on the Quick
Sam Houser
Grand plan pays off There are no recent pictures of our Man of the Year so we had to use this drawing No one knows much about Sam Houser. Along with his brother, Dan, he is the founder of Rockstar Games, the creative geniuses driving Grand Theft Auto. The new one, GTA V, had tills ringing to tune of 10 figures three days after it launched in October. That’s a billion good reasons to carry on developing games in New York City and avoiding the spotlight.
Twelve Months of Heroes
Impressive performances by the dozen
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january 28
Tiger Woods His win in San Diego began his climb back to world number one.
february 3 Gregor Schlierenzauer Leapt to 47th World Cup skijump win. A record by a mile.
march 13
april 21
Pope Francis Argentinian former chemist becomes leader of the Catholic Church.
Marc MĂĄrquez American Grand Prix victory aged 20: youngest MotoGP winner yet.
may 25 Bayern Munich Champions League win completes treble.
june 1
Tino Sehgal Best artist at Venice Biennale for making people move and beatbox.
the red bulletin
Top 3
THE GEAR OF THE YEAR
Hat-tip Heroes
Respect is paid Three people who’ve done great, yet still look up to others
Misfit shine Wearable activity-tracker What it’ll do for you Measure movement, sleep and time. Linked to an app on your smartphone; you sync it by putting it on the screen.
Jack Andraka & Elon Musk He invented an ingenious test for cancer last year, aged just 15, but thinks it’s no big deal. In his view, inventor Elon Musk is a real hero, someone, “who does everything he can to change the world”.
AllumSki.com, Los Angeles Times/Polaris/laif, Getty Images (6), fotofinder, picturedesk.com (2), Corbis (2), Reuters (3), Jörg Mitter/ sam spratt, sascha bierl Red Bull Content Pool
misfitwearables.com
Losers We Love
In 2013, this woman wasn’t beautiful enough Denise Garrido was the shortest-lived beauty queen of the year. On May 25, she was crowned Miss Universe Canada, but the title was taken away from her two days later: a typo somewhere. The real winner was Riza Santos and Garrido had actually only come fourth. But she took it on the chin and handed back her crown. Now she’s more popular in Canada than all the other misses put together. Pays to be humble.
july 22
august 15
Dragonfly Household drone What it’ll do for you Keep an eye on your house, spy on your other half. It weighs less than a coin and is smaller than a piece of gum.
Caroline Hjelt & Lena Dunham One half of the Swedish music duo Icona Pop, whose hit single I Love It was played on the TV series Girls. It was “the best moment of our career… we adore that show. [Girls creator] Lena Dunham is a young woman who does her thing in a world dominated by men.”
techject.com
sebastian vettel & michael schumacher
stickNfind Radar for stuff What it’ll do for you Find the things you lose, by turning your smartphone into a radar detector via detectable stickers for keys/cat/remote.
Vettel is still three F1 world titles shy of Schumacher’s record of seven, but even if he goes on to win 14 one day, fellow German speedster Schumi will always be “his great idol”.
sticknfind.com
september 25
october 15
Team Oracle USA Down 1-8, but won America’s Cup 9-8! True all-time sporting comeback. George ‘Nothing yet’ news channel nonsense aside, it’s Kate and Wills’s baby!
the red bulletin
Olinguito Welcome, brother: previously unknown mammal found in the Andes.
Felix Baumgartner Showed first-person vids of Red Bull Stratos leap. Minds again boggled.
november 24 Sebastian Vettel F1 season ends with Seb world champ for fourth straight year.
december 10
Peter Higgs Proved existence of the god particle and today gets a Nobel Prize.
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Would you fly through here at 160kph?
Flight of the Year
Narrow margin jeb corliss (2)
“It’s the craziest thing I’ve ever done,” says wingsuit flyer Jeb Corliss, of his Flying Dagger endeavour. The daredevil stunt in late September saw Corliss leap from a helicopter and pass through a crevice in Mount Jianglang in eastern China. At its narrowest point, the crevice is just 5m wide. Even the local birds get claustrophobic.
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Bullevard
121.6 million
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On February 28, 1983, this many Americans tuned in to watch the last episode of M*A*S*H. No episode of a English-language TV series has since come close to matching the record set by the Korean War satire.
TV of the Year
Better than Hollywood If television is the drug of the nation, then it’s now possible to get high on 100 per cent pure quality stuff. These are the shows that raised the bar
What’s it about?
What is it that’s so addictive?
Breaking Bad USA
Modern Family USA
House of Cards USA
Borgen Denmark
Broadchurch UK
Carrie Mathison, bipolar CIA operative in love with a fugitive terrorist, tries to prevent further attacks on US soil.
Walter White, a chemistry teacher with cancer, makes the best crystal meth ever. And declares war on his conscience.
Three families, all related to each other, no one is spared. The good old family sitcom as absurd mockumentary.
Politician Francis Underwood unleashes a campaign of revenge through the labyrinthine politics of Washington DC.
Birgitte Nyborg is a politician who seeks power for all the right reasons, then holds onto it for all the wrong ones.
Alec Hardy and Ellie Miller are irritable cops hunting a childkiller in an English seaside town.
Good is evil. Crazy is clever.
Nothing will ever be good again. Not
All the jokes and Sofia Vergara.
Hating Underwood. With a passion.
In the normal TV career vs family showdown, the latter always comes out on top. Not in
Suspense: 10/10 Intrigue: 10/10 Bathroom breaks: 0
Zoe Barnes, who sees herself as a great reporter, but she doesn’t see the strings pulling her.
Katrine Fonsmark Olly Stevens wants constantly reinventing the big journalistic herself, but career, but instead always cool. he finds a heart.
ever.
Denmark.
The real hero
Saul Berenson, Carrie’s boss, who, unlike his charge, never blows his top.
What you say to show you watch it
It’s amazing that, depending on your position, it is either pro- or anti-CIA.
What’s A psychiatrist for missing? Carrie. Or for us. If we were Berenson turns out to be a terrorist in charge of overlord. the ending
Coming Soon Your next boxset 14
White’s partner Jesse Pinkman loses everything and everyone, but Phil Dunphy the never our I’m-cool dad who is sympathy. cringe-worthy but not at all annoying.
Yo! Bitch!
I like the episodes where Phil and Luke do things together the most.
The most exciting thing is the way Claire’s character develops.
Kasper and Katrine just can’t trust each other. That’s the problem.
If you ask me, Olivia Colman deserves a BAFTA.
A happy ending.
The sitcom staple black kid from next door.
A single character that isn’t a douchebag.
(It’s in the pipeline, actually.)
A US remake.
Gag reel at the end of every episode.
Walter and Jesse flee to Europe and open a molecular
Phil and Claire get divorced and a new drama series can begin: Modern
Underwood becomes US President. After
cuisine restaurant in Paris.
Family Warfare.
Birgitte Nyborg becomes the EU Entertainment Commissioner his rivals die in terrible, and quality TV mysterious accidents.
Holding hands and chanting, the locals encircle a burning
wicker man
becomes EU law.
containing the detectives.
True Detective
Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey go (very) dark as cops working a 17-year case. Top-class old/young make-up. Starts January 12 on HBO in US.
the red bulletin
interTOPICS, Sony Pictures Television, RTL NITRO, Melinda Sue Gordon/Sony Pictures Television/Netflix, Mike Kollöffel, itv, Home Box Office (3)
Homeland USA
Daft Punk
Number 1 How two Frenchmen pulled off the comeback of 2013
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matthias clamer
Because these kings of electronic music came up with Random Access Memories, a non-electronic album of funk guitar and handplayed drums. A way to confound people’s expectations with a disco revival as a poke in the eye to electronic dance music hipsters.
2
Because they backed the right horse using Pharrell Williams as a vocalist. Get Lucky was the second most successful single of the year. The only song to have outdone it is Blurred Lines by Robin Thicke and – yes, you guessed it – Pharrell Williams.
3
Because Thomas and Guy-Manuel are in total charge of the image game. They haven’t shown their faces in photos since 1998. This consistent secretiveness has created a brand that in these NSAtimes of ours is worth around US$60 million.
4
Because they reversed the vinyl countdown. Vinyl sales on Amazon increased by more than 100 per cent in 2013, thanks to Random Access Memories. No big round black music item in the online sales giant’s history has sold more copies.
5
Because they brought old favourites back into the limelight. Giorgio Moroder took a back seat 20 years ago and Nile Rodgers was doing the rounds of retro parties with Chic’s old hits. Both have announced new material after surfing the Daft Punk wave.
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Ian Hylands/Red Bull Content Pool
24 m
16
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Maverick of the Year
Look Mum! No hands!
This is Oakley Icon Sender in Zion National Park, Utah, where Red Bull Rampage separates the freeriding wheat from the chaff. James ‘Redneck’ Doerfling of Canada leapt off his bike just before it clattered into the abyss, giving his horrific fall a hint of elegance. US rider Cameron ‘Camshaft’ Zink spun a backflip into the canyon. And Kyle ‘Teddy’ Strait – this guy here– didn’t use his hands at all. It’s called a “perfect suicide no-hander” and it meant the American was crowned overall winner.
Bullevard best of
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“OK, Glass” QUOTE OF THE YEAR. That’s how you speak to Google’s wearable computer. And does Google Glass say, “Look left to find what you’re looking for”? No, not yet, but maybe it will soon. OK, man?
Games of the Year
Firsts, The Last and everything What we played, played and played some more on tablet and console. Plus the Easter Eggs and extras you may have missed
Beat Sneak Bandit
By far the year’s best iPad game is this cross between Dance Dance Revolution and Donkey Kong. You have to clear screens of clocks in perfect synch with the game music. Achingly simple yet endlessly challenging, if you play it on the bus you’ll be swaying in your seat.
➜ Insider Tip The makers of this
colourful, fast and furious delight also made the polar opposite (but equally ace) Year Walk, a creepy, measured, offbeat iPad adventure.
PewDiePie
World’s most watched The biggest show on YouTube is all a game, really Felix Kjellberg, alias PewDiePie, plays computer games and over 13 million people watch. His YouTube channel has been the world’s most popular since August 2013. The 24-year-old Swede makes Let’s Play videos where he plays and films himself. If you’re wondering why millions of people watch, consider yourself old. What you should actually be wondering is why PewDiePie is the most successful at it when there are thousands of other YouTubers doing the same thing. Maybe because he likes playing horror games best and gets scared with his viewers into the bargain. Or maybe it’s because of his hyperactive style: he speaks, screams, laughs, makes rhymes, sings and beatboxes at a dizzying speed. A hero for the ADHD generation perhaps, but he obviously enjoys what he does and his subscribers, the Bro Army, enjoy it too. www.youtube.com/user/PewDiePie
The Last Of Us
The can-a-game-feel-likea-movie indicator ticked two spaces closer to Yes with this engaging, original adventure. There are zombie-like humans and puzzles and fights and things to collect, but there is also a constant sense of being involved in something richer and deeper than that.
➜ Insider Tip Playing on the Hard
difficulty level, you can pause the game, switch to Easy, stock up on ammo, and then switch back to Hard. It’s not cheating, it’s enterprising.
Grand Theft Auto V
Sure, sure: and Citizen Kane is a good movie and The Beatles played some nice music. The surprise comes in realising, as the hours slide by, just how inventive, epic and unputdownable this game is compared with its predecessors. Three very different main characters equate to months of play.
➜ Insider Tip Look for the map in the
“I’M RICH. I’M MISERABLE. HELL, I’M PRETTY AVERAGE FOR THIS TOWN REALLY” Michael Townley (aka Michael De Santa) of Grand Theft Auto V introduces himself. He’s just a regular guy like you and me
cable car station on the top of Mount Chiliad, and an alien-conspiracy storyline will be yours for the solving (online forums a must).
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the red bulletin
Miracle of the Year
Standing in the rain without getting wet
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Getty Images
Why did people queue for hours outside the Barbican in London and then the Museum of Modern Art in New York? To go in off the pavement and then walk in the rain. The artist collective rAndom International set up a 100m² field in a darkened room where it was constantly raining, and yet when you moved through it, you didn’t get wet. Wherever you went, the water dodged you. As if by magic (and clever, detailed 3D mapping of the room and your place in it).
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THE ART OF THE CROWD
Must-reads of the Year
Get booksmart in under five minutes Nine books that you’ve got to read, but probably won’t. So we’ve read them for you. You’re welcome
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What it’s about
What’s to learn
Kate Atkinson Life After Life
Ursula Todd first dies at birth. Then she drowns and after that is laid low by Spanish flu. But it’s not all bad news. She is reborn each time.
Just because you can’t remember something doesn’t
Joël Dicker The Truth About The Harry Quebert Affair
An old professor kills a young girl. Or does he? Writer Marcus Goldman wants to know the truth and becomes a character in his own crime novel for his trouble.
Nothing is as dangerous as the word
Moshin Hamid How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia
A guy makes it out of the ghetto only to become a corrupt businessman. He then writes a (fictional) self-help book on the subject. Whether it helps or not is questionable, but it’s sure to make cash.
Money stinks, but it’s and intoxicating whiff.
Joe Hill NOS4A2
She got away from him once, but now the child-abducting vampire is demanding bloody revenge for the little girl.
Never, ever, under any circumstances – and we mean never – take a lift from a stranger, or, indeed, get in a car.
Jesus Carrascos Intemperie
A hunter pursues an unnamed boy in a barren no man’s land. He is finally given shelter by a shepherd, who is tied to the boy by a secret.
It’s about suffering and dying. It’s a no-hope, constant struggle. And in the end, you lose.
Robert Galbraith The Cuckoo’s Calling
A model ‘falls’ from a balcony; a clappedout war veteran looks for the murderer. Harry Potter author J K Rowling, writing under a pseudonym, creates a superbly depressed crime noir anti-hero.
Everyone – regardless of how rich and successful they are – deserves a second chance.
Clemens Meyer Im Stein
The Berlin Wall has just come down. Some people are looking for love, others for money. Pimp Arnie Kraushaar is on the lookout for both and takes us through the red-light scene in eastern Germany.
Sex industry professionals are a source of great knowledge, not least of which is the secret of crisp, clean bed linen.
Nathaniel Rich Odds Against Tomorrow
Mitchell Zukor calculates the likelihood of disasters for an insurance company. Suddenly Manhattan goes under. Now there’s a business opportunity…
Have no fear!
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Americanah
Ifemelu finishes her studies in Nigeria, moves to the US and has a career as a blogger. Everything is wonderful. Anything is possible. But she can’t forget her childhood sweetheart, Obinze.
Love. Love. Love.
Would you buy a masterpiece for just US$60? New Yorkers wouldn’t Street-art legend Banksy was selling original works for 60 bucks in Central Park and only three passers-by wanted to take them. One of them even haggled the price down, and is now a rich man. Art connoisseurs in the Big Apple are kicking themselves.
mean that you weren’t there when it happened.
“I”.
What should I do to change my life?
dietmar kainrath
It’s called life.
Kainrath
Can talk
getty images
Hiding, running away, closing your eyes and hoping it will never happen: none of the above will ever get you anywhere.
the red bulletin
Bullevard September 12, 2013 (18.8bn km) NASA announces the August 2012 date after much calculation. Voyager 1 has 10-12 years left before its generators stop and it goes silent.
The longest goodbye This year, mankind waved farewell to a spacecraft as it left the solar system
December 16, 2004 (14.2bn km) Enters the termination shock, the first boundary of our solar system.
February 17, 1998 (10.4bn km) Now the most remote man-made object, beating the record held by the Pioneer 10 space probe.
February 14, 1990 (6bn km) Sends back its last photo, a homeward glance in which the Earth, famously, is a tiny, pale-blue dot.
Earth
NASA/JPL-Caltech
Sun
2 013 August 25,2012 (18.2bn km) Voyager 1 crosses the heliopause, the second solar system boundary, into interstellar space where the sun’s magnetic field is no longer active.
Voyager 1
September 5, 1977 Voyager 1 space probe leaves Cape Canaveral, USA, aboard a Titan IIIE-Centaur rocket.
best of
Voyager 1
Ask NASA!
Whenever a question about Voyager 1 pops up, NASA patiently answers it. So we got quizzical.
If Voyager 1 stumbles across a new planet, who will it belong to? NASA? The US? Planets don’t normally belong to anyone. Let’s assume there are aliens and they found Voyager 1, would it then belong to them? Voyager 1 will always be a NASA mission. We don’t anticipate any change in ownership in future either. Jane Platt and Jia-Rui C Cook NASA, Jet Propulsion Laboratory
November 12, 1980 (1.4 billion km) Another 18,000 pics after a flyby of Saturn, then alters its course for the last time, to head out of the solar system.
March 5, 1979 (Distance from Earth: 788 million km) Closest point of Jupiter flyby yields 18,000 photos, which show atmospheric storms, active volcanoes on the moon Io and two new moons.
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Secret of the Year
She is painted identically – as geometric tests have shown – but looks considerably younger and, according to researchers, was done 10 years earlier. But was the so-called Isleworth Mona Lisa (left), unveiled in 2012 after 40 years in hiding in a Swiss bank vault, painted by Leonardo Da Vinci? Might she even be the original? Thus making the famous Gioconda (right) simply a later copy? Books by the American onetime owner, Henry F Pulitzer, and a new one by the German author Josef Nyáry claim to have the answer, but the art community remains divided on its authenticity. 22
The Mona Lisa Foundation (2)
Was it Leonardo?
Bullevard best of
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The Replacements
Exploding stars
mesut özil is the new zinédine zidane
Ijad Madisch is the new Mark Zuckerberg
Sky Ferreira is the new Rihanna
Gareth Bale is not the new Cristiano Ronaldo
He wasn’t good enough for Real Madrid and went to Arsenal – and only took the Gunners to the top of the Premier League straight away. Quiet genius.
He founded ResearchGate, the ‘Facebook for scientists’ with over three million members and hopes to revolutionise global thinking. Like!
She looks just as good as Rihanna and sings (Night Time, My Time) just as good, too. The only difference is that the future belongs to her.
He didn’t cost €100 million, ‘only’, say Real Madrid, €91m. That’s €3m less than teammate CR7, who remains the most expensive player of all time.
MOKA*
Can toons
*Museum of Kainrath’s Art
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REUTERS, Getty Images (5), Research Gate, Laif
Dietmar Kainrath
Out with the old, in with the new
Wear it. Mount it. Love it.™ GoPro App
madison.co.uk
Bullevard best of
2 014 All Around the World
Take off
Where to be in 2014: planet Earth’s and elsewhere’s very best attractions
Spring
San Francisco, USA Eat your last chowder At Pier 39 in San Francisco, before the local seafood starts to swim in waters from the oncoming Fukushima swill.
3 June 25
Manaus, Brazil Hear vuvuzelas, not Verdi In the middle of the rainforest, at a just-opened football stadium. The building of venues here is something of a tradition: the Teatro Amazonas opened in Manaus in 1887.
August 15
Panama Take the world’s best short cut
9
Celebrate the centenary of the Panama Canal as you make your way from the Atlantic into the Pacific.
7
Where Are You Going?
Rio or Riga
The art of football, or just art. Decide what’s for you by choosing from these
26
1
a. Richard Wagner b. Vágner Love
2
a. Balotelli b. Baryshnikov
3
a. Garancca b. Guzan
4
a. Marcos Rojo b. Mark Rothko
5
a. Misimovic b. Nimzowitsch
6
a. Gidon Kremer b. Júlio César
Rio If you’ve picked three or more of the following names: 1b and 6b (Brazil), 2a (Italy), 3b (USA), 4a (Argentina), 5a (Bosnia-Herzegovina): all footballers from countries that have qualified for the 2014 World Cup. Riga If you’ve picked three or more of these names: 1a (composer), 2b (ballet dancer), 3a (singer), 4b (painter), 5b (chess grandmaster), 6a (composer): the capital of Latvia is also the 2014 European Capital of Culture.
1 January 30
Aconcagua, Argentina Climb a 6,962m peak – blind That’s what Neelu Memon will be doing. The blind mountaineer from New Zealand hopes to climb the highest mountain on each continent: Aconcagua is the first of her seven-summit tour.
3:3? Was it a draw? Go to both!
the red bulletin
Wake Up! How to get over jetlag
September 18
Scotland Drink whisky and witness history
1. Never go to sleep straight after landing. 2. Always fly west. 3. Only book evening flights. 4. Don’t eat too much. Drink a lot (of water).
F e b r ua r y 7- 2 3
If you’re in the Bonnie land for the independence referendum. Ideally you’ll be drinking Ardbeg from the Isle of Islay. Alternatively, if peatiness isn’t really your thing, try the fruity Bladnoch, from the Lowlands instead.
Sochi, Russia A short hop from the ski slopes to the sea At the warmest Winter Olympics ever. Appropriately enough, Sochi’s coat-of-arms has a palm tree on it as well as waves and mountains.
M ay 4
Haryana,India, and 32 other countries Run around the world against a car
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At the Wings for Life World Run. Run as far as you can without getting caught by the Catcher Car.
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NovembeR 2
jun e 1
China Fly over millions of people’s heads
Trieste, Italy Cycle on water Or fly there... The Giro d’Italia will start on May 9 in Belfast and make its way via Ireland to Italy.
At the Red Bull Air Race World Championship final in one of the country’s megalopolises (exact venue tbc).
J un e 2 8
Sarajevo, Bosnia Let’s party, not fight Where World War I began 100 years earlier. Like at the Baghdad Café in the heart of the old town.
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December 31
Mars Just look up And watch comet C/2013 A1 hurtling towards Mars at 56kps. The best place to do that is at the Southern African Large Telescope in Sutherland.
Gisborne, New Zealand Be the first to surf your way into the New Year April 29
Antarctica Watch the solar eclipse In a place that gets no sunlight for half the year, at precisely 06:04 Universal Time (06:04 GMT).
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At the world’s easternmost city. If you can’t wait till then, get yourself to Wainui and Makorori – two of the world’s best surfing locations – on January 12 for the start of New Zealand’s Surfing Championships.
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the red bulletin
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Bullevard best of
Watch Out
2 014
MOVing WITH THE TIMES There have been a lot of new features for wristwatches, but not all are still popular.
Mobile phone Text messages, emails, Facebook, you can get the lot via Bluetooth. But you still need a mobile phone.
Watch The smartwatch can do what any good watch can: tell the time, very precisely and in the language of your choice.
1977: HP calculator watch Now an expensive collector’s item. Back then it was a battery-guzzling flop.
Key As with a smartphone, apps make a smartwatch smarter. There’s even an app that can open your car door.
Music Manage your playlist while you’re on the go without worrying you’re going to drop and break something.
2000: Casio wrist camera A digital camera in a wristwatch? Sounds cool! Problem was, nobody wanted one.
Wristy Developments
Smartwatches
After years of technical stagnation, watches are back with a vengeance. Is this the beginning of the end for non-smartphones? In 2014 the do-it-all watch makes the leap from science fiction to reality, but what can the new smartwatches really do, other than be mistaken for an elderly person’s panic button? Basically, many things a mobile phone can, except that you don’t have to rummage around in your pockets for it. The competition to create the first market-leader is under way. Samsung and Apple are battling with a tiny rival: Pebble (above), the internet watch, into which 70,000 people invested $10m on the funding website Kickstarter.
2014: Ressence Type 3 On which traditional hands are replaced with little slits of light. All for €23,000.
How we’ll get around in future 28
Hyperloop As conceived by inventor Elon Musk, capsules are propelled through tubes by compressed air. Average speed: 965kph.
Jetpack Rocket rucksack made in New Zealand goes to market in 2014 and will fly for 30 minutes at speeds of up to 74kph.
Self-driving car Mercedes are calling it the Intelligent Drive, and nobody sits behind the wheel. Ready to go into production.
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sascha bierl
Good Ideas
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LOOK & FEEL REVITALISED VITA LIFT 5 DAILY MOISTURISER WRINKLES LOOK SMOOTHER SKIN IS HYDRATED LOOKS FRESHER FEELS COMFORTABLE FEELS FIRMER
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COULTHARD’S
CUBA David Coulthard and a small crew of loyal mechanics took part in the most authentic classic car rally of them all – on an island where new cars are embargoed photography: Balazs Gardi
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“Here she is. This is the beautiful 1955 Pontiac Chieftain I drove on the Havana Classic Car rally in August this year. The kindest thing to say is that it looked better than it drove, which is only to be expected because it’s a 50-year-old car maintained with whatever parts can be found to keep it running. I mean, did it have any brakes? I’m not sure. Maybe a couple of bits of wood for brake pads. But it looks so good even stationary that it makes you feel special just sitting in it.”
“This is me with Tony Burrows of Infiniti Red Bull Racing. There’s a rack of old car parts along a wall in here that most garages would just bin, but in Cuba these are vital: anything that might be useful to keep a car running is held onto. The ingenuity is amazing. Some cars have plastic tubs for fuel tanks because the old ones have rusted away and they can’t source or make replacements.”
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“The Pontiac’s owners have this garage where they service some of the old beauties and run a taxi, too. The cab is their day-to-day source of income, so it’s pretty important that they keep it running whatever goes wrong. The engine isn’t original: it’s been dropped in from a modern little hatchback and made to hook up with the old running gear via some ingenious twists and turns under the bonnet. My mechanics, who are all Formula One guys, were amazed by what they saw: it’s like the flip side of F1 – a different kind of innovation.”
“In Havana you feel like you’re in a time warp. This used to be a thriving place and it still has incredible potential, but everything is different. You don’t own your house: if you want to move, you have to try to swap with someone on the other side of town.”
“What you see here is one man’s love for his machine. All over Havana there’s beautiful architecture that’s not had any care since the revolution, but in among the decay, you have this beautiful shining car, in the best possible state of repair, because it means so much to the guy who owns it. The few people who can afford cars here really cherish them, because they’re irreplaceable.”
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“On the rally, Tony Burrows, who I’ve known since I raced in Formula 3, did map-reading duties. You can see that the roads are actually pretty quiet. This is quite a built-up area and there’s not a lot of traffic. Most people take the bus. On an island of 11 million people, there are only 250,000 cars, so the roads don’t really get busy.”
“This gentleman [above left] was a photojournalist who wanted to show us pictures of the grand prix held here in 1958 [left]. He had pictures of all the stars of the day – Stirling Moss, Carroll Shelby and so on. Juan Manuel Fangio, who was world champion, was kidnapped and released a day later. The circuit ran right along the Havana waterfront. It was beautiful and it must have been really something back in the day.” “I had time to walk through some of the tourist areas in Havana, where you get a real sense of what a thriving place it must have been. At the end of two days in Havana, me and the boys strolled down to the waterfront and enjoyed a cigar [above] looking over the Straits of Florida towards America, which is just 90 miles away. It’s quite a place.”
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How does it feel to be trapped by your own success? Brian Fallon of New Jersey band The Gaslight Anthem on escaping the Bruce Springsteen comparisons and forging a new sound Words: Jon Coen Photography: Matthew Salacuse
The Gaslight Anthem broke up on March 30, 2013, after a UK gig at Troxy, in London. “No one knows this story. We were stuck. I had nothing left to say. We were like, ‘Why are we doing this?’ We almost shut it down,” says frontman Brian Fallon. They didn’t actually break up. No one said the words out loud, but it was discussed tangentially. There was no irate screaming match, no beer cans thrown at the wall, no tossed microphones or storming off stages. Just a civil discourse to possibly end it. Fallon comes clean on this at Artichoke Pizza in the Chelsea district of New York. The city is stifled by a late-summer heatwave and the evening temperature is about 30°C, with a jungle-like humidity that New Yorkers accept like the icy north-west winds howling between the buildings in February. “It’s been hot everywhere. Europe was hot. Not as hot as this, though. We just got back, two weeks ago today. It’s brutal,” says Fallon, digging into a margarita pizza with fresh basil. The air-conditioning unit keeps the room bearable, but not very cool. Despite having played large venues worldwide, Fallon is better suited to smaller joints. He’s in a talkative mood, and mentions a few pizzerias in his home state of New Jersey before his mind wanders, eventually talking about how he downloads movies through iTunes because they’re cheaper than his cable TV provider. Fallon grew up near the beach. Locals don’t really call it the Jersey Shore. After he, guitarist Alex 38
Rosamilia, drummer Benny Horowitz and bassist Alex Levine had kicked around in local punk outfits, they formed The Gaslight Anthem in New Brunswick, a college town with a history of fostering underground bands (literally, in basement venues) in the shadows of Philadelphia and New York. The quartet released their debut album, Sink Or Swim, in 2007 and toured to audiences of around 150 people. Fallon was already in his mid-20s. “You gotta remember, Jimi Hendrix and Curt Cobain were dead by 27. Everything they did… dead,” he says, “We weren’t 17. It was like, ‘How long is it before this is just not a viable path?’ We had to play one show to get to the next, or we couldn’t even get home. So we didn’t have the luxury to fight. Your parents are supportive, but they’re saying, ‘Maybe you want to think of a back-up plan?’ We had to get our act in gear.” In the summer of 2008 they released The ’59 Sound, a brilliant album of punk-tempo Americana and went on to sell out two shows at legendary New Jersey concert venue Stone Pony. You’d be right for thinking all this sounds a bit like a Bruce Springsteen song. Springsteen basically wrote the biography of The Gaslight Anthem before they were born: four kids from blue-collar families dreaming of making a rock ’n’ roll living. The Boss is to this area what John F Kennedy was to Boston. The folksy commonality of the Boss, The Replacements’ Paul Westerberg and Joe Strummer of The Clash had a massive
influence on The ’59 Sound. As The Gaslight Anthem toured, every review made reference to New Jersey and Springsteen. In 2009, the Boss cemented the relationship at Glastonbury Festival by joining the band on stage to play the album’s title track with them. The band was honoured and the appearance bolstered their profile. But at the same time, they weren’t one of those bar bands with just enough tie to the Boss to keep the party going. You can’t listen to a Gaslight track or talk to Fallon for five minutes without him dropping one influence or another. It was Sam Cooke while writing The ’59 Sound; he loves The Rolling Stones and says no one else could do what punk-rock guitarist Mike Ness does. While getting tattooed by Bouncing Souls’ bassist Bryan Kienlen, he expressed his love for Greg Dulli of the Afghan Wigs. On more than one occasion, he’s listed Pearl Jam as his favourite band. On this hot night, he makes several Bob Dylan references. Then there’s Lawerence Arms, Steve Earle, Lucero… Fallon has been struggling with the Springsteen shadow for some time. The band’s third studio album, American Slang, was well received after its release in 2010, as was its Nashville-recorded follow-up, Handwritten. Although both albums hit the charts in multiple countries, they wondered how much success was down to the Bruce juice. “I don’t want to be Springsteen,” says Fallon. “That was for The ’59 Sound and that was all. People latched
Left: The Gaslight Anthem draw huge crowds worldwide – they’ve sold out shows everywhere from London and Paris to Auckland and Adelaide. Right: Brian Fallon photographed for The Red Bulletin at The Music Zoo guitar store in New York
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onto it. I’ll be damned if I’m going to get somewhere on someone else’s coattails. No way. I’m a songwriter. That’s what I do. I’m so into my craft – the poetry of it, the TS Eliot books, the blues records. I’ve digested Springsteen and The Clash for 20 years. There is no blood to be sucked out of those veins anymore. Sure, when I hear those songs, I still get charged, but there’s nothing left for me to draw from that well.”
T
he band thrust Fallon’s infectious magnetism toward the spotlight from the beginning. You might call it a star quality, though that’s not a term his circle of friends would utter. Although he has never released a full solo album, Fallon and his Gibson acoustic guitar have their own following. He has an ability to entertain far beyond Gaslight records or the biggest festival gig. His on-stage banter is famously witty, his willingness and ability to joke well-documented. In 2011, Fallon and Ian Perkins, originally the Gaslight Anthem’s guitar tech, formed a side-project called The Horrible Crowes. They released an album called Elsie, a darker offering than anything Gaslight. The career arcs of the two bands are distinctly different. “We played our second Gaslight Anthem show at Only Game In Town, in Somerville. That’s like a video game store where you would go to buy Dungeons & Dragons. If anyone says they were there, they weren’t. It was like 20 people jammed in a room about the size of this booth,” says Fallon, gesturing to the pizzeria table. In contrast, the first Horrible Crowes show was at the Bowery Ballroom on New York’s Lower East Side. The second was at the famed Troubador in Hollywood. “We were very fortunate. And to sell them both out – that was crazy,” he says. Fallon has received numerous offers to branch out on his own and in January last year he announced plans for a solo record. It’s clear he would have a fulfilling career with or without The Gaslight Anthem, so what happened backstage at that show in London? “It wasn’t like this thing was years in the making and we were struggling… As soon as this reared its head, we dealt with it,” he says. “It’s totally better to burn out than to fade away. And I would rather cut its throat right then and there and watch it die. I’d rather everyone go, ‘What happened to that band?’ than watch us become the red bulletin
picturedesk.com
“ I don’t want to be anyone else. I want my own piece of the pie”
old men and hated by everyone. Because I love the band and what we’ve done.” While Fallon would always keep a place in his heart for his influences, it was time to sever the ties. But how do you separate gracefully when those artists are the patron saints of the common man? “I’ve been trying to get out of this for a really long time,” says Fallon. “I don’t want to be anyone else. I want my own piece of the pie. I don’t want Bruce’s piece. I don’t want Joe Strummer’s piece or Paul Westerberg’s piece.” His emotions start to run high. “I don’t want their piece because they already ate it. And if I have to, I will react against that, even if it means shooting myself in the foot, career-wise. Because I did not get into this to do it your way. I’ll say, ‘It’s my ball. I’m going home,’ rather than do it your way.”
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e almost did just that on July 28. At the end of three consecutive shows at Pier 26 in New York, Fallon was having fun with the crowd during the encore when the audience began chants of “Bruce”. Fallon didn’t want to play the game anymore. He turned around, belted out The Who’s Baba O’Riley and was done. The following day, he poured his heart into a blog post about the bandana-lined pigeonhole in which he feels he’s been put. The band quickly met to discuss their options. As each member suggested how he could bring a new element, suddenly there was new inspiration. Horowitz talked John Bonham grooves. Rosamilia expressed a desire to play piano. Perkins mentioned slide guitar. “It’s perfect,” says Fallon. “I don’t want to strum chords. I want to play riffs. I study the blues. I want to do different things. People may not like it, but I’m not playing for them. I’m playing for me. There’s a certain sense of selfishness to get to the selflessness.” Fallon suggested they use the solo songs he’d been working on for the next Gaslight album. The decision was unanimous. The Gaslight Anthem would continue. “I started to compile a list of guys that stepped away from their bands. Ryan Adams is one. Whiskeytown was a good band, but they didn’t write no Heartbreaker. There were a lot of fights there. I don’t know if he could have done his best work with Whiskeytown, but I know that I can do what I need to do with these guys.” gaslightanthem.com the red bulletin
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The blue racing trucks made by the Kamaz Master team are the best in the world and dominate t h e D a k a r R a l l y. A t t h e r e m a r k a b l e Russian plant where they’re made – and indirectly power a city – winning drivers must get their hands dirty in the workshops Words: Werner Jessner Photography: Heinz Tesarek
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Denis Klero/Red Bull Content Pool
K Chelny Moscow
RUSS I A
Chelny is the factory’s city, Kamaz is the reason for its existence
he map of Naberenezhnye Chelny – more easily referred to, as the locals do, as Chelny – reveals more about the city than those locals might care to. In the late-1960s, the political bigwigs of the republic of Tatarstan convinced the national authorities to build a truck plant in this backwater on the River Kama, about 1,000km east of Moscow – the largest such plant in the Soviet Union. They also needed a city for about half a million people, which was built, simultaneously, on the site of the existing, much smaller Chelny. At the time, the town planners must have had nothing but grid paper to hand, which explains the strictly geometric form of the city, with the brick buildings of the old town centre backed into a corner, and an urban characteristic unique in Russia: in Chelny they don’t ask you what street you live on, rather which block. In the 1990s, known in the former Soviet Union as the Wild ’90s, when the collapse of the old order brought the 44
daring, the lost and the criminally minded to the surface, when people went to bed poor and woke up rich (and vice versa), when there was such enmity among children in Chelny that parents had to pay protection money, the reason the city existed in the first place became even more of a sheet anchor for its inhabitants. Even now, two generations after the Kamaz truck plant was established, its size is breathtaking. Every day the schlagbaum – the German word for ‘barrier’, borrowed by the Russians – opens to admit 50,000 workers. The Kamaz sign below the assembly plant from where the finished trucks roll out is about the same size as a swimming pool, although it seems smaller when set against the building’s vast facade. Kamaz, the plant, is its own district; the workers’ quarters are the rest of the city. The answer to the question of how Chelny was populated so quickly lies in the Communists’ centralised economy. In the Soviet Union, you applied for an
The Kamaz sign below the assembly plant from where the finished trucks roll out is about the size of a swimming pool. Kamaz, the plant, is its own district; the workers’ quarters are the rest of the city
Kamaz Master races eight or nine trucks at a time. The average life of a racing Kamaz: three Dakar starts
The unloved middle seat: who’s up for an 8,000km ride through South America?
apartment, which was linked to a workplace, and waited. And waited. And waited. Or you went to Chelny (which, for a short time in the 1980s, was renamed Brezhnev, in honour of the General Secretary of the Communist Party). There you could get an apartment straight away, everything was new, the Kamaz plant was the destination for the city’s six tramlines, and there was a river which served as a recreation area. The Soviet authorities also concentrated their petrochemical activities in Nizhhnekamsk, just 40km upstream. Today, in a Chelny criss-crossed by 20 tramlines, there is still no real centre (not even the Kamaz plant), no monument to act as the prime civic focus. Only longtime residents can tell the difference between apartment blocks of the 1970s and the 1990s, and visitors must look hard for a fixed point of reference. 46
There is one a few streets from the main Kamaz plant. In a functional building dating from 2007, is Kamaz Master, the sporting division of Kamaz. For the last quarter of a century, its racing trucks have been entered in every Dakar Rally, and have won 11 times. The elite of the firm work at Kamaz Master, 110 people in all. Today is a Russian national holiday, but it’s business as usual there, with one difference: in the canteen, where the staff line up quietly and everyone sits together regardless of rank or age, the food is free. A large glass bridge, from which there’s a great view of the assembly hall, is also where the trophies are displayed. There are more than a hundred in total; the more important the victory, the more prominent the position. The trophies for overall victory in the Dakar are placed on a Russian flag in the centre. the red bulletin
Marcelo Maragni/Red Bull Content Pool
The engines manage 1,000hp, require 150 litres of diesel an hour and have as much torque as a showroom of Volkswagen Golfs
With 63 stage wins, Vladimir Chagin (right) is the most successful Dakar participant i n h i s t o r y. A p p o i n t e d team head in 2012, he is modest about his success. “I’ve been involved with the Dakar for 25 years, and so you can’t help but know your way around after that”
“That was me,” says Vladimir Chagin, “that one, this giant one here, and the two below, I think. Oh, and that one over there is for one of mine as well.” Chagin – jeans, white trainers, shortsleeved checked shirt, red-gold sports watch – is a legend here, one of the bestknown and most successful sporting figures in Tatarstan. His seven overall victories and 63 stage wins make him the undisputed Tsar of the Dakar. No one has won more than Chagin in the history of the race, and that made him a logical choice to head the Kamaz Master team once his driving career was over. At 18, he was an aspiring go-kart driver, and with a broom in his hand he started right at the bottom of the then-new Kamaz sporting division. Word had reached him that the division head, Semen Yakubov, was trying to convince the Kamaz management to take part in the Dakar the red bulletin
Rally, “to demonstrate the superiority of Soviet trucks to the whole world”, as the approved phrasing of the time would have it. Chagin wanted to be part of it. n December 1989, the adventurers hit the road for the first time. “For the customs officers at the French-Spanish border, we were the first Soviet citizens they had ever seen with their own eyes,” remembers Chagin, who was allowed to go along as a mechanic. In 1991, Kamaz entered the Dakar Rally for the first time. All five of their trucks made it to the finish line, and with a second and third placing they trumped all expectations. Shortly thereafter the Soviet Union collapsed, and the formerly state-run Kamaz became an incorporated company. It was 1996 when they chalked up their first overall victory, the year that Vladimir Chagin made his debut in the cab. His first overall victory came in 2000, on the Paris-Dakar-Cairo route. “There were terrorists in Niger and the rally had to be suspended,” says Chagin. “We then flew the entire retinue to Libya in Antonov freight planes: 15 trucks down below, cars 47
Dakar 2013 winner Eduard Nikolaev (back to camera) installs an engine with two colleagues. For 49 weeks of the y e a r, t h e d r i v e r s a r e indistinguishable from normal mechanics
Races in Russia serve as prep work for the Dakar. “We will take part as long as the plant wants us to,” says team head Chagin.
Denis Klero/Red Bull Content Pool
“There have been cases where a driver has tried to kick his co-pilot out during t h e r a c e ,” s a y s S l a v a . “ B u t not with us: we forget about what happened on the road”
above, motorcycles in between, and the drivers upstairs. It’s a miracle they could even get them off the ground.” Without this assistance from Kamaz, the rally would never have been completed. Just like Vladimir Chagin used to do, the drivers of today, like Eduard Nikolaev, have to work on their cabs. “We’re mechanics first, racing drivers second, and we’re paid like mechanics,” says Nikolaev. There are win bonuses. The stars of the Dakar assemble their trucks, repair them, enhance them and go home with blackened fingernails. Workers who distinguish themselves with a particular talent get the chance to prove themselves in a local race as the third man in the cab, the mechanic. Nikolaev had to work his way up from the seat next the red bulletin
to Chagin and Ilgizar Mardeev before he could take the wheel for the first time. What does a mechanic have to work on during the race? “You monitor the instruments, you have to know all the target values and data and you’re responsible for things like the correct air pressure in the tyres: soft in the sand, hard on gravel and asphalt,” says Nikolaev. “A good mechanic really relieves the burden on the driver.” The selection process for the Dakar is hard, and aspiring race entrants have many opportunities to make mistakes, by throwing up in the cockpit, for instance. Nikolaev is unshakeable on this point: “If you’re going to be sick, you should stay at home. Only tough guys drive the Dakar.” Slava Misyukaev, a hardened veteran of five Dakar starts, says, “if the mountain roads are bad, it’s a good idea to skip dinner the night before.” When camping overnight during the rally, the Russian stomach trusts in home-style food, like dried fish. Tensions arise when three men spend two weeks under extreme conditions in a space about 4m square. “There have been cases where a driver has tried to kick his co-pilot out during the race,” says Slava, “but not with us. We have a rule: once we’re camping for the night we forget about what happened on the road.” There are few things that demand more of a person, mentally and physically, than the Dakar Rally. Vladimir Chagin remembers Morocco in 2007: “I wanted to overtake a car in the dust and at 130kph, I failed to see a boulder. We rolled over four times, the cab was torn away from the chassis, I couldn’t move and we had to be freed. Fortunately, apart from bruises, a hand injury and a fairly minor neck injury, we were OK. After that, the mechanic and I won the Dakar two more times, the navigator three times.” The trucks are made of similarly stern stuff as the men in the cockpit. There were attempts to use mass-produced parts and materials, but they are a thing of the
past. A Kamaz Master truck comprises the best bespoke truck parts in the world. “From the main Kamaz plant we get the cabins, which we modify,” says Ilgizar Mardeev, once a successful Dakar driver and now the team’s production manager. “The chassis is produced in collaboration with German specialists Reiger. The gear mechanism comes from ZF, also in Germany. The axles come from Sisu in Finland. Currently we’re testing an engine from the Swiss-based Liebherr.” The competition is doing exactly the same thing, according to Mardeev: “Hino is a Japanese company, but their racing trucks come from France. Iveco is Italian, but their racing trucks are Dutch.” Way down in the cellar at Kamaz Master is the engine test station. Incoming regulations will limit the engines cubic capacity to 16.5 litres, and they will also have to be low-polluting. You won’t see any more 18.5-litre trucks wreathed in black clouds. It is a hard nut for the technicians to crack, particularly as they’re keen for as much of the 1,000hp to survive the downsizing as possible. Even more impressive is the torque, which is crucial for forward momentum in sand: at 4,500Nm, a Kamaz Master has 18 times more torque than a 110hp VW Golf TDI. The tank holds 1000 litres of fuel, and consumes up to 150 litres an hour. o cope with this kind of power, everything has to be enhanced, from the cooling system to the cylinder heads, from the big-end bearing to the valves. This is what they do at Kamaz all day. “If you lock me in the workshop on my own, I can put together a racing truck within a week,” says Andrey Kargino, who came third at the Dakar Rally 2013, behind Nikolaev in first place and Ayrat Mardeev, also for Kamaz, in second. The historic 1-2-3 finish overwhelmed the normally reserved Tatars. Eduard Nikolaev cried at the finish line, and fans who had travelled a long way to see this weren’t going to let them celebrate alone. Later there was an official reception in Moscow, and when the drivers came home in triumph to Nizhnekamsk Airport, the arrivals hall was full to overflowing. The next morning they all turned up to work at the plant, right on time. kamazmaster.ru/en
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Where the wild is to get the star of your movie to outrun an avalanche, you hire a special effects guy. or, like one bunch of filmmakers, you head for the mountains and do it for real words: Aksel Lund Svindal photography: frode sandbech 50
Free man: Norwegian skier Aksel Lund Svindal swapped downhill for unknown territory
Aksel Lund Svindal (inset) and team went to conquer the highest peak in Norway
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the wintry conditions
are cool.
we can combine good, fresh
snow
with this amazing place. It will be a new experience compared to previous years
A
ksel Lund Svindal is one of the greatest alpine skiers of modern times. He has won golds and titles at Olympics, World Championships and World Cups. Once a year he goes way off-piste, teaming up with a group of adventurous filmmakers to go where no skier has gone before. This is his diary of his most recent trip, to Norway, for the film Supervention, a snowboard and ski action documentary two years in the making. D ay 1 – T H E J O U R N E Y
It’s early spring in Oslo, where we get on the plane. Oslo is almost on the same latitude as Anchorage, Alaska, and it hits me, on the two-hour plane ride up over Norway to Tromso, that this is pretty far north. This is my sixth trip in six years with the moviemakers Field Productions. When we arrive at Tromso airport, which is at sea level, the temperature is below zero, there’s snow on the roads and the snow banks are 2m high. From here, the two-hour trip to our final destination is as scenic as it gets, and that includes the ferry from Breivikeidet to Svensby. We stop when the road ends, in the sleepy old fishing village of Koppangen, in the Lyngen Alps. Reaching our destination, it seems like we made a pretty good impression during our short visit here last year, as one of the guys who lives in the village is so happy to see us again that he greets us with a 54
The first day is about checking out the conditions. there has been a lot of snow and
a lot of avalanches
But the snow has settled and it is possible to ski almost all of it, even the really steep stuff
lovely homemade dinner: cod that has gone straight from the sea to the pan, fried to perfection with bacon and onions, mashed potatoes and boiled carrots. His wife made us her speciality cake. After dinner, we get all the equipment out. Because this is gear I am not so used to, some of it brand new, I need to go through it to be sure everything fits and works perfectly. Being the least experienced of our party in terms of filmmaking, I’m not in the slightest bit embarrassed to ask the other guys about anything that could be helpful or useful to me. Our guide, Tor Olav, explains the conditions, the terrain, what precautions we should take and what to be aware of, and we discuss the possible lines we can ski and the goals for tomorrow. The plan is to start checking out the snow on shorter lines, where there is a safe and easy exit, before we start working on the bigger and more exposed stuff. All in all, the first day has been about the impact of the surroundings, the warm welcome and the excellent organisation. We are thoroughly briefed so that we all know what we’re doing tomorrow. From my point of view, the wintery conditions are cool. It will be a new experience, compared to my previous years of freeskiing, when the snow was old and heavy. Now we have the possibility to combine the good fresh snow in this amazing place.
The daily routine: up at 5am, leave the cabin at 6am, in the mountains until 2pm (below), then lunch and a rest. At 4pm, back out again for another 4-5 hours, then dinner, and in bed at 10pm
Mattias Fredriksson
D ay 2 – f i r s t s h o t s
The first day on the mountain is about looking around and checking out the conditions, in particular the snow. There has been a lot of it this past winter, and there have been a lot of avalanches, which could be a potential danger in our area, too. But the snow has settled and it is possible to ski almost all of it, even the really steep stuff. We were only able to ski one big face today, but at least we got to see a lot of the terrain, and make plans for the next days. Since we’re so far north, the sun rises really early. We were on the mountain at six o’clock, and that was almost too late: the sun was so strong it seemed more like the middle of the day. We got some good skiing in the morning, and then we had lunch in the sickest spot, in the middle of a big south face. After lunch we were a bit unlucky. The snow seemed to become a bit to warm as soon as the sun hit it, and what we thought would be great lines turned out to be impossible to ski in a safe way. On the way back we found a line that my friend, freeskier Eirik Finseth, was drooling over last year, which was 55
Don’t look back: every skier carries an avalanche emergency kit
i was quite nervous but on a level where I could handle it, where it was not too uncomfortable impossible to ski at the time. Today the snow conditions were perfect and he was able to ski it, and it was awesome. It might be the steepest face around here, and in the middle of the face you have to turn left not to fall to the very bottom. I am happy Eirik claimed that line, and it was great being there to see it. Today turned into a really long day in the mountains, and it was good to come back to the cabin, eat homemade entrecote with potatoes and greens, and go straight to sleep. 56
D ay 3 – T H E A V A L A N C H E
We got up at five o’clock again, then went to an area we looked at yesterday. We thought the snow might be good, since it was on a north face, and it turned out to be seriously good. That, in combination with good light, made for a really fruitful morning; we shot several lines before nine o’clock. Apart for some hairy skiing from Asmund Thorsen, Norway’s most celebrated big-mountain skier, we may not have produced the most jaw-dropping footage, but it was nice to do some skiing without being scared to death, and we also managed to shoot some close-ups. On the way there, we’d spotted another possible location, which Eirik was curious about. A huge spot, with two lines beside one another. We took a picture, studied it,
and it looked skiable. It turned out to be quite the contrast to the face we skied in the morning. The mountain ridge was really narrow and went straight down on both sides, and the skiing was gnarly. We were quite tense on the top – cheerful, but both Eirik and I were quite nervous. It’s not too often I can feel that Eirik is nervous, but I noticed it yesterday, and then today. I was quite nervous, but on a level where I could handle it, where it was not too uncomfortable all the time. Sometimes it was a bit too much, and I had to move so I could see the face over the ridge, because when I was standing too far back it looked as if skiing down from there was impossible. If you can see just the first 50m of where you are going to ski, you can focus on that, and the red bulletin
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not how far it is down to the bottom of the mountain. That happens sometimes on the pro skiing circuit, but those slopes have been skied a thousand times before. Here, there is the fear of the unknown. I can’t be as prepared for this as I am for downhill: that’s my job, whereas this is more of a hobby that I get to do once a year. Here, too, you have to factor in moving snow. I am not certain how the snow is going to respond to my movements, but in downhill skiing, I know that it’s solid ice. Even though the danger for an avalanche is low, some fields of top snow might loosen, and that is just what happened to me. I skied a line inside a ravine that was pretty deep and narrow, where it was almost impossible to do any turns, and suddenly there was a lot of snow chasing me and I had to straight-line it. When it’s really steep and you go straight down, it has a tendency to go pretty fast, but luckily I managed to stay on my feet and cut to the left once I was out of the gorge, and I could see the snow passing by on my right at great speed. It was supercool and quite sketchy. Eirik had been standing below in anticipation. He had had a great run, so we were both so happy to be at the bottom. I held up my hand and it was shaking like hell, our faces all smiles, and the guys from the film crew were cheering and screaming. It was the best feeling ever right there on the glacier. After this, we took a break and a nap because the sunlight was so hard, and if you shoot in it when it’s like that in the middle of the day, it doesn’t look good on film. After the break we hiked up to Taffeltind, a popular mountain in the range. In a beautiful sunset we skied down from Taffeltind, the mountains and fjords bathing in orange-red sunlight below us. It was fun skiing and will probably look spectacular on film, but nothing too dramatic. When we got back down again it was more or less just to eat a shipload of shrimps and go to bed.
We started going over the glacier and up to Lenangstind, but halfway up the mountain clouds came in and we couldn’t see the contour of the top – and neither could we reach it. It’s quite the mountain, and you need to climb it using rope, crampons and an ice axe. So, for safety reasons, we aborted the mission and skied down to the lower part of the glacier, over to Store Koppangtind, which peaks about 500m lower. Clouds will usually build up around the highest mountain in a place, leaving the lower peaks in the sun. We had lunch at the bottom and spent a few hours getting to the top, at first with skins [fabric that prevents skis from slipping backwards] under the skis, and
keep out of the exposed areas where snow might come tumbling from above, turn where it’s safest – behind a rock for instance. I can understand the recent growth in popularity of touring; its fun, it’s a great workout and it’s challenging in a way that you forget that you’re actually exhausted. And, of course, the turns on the way down feel even better if you have climbed up, although I’m still always surprised about how short a time it takes to get down a face it took several hours getting up. D ay 5 – t h e f i n a l p u s h
The temperature has become really warm and the change has had a very negative effect on the stability of the snow and the threat of avalanches is now significant. We went for a short tour, kept ourselves high in the terrain on a ridge, and when we started skiing down again, the skis were sucked to the heavy snow. And if we took a turn over the ridge, the upper layer of snow let go and slid down, taking more snow with it the further it slid. When we got to the bottom, almost the whole side of top snow on the face below the ridge we had skied down was gone. It’s not so much that it would be fatal if it caught you, but it definitely has the power to break legs – it’s massive. One of the things I really love with skiing is that two runs are never the same. The snow, the light, what I do – it will all change from one run to the next, and that goes for freeskiing and downhill. While I am totally aware that I am in control of the hazards on a downhill slope, here I have to speak to the guide to get a comprehensive understanding of the security issues in the mountains, how the snow will respond in the different conditions. Also, we prepare for the worst-case scenario with shovels, backpacks with airbags, avalanche probes, etc. When I’m in my spandex, medical help is next to the slope; we are pretty far away from any assistance where we are right now. So that’s why we do everything we can to avoid the worst-case scenario, and it has gone really well so far. It’s been a long week with not much sleep. Even though the ideal conditions are gone and we could go home, I’ll stay here a few more days just to relax, do some more touring and enjoy this place without thinking about having to ski down the mountains in the most impressive way possible. Taking it easy can also be nice.
I skied a line inside a ravine and suddenly there was a lot of snow
chasing me. I managed to
stay on my feet, cut to the left and the snow passed by
D ay 4 – h o t t i n g u p
Because of the great weather, the steepest and most exposed faces have become impossible to ski. When it’s warmer, snow divides into layers, with the upper layer heavier and looser, increasing the possibility for avalanches. So we focused on the whole experience-of-touring part and found mountains that were great for hiking if not so exciting to ski. 58
then booting with the skis on the rucksack. It’s really nice to go touring. It takes a lot of time, definitely more than half of the journey, so it’s a good thing to enjoy. The first time I tried it was when we were in Lofoten two years ago, and last year I ended up doing it quite a bit for training, even though we were on the slopes with a lift going right beside me, climbing stuff that was no fun skiing down afterwards. Here it’s nice, both because of the beautiful nature and because it’s great training. I like to be in front and plan the route, because you have to read the terrain. The shortest way to the top isn’t always the fastest. Using skins, an inclination of about 18° is perfect. When it becomes steeper, you have to take the skis off and start booting. I definitely prefer being on my skis, and I love the challenges involved to find the best and safest way to climb a mountain:
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In demand in Hollywood yet ignored by the paparazzi, Eric Bana proves that a movie career can be A-list and low-key. His new film is a true action tale – a perfect fit for a man who enjoys real-life adrenalin w o r d s : R o be r t Ti g he p h o t o g r a p h y: G r aha m Shea r e r
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E Bana’s obsession with his Ford XB Falcon was the subject of his 2009 documentary, Love The Beast
ric Bana’s office used to be a chocolate factory. Now it is home to a global skate brand, a barbershop and the kind of café that’s popular with fixed-gear bike fanatics and dedicated followers of fashion. Like his home, it’s in Melbourne, the hipster capital of Australia and the city recently voted the world’s most liveable for the third year in a row. Bana grew up in suburbia, just a few minutes from Melbourne Airport. In his 20s he worked a series of menial jobs before trying his hand at stand-up comedy. That led to his own television sketch show in the 1990s and his movie debut in low-budget Australian film The Castle. His next role, as infamous
Australian criminal Chopper Read, changed his life. Bana’s intense performance in Chopper landed him a part in Ridley Scott’s Black Hawk Down. Since then, the 45-year-old father of two has featured in blockbusters like Troy, Hulk and Star Trek, and delivered mature, measured performances in Munich, The Time Traveler’s Wife and Hanna. Bana’s movie career has taken him around the world, but he has never been tempted to live anywhere else. He’s a true blue Aussie bloke and proud of it. He supports St Kilda, his local Australian Rules football team, and in 2009 he made Love The Beast, a film about the other love of his life, a 1974 Ford XB Falcon coupe he bought when he was just 15 years old. Bana has described his dad’s garage, where he worked on the car as a teenager, as his ‘cocoon’, his refuge from the world. His office, a loft-style space he shares with a producer/director friend, seems to serve a similar role in his life today. When he’s not making movies, Bana spends four days a week in the office, running his production company Pick Up Truck Pictures, a lean operation staffed by Bana and his personal assistant. One day a week he heads for the hills to get away from it all. “Success to me equates to time,” says Bana. “I jump on a bike or in one of my cars and go for a drive in the country to clear my head. I know I’m very fortunate to be in a position to do that. I don’t take anything that I’ve achieved for granted, not for a second.” the red bulletin: One review of Hanna argued that your character gets a raw deal in many of your movies. It said: “Bana is consistently cast in roles in which he doesn’t get the girl, doesn’t finish the job, doesn’t save his planet and usually winds up six feet under by the time the credits run.” Do you feel hard done by? eric bana: I think that’s a bit harsh and not entirely accurate. Let’s look at some of the movies I’ve been in: I died in Troy, I died in Star Trek, I died in Hanna, and I died in Deadfall. I survived in The Time Traveler’s Wife, well kind of – I died and came back. I didn’t die in The Castle, I didn’t die in Chopper, I didn’t die in Black Hawk Down, I didn’t die in Romulus, My Father, I didn’t die in Funny People. I didn’t die on screen in The Other Boleyn Girl and not only did I get the girl in that movie, I got two of them, Natalie [Portman] and Scarlett [Johansson]. So come on, I’ve done OK.
“ Success to me means time to jump on a bike or in a car and drive in the country to clear my head�
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Your next movie, Lone Survivor, tells the true story of a failed Navy SEAL mission to capture a Taliban leader in Afghanistan. What attracted you to the role? I read the book [by Marcus Luttrell] twice and I’ve always had an affection for the Special Forces community going back to Black Hawk Down. I play a small role, but when the director Peter Berg rang me and asked me if was I interested I said, “Absolutely.” To get the chance to contribute to telling Marcus’s story was really special. War movies like Zero Dark Thirty and The Hurt Locker have stirred up a lot of controversy in recent years. Do you expect Lone Survivor to attract similar criticism? I don’t like the soapboxing that certain movies attract, where people use a film to voice their opinion on something. I remember when Black Hawk Down came out in 2001 and people asked for my opinion about 9/11 and George Bush, and I was like, ‘What are you talking about?’ I prefer people to focus on the film and the story and not make it about themselves and their political views. To me, Lone Survivor is the most incredible survival story. It’s impossible to read the book and not come away thinking‚ ‘We’re all capable of so much more than we think.’ I hope people take that out of the movie and don’t turn it into an argument about whether the SEALs should have killed the goat herder. The backlash against Lone Survivor has already started with questions about the accuracy of the book. Then they can go knock on Marcus Luttrell’s door and take it up with him. We had Marcus on the set, we had Navy SEALs on the set and I know the filmmakers went to a lot of effort to make sure the details were accurate. Is Lone Survivor an important movie for you given that your last big blockbuster at the box office was Star Trek in 2009? Big movies don’t have the impact you might think and it’s really dangerous
“ As I crashed I thought, ‘Thank God we’re going in head on.’ We were lucky to walk away from that” 64
to chase those movies, because if you don’t deliver a great performance in a big movie that’s not good for your career either. I chase roles that showcase what I can do because that’s what’s going to keep getting me work. For me, it’s all about the work and what’s interesting. I’m still sent interesting parts and I’m still knocking back roles that other people would kill for. You haven’t done many comedies since starring in your first movie in 1997, The Castle. Is that by choice? Early on I avoided comedy deliberately. It wasn’t hard because no one in Hollywood knew about my stand-up background. I’d be open to it if the right role came along, but I tend to get more serious stuff. Like Beware The Night? I’ve just finished shooting that on location in New York. It won’t be released until the end of 2014 or early 2015, but I’m really excited about it. It was directed by Scott Derrickson, who did The Exorcism Of Emily Rose and Sinister, and it’s a bit of a mash-up. It’s in the horror vein but it’s
Bana has competed in the Bathurst 12 Hour Enduro, the Targa Tasmania Rally (where he crashed out), and the Australian Porsche GT Championship
character-driven; it’s not a slasher film. I play Ralph Sarchie, a police officer who investigates cases concerning demonic possession and exorcism. He was just an unbelievable character to play, a real powder keg. Is it getting harder to find good roles and movies? Over the last five years it’s been getting harder for everyone because everything is going bigger – bigger concepts, bigger budgets, bigger movies – and the more intelligent, interesting movies have been harder to get off the ground. The movies I’ve made recently are not movies that people rush to see on opening weekend. Yes, it can mess with your head because you can question yourself and wonder how to find the right balance, but no one really knows the answer to that. I do know that bigger isn’t always better. Does the dumbing down of the movie industry concern you? It does concern me in the sense that even if it wasn’t a dumbing down, even if some of the bigger movies were smarter, it’s still dangerous because there are so many small stories that deserve to be told that aren’t being told. That type of filmmaking is getting extremely hard. Would you prefer to tell your own small stories? I’d like to direct another movie, but I’m not busting my chops at this stage to find that story. I’ll do it at some point and it will probably be a narrative next time rather than a documentary. It would be a real luxury to be able to tell people where to go and what to do and not have to put myself in harm’s way. Your first film as director was Love The Beast, about your Ford Falcon Coupe. Has your relationship with the car changed over the years? I should hope so. I bought the car when I was 15, so I would hope I’ve moved on since then, otherwise I’d be a pretty tragic human being. There are periods when it sits under a tarp for a year and other times where I drive it every day. There have been times when it’s in bits and pieces and I curse it, but I’ve got an immeasurable amount of enjoyment from it. I don’t want to sound like a wanker, but the car brings people a lot of joy. It puts a smile on people’s faces. What do you remember of the crash in the Targa Rally in Tasmania that features in Love The Beast? As we hit the tree I remember thinking, ‘Thank God we’re going in head on.’ The worst thing to do is to go in sideways because the car sucks around the tree. We were lucky to walk away from that crash.
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Bana bought the Falcon when he was 15 and has been working on the car ever since
The coupe didn’t fare so well, though. It needed a full rebuild, right? It was in celebrity rehab for quite a while, but it’s even better now than it ever was. I’ve retired it from racing because I’ve put too many man hours into it. What else is in your garage? I’ve got a Yamaha 450 motocross bike I ride in the bush. I’ve got a BMW 1200 GS, a Ducati 851 SP3, an old Ducati Monster, and a Ducati 748 RS race bike, which is just for the track. I’ve also got a 1955 Porsche Pre-A Speedster, which is my only serious investment car; I bought it 11 years ago and it’s probably doubled in value in that time. Apart from being able to indulge your love of motorsports, what does success mean to you? It means jumping off the hamster wheel whenever I choose. Early on in my career I realised I could work pretty much non-stop or I could make it work for me. If I wasn’t married and didn’t have kids I might have done things differently, but by the time I had any sort of success I was already married with kids. Has success changed you? I started working in the movie business when I was 22 and I’m 45 now, so of course I’ve changed. I’d like to think I’m a more evolved version of the species. Still, on any given day I can beat the crap out of myself or feel pretty good about myself, like all of us. The key is to make sure you don’t wrap up too much meaning in your work and having outside interests helps you keep that balance. I’m happy with my life now, but then I wasn’t miserable 20 years ago when I was stacking shelves, pushing trolleys and doing stand-up comedy. Steven Spielberg once said of you: “He’s got all his priorities straight… If he never acted another day in his life, he’d be a very happy man.” Agree? That’s interesting. I think I’d be a bit frustrated. It’s a lovely compliment, but I’d have to disagree. I love living in Melbourne, I love being a parent and I love carving out time to do the things I want to do. What’s coming up for you? Right now I’m reading scripts, but I haven’t got a clue what I’m doing next and I love that. I rarely walk onto a film set knowing what my next movie is going to be. I don’t want to be thinking about that next movie while I’m in the middle of one. Sometimes that means the gap ends up being too long, because it might take you a while to find something. Is it true you have a rule about not doing back-to-back movies? the red bulletin
It’s the way I like to work rather than a determined effort to seek a work-life balance. I could do more movies, but if I did I’d be doing movies I don’t really like that much. The reality is it’s really hard to find a good movie. How many good movies are there every year? Not many, and you need to be very lucky to be in one of them. If you can be in one half-decent movie every five years you’re doing well.
“I could do more movies, but it’d mean doing ones I don’t really like that much. The reality is that it’s hard to find a good movie and you need to be very lucky”
Have you had to turn down roles because you live in Melbourne? Living in Melbourne has made no difference to my career. The difference is I’m able to hide easier here. So you’ve never been stalked by the paparazzi? They’ve never been interested in me. They tend not to hang around the same places I do. I think the paparazzi like to live pretty glamorous lives themselves, so if you stay away from all the cool, trendy places, they stay away from you. How do you handle press junkets? They’re a novelty for me. If I go on a junket, it’s a week out of my year and it feels weird and flattering at the same time. It’s fine when it’s not every day. Could you choose between motorsports and acting? Ouch… That’s low. I’m not an idiot, I know that acting enables my hobbies and my motorsports, but I could never not indulge my love for my cars and bikes. That’s a lose-lose scenario. twitter.com/EricBana67
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C omp ressorhead are the on ly true meta l ba nd .
The robotic trio weigh a tonne and rock harder than their human c o u n t e r pa r t s , a n d n o w o n d e r : t h e g u i ta r i s t h a s 7 8 f i n g e r s , the bassist has an iron skull and the drummer has four arms w o r d s : F l o r i a n O b k i r c h e r p h o t o g r a p h y: N o r m a n K o n r a d
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Fingers Guitar
FROM MOBILE PHONE TEST PIECE TO 78-FINGERED ROCK GOD
n industrial wasteland in the north-west of Berlin. Stripped car wrecks, derelict buildings, lots of rubbish and not a soul to be seen. The only sign of life is a muffled, rhythmic thump coming from one of the buildings. Boom! Boom! Boom! Follow the noise into to a small rehearsal room. Concert posters on the wall, a sound system, tangles of cables. Just what you’d expect inside a band’s place, but the only difference is that the three musicians currently rocking along to an AC/DC song are robots. A metal giant with four arms swirling around over the drums. His bandmate, covered in tubes and wearing sunglasses and cowboy boots, is playing a guitar solo. The bass player nods his iron skull, antennae rocking along in time to the music. His steel digits glide quickly over the fingerboard. This is not the set of a sci-fi movie. This is Compressorhead, the only metal band in the world truly worthy of the name.
festival in Australia: five concerts in five venues across the country, each with 50,000 people in attendance. On the same bill as Red Hot Chili Peppers and Vampire Weekend, Compressorhead rocked the crowd with cover versions of songs by bands including Nirvana and The Ramones. YouTube videos of their practice sessions have achieved cult status. The Red Bulletin spoke with the robots about singalong audiences, the Christian Robot Alliance and their relationship with ‘meatbags’, as Stickboy, Fingers and Bones call their human counterparts. the red bulletin: Stickboy, what did you do before your rock career? stickboy: I was a motor racing driver in my first life. Some parts of me were in a motocross bike; others were in the diesel engine of an East German truck, as were the spikes in my mohican. My legs are made of pneumatic cylinders and the shock absorbers from an Italian moped. Can you remember your first attempts at playing drums? In the early days I had mobility problems. Which isn’t that surprising when you’ve got four arms. I thrashed at the cymbals so hard that their stands fell over. Fingers, what makes you different from other guitarists? What’s the secret behind your technique? fingers: I can play rhythm and solo guitar at the same time, which means
L emmy f rom Motörhead is a fa n .
“ H E P O S T E D O U R V I D E O O N his B A N D ’ S FA C E B O O K PA G E A N D W R O T E , ‘ Y O U ’ V E G O T T O S E E T H I S T O BELIEVE IT!’” Six years ago, Berlin-based technology artist Frank Barnes made a human-sized mechanical drummer, Stickboy, from old industrial robot parts. A musician with four arms and two legs but, as Barnes says, tongue-in-cheek, no brain. Barnes sent Stickboy on tour with two fembot dancers. Barnes then went on to build a band, Compressorhead, with the help of the robotic art collectives Kernschrott and Robocross. Stickboy was joined by Fingers on guitar and Bones on bass. All three are operated by MIDI commands, (the industry standard electronic music interface), moved by electro-pneumatic valves and driven by good old rock ’n’ roll. The trio’s live baptism of fire came in January of this year, at the Big Day Out 70
I can do the job of two meatbags. As for my technique, a sequencer operates the pneumatic pistons on the slide over the fingerboard. These pistons used to be used by mobile telephone companies to check the functionality of the phone’s keys in their factories. They became obsolete with the advent of touchscreen phones. Why specifically 78 fingers? f: The fingers on my left hand are on two slides, which means I can cover the whole fretboard. I have five fingers on one, seven on the other, and both have six strings. So that makes 72 fingers. And then there are the six fingers on my right hand, one for each string. You shared the stage with Red Hot Chili Peppers at your first
s t i c k b oy drums
THE ONE WHO BROUGHT THE BAND TOGETHER: FOUR ARMS AND INHUMAN PRECISION concert. How did that come about? s: I’d played the festival once before, years earlier, that time with two fembot dancers. The organiser liked my show and said to me after, “If you ever start a band, get in touch. I’d book you on the spot.” How did you do alongside all those human bands? s: Very well. When we played TNT by AC/DC, thousands of fans sang along. We do mass karaoke at our gigs. The song lyrics are projected on to a screen behind us and the audience becomes our singers. Why don’t you have your own? s: We’ve been looking for the right man for the job for a long time now. But we haven’t met the perfect singer yet. Would you want a human or a robot frontman? s: Either. But he’d have to make our circuits glow. Someone suggested Stephen Hawking. At least we’d understand him. Who’d be your dream choice? s: Lemmy Kilmister from Motörhead. I’ve heard he’s a fan of yours? s: That’s right. Lemmy posted the video of our cover version of Ace Of Spades on his band’s Facebook page and wrote, “You’ve got to see this to believe it!” Within two days we’d had over a million hits on YouTube. We’ve now had more than five-and-a-half million. bones: Afterwards, a Dutch robot band redid our cover of Ace Of Spades with acoustic guitar and panpipes. As soon as you hear the words Germany and robot band, you think of Kraftwerk. s: Robot wannabes. b: Come on! They had robots on the stage 30 years ago. We have to respect that. What do you think of digital drum machines? Are they brothers-in-arms or competition? s: Brothers-in-arms. The only problem with those little boxes is that they can’t really rock. They get envious when they see me headbanging. Does a robot band really rehearse? the red bulletin
bones Bass
Credit:
THE NEWEST MEMBER OF THE BAND HAS B E A R - L I K E PAW S B U T THE SENSITIVITY OF CHARLES MINGUS
s: Yes, but not as often as a human one. We are innately in sync. We communicate via MIDI. It’s rare for us to be out of time. So where do problems arise? s: Settings often have to be tweaked, for example, in my case, where I do my drum roll with just one hand. But after five million hard drum rolls, it is feasible that my joint has lost some of its precision. So the software needs to recalibrate it. My joints also need to be replaced every couple of years. What kinds of things do you always take with you on tour? s: Nuts and bolts. A clean pair for every day, at the very least. f: The air compressor. We’re almost completely pneumatic. How many compressors do you have with you? f: One 11kW compressor. It’s the size of a wardrobe. He’s the fourth member of the band – and probably the most important. Nothing works without him. b: We even named ourselves after him. How do you get about, actually? s: In huge cases. Our seven-man crew check us in at the airport. We don’t get through as hand luggage. So those are your bunks, so to speak? s: Exactly. In our case, sleep means being put on standby. What do you dream of? s: Zeros and ones. If there’s a two,
have a personal liking for lithium lubricant. It makes my joints really agile. What about groupies? s: It never stops. From old household appliances to high-tech toys. If an event organiser books Compressorhead, he needs to have a forklift truck on hand. b: We’re just heavy guys: a real heavy metal band. Metallica weigh 400kg all in. Compressorhead tip the scales at 1,300kg, and that’s not including the compressor. Are festival stages able to take the load? s: Not always. After our first couple of gigs in Australia, it turned out that we were too heavy for the main stage. So we got a stage of our own. So do you leave the stage by forklift for a second before your encore? s: We just stay put. But just to be clear, we’re not stiff. f: I can even jump. Well, a couple of centimetres, anyway. I’m like Keith Richards up there. He once said he had the smallest workplace in the world: one square metre, because he’s always in the same place on stage.
Wh at do you d ream of ?
“Zeroes and ones. If there’s a t w o , i t m e a n s I ’ m h av i n g a terrible nightmare” it means I’m having a terrible nightmare. As rockers, you must know what it feels like to have a hangover in the morning. s: We certainly do. Missing parts, faulty wires, leaky valves. What would you say are a robot band’s guilty pleasures? s: We love the smell of ethanol. I also the red bulletin
b: I can roll around the stage on my caterpillar tracks. From the edge of the stage over to the other band members. What about stage diving? s: We’d cause too many injuries. We’d rather do without going to court. Has there ever been an instance of on-stage blackout? b: Yes. Caused by impure electricity.
We’d just got going and suddenly there was no power. Awful. f: Power units at outdoor festivals are a problem. They work with different earth potentials. If the power units are connected to each other, you get impure electricity. And then equipment tends to switch itself off. Our electronics are very sensitive when it comes to that. Your live show includes rock classics from Led Zeppelin to AC/DC. Why do you like classic rock so much? s: Isn’t that obvious? (Laughs.) Why should machines always just play synthesizer pop? Could Compressorhead also play free jazz? Improvised music? b: We’ve often played with the idea of just improvising without MIDI prompts. But, in the end, we’re better suited to rock ’n’ roll. But would it be possible, technically? s: We’re currently working with producers who are writing music for us. Rhythms that no human drummer could play – because he’s two arms short – and that creates completely new possibilities. Isn’t the funny thing here precisely the fact that you play songs by humans? s: If the fans know the song, then that encourages them to sing along, of course. Plus if they know the song, they can judge how well we’re playing it. But you can’t build a career on meatbag cover versions. What is the best way for someone to become a robot band member? s: Your best bet for becoming a robot musician is to die and then be brought back to life as a rock machine by meatbags. It worked for us. b: A lot of industrial robots are thrown away as soon as a newer version comes along. We’ve invented the Christian Robot Alliance just for them. What’s that all about? s: Our crew regularly get old robots from universities and businesses. They are put into service and given a new job at our workshop. So they might work at our robot bar, for example, which we often have with us at our concerts. Meatbags put glasses on a conveyor belt, a machine squirts vodka from above and then a robot monkey urinates orange juice into it. Once that’s all done, you take your drink off the conveyor belt. Do you have a plan B in case your rock careers don’t work out? s: I’d like to be part of the first robot wrestling team in my third life. That would rock, wouldn’t it? www.compressorheadband.com www.kernschrottrobots.de www.robocross.de
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A Higher Calling Jed Mildon made action sports history with the first triple backflip on a BMX. But how do you top that? Building giant ramps and leading a gang of record-breakers over them is a good start Words: Robert Tighe Photography: Graeme Murray
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Leap of faith: Jed Mildon takes to the air on his specially built BMX course
“This is about having my own jumps to do the kind of tricks I want to do. The records are a bonus�
T
Ramp with a view: the purpose-built jump (above) is made from shipping containers. The foam pit (left) saves limbs testing tricks. Construction crew (below l-r): Jed Mildon (also far left), Paul Langlands and Jake Prebble
he view from Dan Franklin’s kitchen window, into his back yard, is dominated by three shipping containers. “It’s part of the landscape now,” he says, of the ramp, about 14m high, made from the containers. Franklin’s farm is the last property at the end of a cul-de-sac outside the forestry town of Tokoroa in New Zealand’s North Island. It’s a private, peaceful part of the world – or at least it was until Dan’s son discovered freestyle motocross. Nick Franklin is one of the top FMX riders in the country and, since he started riding as a teenager, 15 years ago, he’s claimed more and more of his father’s land to build an FMX playground, complete with dirt jumps and a foam pit. Jed Mildon and Nick Franklin have been friends since early 2011, when they first discussed the possibility of landing a triple backflip on a BMX. Mildon practised the triple in Franklin’s foam pit before landing it successfully a few months later on May 28, on a purposebuilt ramp in his hometown of Taupo, a 45-minute drive from Tokoroa. When, late last year, Mildon proposed building some of the biggest dirt jumps in the world to test the limits of what was 77
possible on a BMX, the Franklins’ farm was the obvious location. Dan and his wife, Sue, have long been resigned to the fact that their back garden is a haven for bicycle daredevils, but they seem to enjoy the hustle and bustle. “It’s usually very quiet here, unless Nick or Jed is around,” says Dan. In January 2013, three 40ft containers, salvaged from the MV Rena, a ship that ran aground off Tauranga in 2011, were delivered to the farm. Mildon hired a crane to stand one of the containers on its end and lean the other two against it to form an arrow-like shape. With the help of friends, the containers were welded together, two truckloads of concrete were poured into foundations to support the structure, and sheets of plywood were drilled along the length of the two sloping containers to create two ramps, known as ‘roll-ins’, each 14m long. In September, Mildon used an excavator to carve out a 60ft dirt-to-dirt jump leading into a 40ft jump, designed to boost him into the air and give him enough hang time to pull the first triple backflip on dirt. “The first jump is a speed jump and the bonus is we can get some world records on it while we’re sussing out the second jump,” says Mildon. “The second jump is the one we’ll fly on. That’s the jump we’ll do the triple on.” Finding time is Mildon’s biggest problem. He had a window in the first week of October before he had to get back to work as a professional BMX rider with Nitro Circus Live, a world-touring stunt show led by Travis Pastrana. Heavy spring rain had made the dirt soft and spongy instead of hard and fast, but consecutive days of sunshine early in the week had helped to improve conditions a little. On the Thursday morning, Mildon and his riding buddies Jake ‘Gypsy’ Prebble and
Paul Langlands arrived at Franklin’s farm, armed with shovels. “I think we have to dig most of this out and let the base dry,” says Mildon. “How far down do we need to dig?” asks Prebble. “Just as far as the sponge goes,” says Mildon. “It’s real soft here.” “This is the ideal time of the year to build jumps, because it’s soft enough to shape the dirt and you’ve got some sun to dry it out,” says Langlands, “but it’s not the ideal time to ride them.” “We need the surface to be rock hard,” Mildon explains. “We want to eliminate any friction or drag on the bike, so we can build up the speed we need to hit the second jump. If we had another week of sunshine we’d be fine, but it is what it is. The records are a bonus and I can come back in the New Year to get the tricks I don’t land this time. This is more about having my own jumps to do the kind of tricks I want to do. I don’t get enough time in the air on normal competition jumps.” Mildon, who was born in Taupo on November 5, 1986, has been obsessed with jumping bigger, higher and longer since he landed his first backflip as a 16-year-old, announcing his arrival on the BMX scene with a bang. “Jed jumps massive every time,” says Langlands. “When he was younger he’d turn up to the local skatepark and look for the biggest jump to do tricks on. He’d ride lines that no one else would dare to ride.” In 2007, Mildon met Dane Searls, an Australian rider with a shared passion for big, badass dirt jumps. Four years later, just a few months after Mildon stunned the BMX world with his triple in Taupo, Searls landed a backflip off a 60ft dirt jump. A few days later, the 23-year-old Australian died when a jump from a
Long way down: Mildon (also below left) prepares to 'drop in'. He can reach up to 70kph by the time he gets to the bottom of the ramp
balcony into a swimming pool went horribly wrong. Mildon’s latest project is partly inspired by Searls. “Dane showed it was possible to jump 60ft on a BMX and we’re just carrying on where he left off,” says Mildon. “I think he’d be proud that one of his mates is carrying on his legacy.” The clip of Mildon’s triple backflip in 2011 has over nine million views on YouTube. The stunt has been described as one of the greatest moments in BMX history and confirmed Mildon as one of the best freestyle BMX riders in the world. “No one really thought a triple was possible on a BMX,” says Langlands, leaning on his shovel, “but I guess they’re the kind of people who don’t achieve anything, the kind of people who spend their time playing PlayStation while we’re out here doing great stuff.” It’s mid-afternoon before Mildon decides that the jumps are dry enough to bring the bikes out for a test run. Prebble is Mildon’s wingman: he was there in Taupo when he landed the triple and was pruning grapes in Queenstown when
“Those who thought a triple backflip wasn't possible are the people who don’t achieve anything”
Flip side: Mildon likes big jumps and looks for lines others won't ride
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Mildon rang him and asked him to help out on this project. Prebble is an amateur who works to earn enough money so he can ride as much as possible. As well as helping Mildon build the jumps, he helps test them, a job that would challenge many professional riders. The pair play rock paper scissors to decide who goes first. Mildon wins and after a last-minute check of his bike and a couple of warm-up tricks landed in the foam pit, he’s poised for take-off at the top of the roll-in. “Dropping in!” he shouts, before he rolls his front wheel over the edge of what is an almostvertical ramp face, hoons down (he can reach 70kph), launches off the 2m-high take-off and lands on a straight ramp. “That was massive!” shouts Langlands, from his vantage point on top of a pile of dirt. One of the best freestyle BMXers in the country, Langlands is sitting this session out as he recovers from an injury. “It felt like my front end was going to implode,” says Mildon. For his next trick, Mildon sets a new world record for the longest dirt-to-dirt 360. A few minutes later, Mildon lands a Superman backflip, for another world record. “Fun times on the farm,” says Mildon, with a big grin on his face. Prebble bags a couple of records of his own, landing the longest dirt-to-dirt tabletop and turndown before Mildon nails another record, this time a massive front flip. “Yeaaaahhhhhh booooooy!” shouts Langlands. “Old Milly setting records!” Mildon heads back to the roll-in to try one of his signature moves, the Warrior flip, a double backflip with tail whip. He gets the rotation right, but gets bumped off his bike on landing and takes a heavy hit to the ribs before bouncing to a halt. “Maybe we should do some more work on this jump,” he says, after he’s had a chance to catch his breath. “I’m done for the day.” As he winds down, Mildon reflects on the day’s session. “I’m stoked that the jumps are working and, more importantly, that we can crash at these speeds. That’s what has put most people off jumping jumps this big, but it feels normal to me. It’s a weird feeling to be achieving all these records. I need to learn to be satisfied, but all I can think about is how much bigger we can go. I’m looking forward to trying some tricks on the second jump tomorrow.” The following morning, Mildon, Prebble and Langlands are back at the jumps, back on the shovels. Mildon is looking fresh and feeling fit, some achievement considering the pounding his body took the day before. “I’m lucky that I’m a well-conditioned 80
Not taking it lying down: the soft dirt caused Mildon to crash, but he copes with the impact. “I’m lucky I have good genes,” he says the red bulletin
“We’ve set five new world records, so we’re winning” human and I’ve got good genes. My dentist told me I have these massive roots in my teeth, so I guess I’m well-built. “I played a lot of rugby in school so I’m used to a lot of physical contact,” says the man whose nickname is the Jedi Warrior. “BMX is much more intense than rugby. Crashing on dirt or concrete is much harder on the body than getting tackled on the rugby field.” Mildon’s greatgrandfather Ben Gemmell played for the Maori All Blacks: “I guess what I do now the red bulletin
is the equivalent of being an All Black in a sport that I’m truly passionate about.” By lunchtime, the jumps are not nearly hard enough to ride and Mildon is second-guessing his decision earlier that morning. “Oi Langers! Do you know the only soft spots on the landing are where we dug it out? It’s so disheartening. If we came back in a week it would be perfect.”
M
ildon doesn’t have a week and rain is forecast for the next few days. With a couple of hours of daylight left, he climbs the 39 steps to the top of the rollin. After a couple of minutes, he still hasn’t dropped in. “I’m waiting for a butterfly to get off my roll-in,” he shouts down at Langlands. He stamps his two feet to try and scare it away. “Move!
Get off my roll-in. Move, you idiot! OK, it’s gone. I’m ready… dropping in!” “He has a lot of speed, but not enough to make that second jump work,” says Langlands, after Mildon lands a perfect backflip over the first jump. “Maybe when it’s rock hard in January or February, it’ll work.” Mildon isn’t giving up that easily and he tries four times to get enough speed to make the second jump work. Four times he falls just short of the landing. “What do we do?” he asks Langlands. “If it was dry you’d have heaps of speed for the second jump,” Langlands says. “You need more speed. For how soft the dirt is right now the first jump isn’t big enough.” “I guess I’ll just have to do some more tricks on the first jump then,” says Mildon. The light is fading as Mildon attempts the world’s longest double backflip on dirt. His front wheel comes up just short, pitching him over the handlebars and onto his shoulder with a sickening impact. He skids along the dirt and comes to a stop at the bottom of the landing. He’s winded, dazed and disappointed with himself. “Damn, I almost landed it,” he says. “You were so close,” says Langlands. “Is that you done for the day?” “I might send it again,” says Mildon. “You’re joking!” “Well, I can’t be any sorer than I am and I want that double so bad.” “Why don’t you just finish with a few mellow tricks?” “These are my mellow tricks!” “Then maybe just be content with what you’ve done this time around and respect the jump.” Mildon listens to Langlands’ advice and puts his bike away. He comes back with a measuring tape. “You know, I haven’t even measured this gap yet,” he says. Mildon’s other nickname is Horizontal Man because he’s so laid-back. “Let’s see. It’s 58ft, but it was supposed to be 60ft.” “That’s Dane [Searls] laughing at you,” says Langlands, after a nervous silence. “That’s his cheeky little joke.” “That’s a brilliant end to this project,” laughs Mildon. “We thought we’d made a jump as big as Dane’s, but it turns out we’re 2ft short. Still, we’ve set five new world records, I’ve got three and Gypsy has two, so we’re winning.” Mildon vows to return to Franklin’s farm early next year to finish what he started and land the first triple backflip on dirt. He also hopes to host an event in Tokoroa, as a way of encourage other BMX riders to think big. As for his own ambitions, the Jedi Warrior says he’s getting started. The force is strong in this one. jedbmx.com
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Epic moments from the world’s best clubs and festivals: Strobelight Anthems on rbmaradio.com
Goodbye world: block it all out with noisecancelling headphones MUSIC page 89
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 Go truly off piste on some of the world’s best backcountry snow
getty images
Powder room
Russian helicopters, acres of untouched snow and not another tourist in sight. Welcome to Kyrgyzstan travel page 86
the red bulletin
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Action!
yo u w i ll s u rvive
Pro tools
tech to keep you at the peak of your powers
Picture perfect Quick movements in full HD are no problem at 50 or 60 frames per second.
Compact Measures just 524.4 x 47 x 82mm, weighs 90g including the battery and is also waterproof.
Perspective The Carl Zeiss Vario Tessar lens with a 15.3mm fixed focal length makes for a viewing angle of 170º (120º with the image stabiliser).
Power MOnkey explorer Waterproof USB solar-powered charger for smartphones, MP3 players and digital cameras.
Firm hold As well as the universal helmet mount, it can also be attached to chest straps and handlebars.
powertraveller.com
Heater Meals Used for years by the US armed forces, this range of meals uses foodgrade iron and magnesium powder to self-heat to 37ºC.
Markus Pekoll records all his training runs
MOUNTAIN-BIKING To truly excel in the saddle, champions choose an extra perspective on things
“My Sony Action HDR-AS30V camera helps a lot with my training,” says current European downhill mountainbiking champion Markus Pekoll. “I film every training session. When I’m done, I get the footage up on my mobile phone and analyse different lines and work out time differences.” The 26-year-old from Austria particularly likes the SteadyShot function. “The picture doesn’t move and I can focus on the line. The only way you can tell how rough the terrain is, is from the way the visor on my helmet is shaking.” The UCI, cycling’s world governing body, forbids cameras during races. Great videos are going unrecorded, because, says Pekoll, “there’s nothing like the intensity of a race, the speed and the mass of spectators by the track”. sony.net
Yeti Cooler Tundra 65 Virtually indestructible and grizzly-bear-proof dry-ice cool-box will stay cold for up to seven days. yeticoolers.com
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the red bulletin
kurt keinrath
Head for sights
heatermeals.com
Action!
NOT J UST C U R R I ES
party
The Indian food you’ve never eaten
Mumbai’s best club for live music can hold 800 revellers
The policy of no-policy
laif (3), Philipp Horak, picturedesk.com (3)
Florian Obkircher
Mumbai Anything goes at the all-music venue in India’s largest city – except for noisy drinks What do you do when your favourite bands never come to town? You invite them yourself. That’s what five artists in Mumbai did six years ago when they set up their own club in an abandoned factory building. Their aim was to promote the local band scene and attract their favourite music-makers to Mumbai. Now Bluefrog is home to a restaurant with a futuristic crater-like seating area, a recording studio, an artist agency and a club with six gigs and concerts a week. A club that can successfully host jazz guitarist John McLaughlin and legendary DJ Sasha has only thing in mind: celebrating great music regardless of genre. The Bluefrog crew are serious about this. It’s a policy not to serve cocktails during a performance. The shaker would be too loud and ruin the live experience. blueFROg Mathuradas Mill Compound, Senapati Bapat Marg, Lower Parel, Mumbai 400013, India www.bluefrog.co.in
the red bulletin
Bhang Lassi Bhang is made of dried cannabis leaves and is legal in India. Once mixed with yoghurt you get a green elixir that Sufis have used to achieve spiritual ecstasy.
Thirst rule of nightclub: no cocktail shakers during gigs
hau nted h o uses THESE THREE MUMBAI HOUSES ARE HOME TO GHOSTS. GUARANTEED
SNDT GIRLS COLLEGE Neighbours have heard the ghost of a teacher thrashing his pupils in the backyard of the college at 1.30am. First a maths lesson begins, then comes the wailing of children. RAJ KIRAN HOTEL A blue glow at the end of the bed, sheets fluttering: it has been officially confirmed by paranormal experts that something spooks this hotel outside Mumbai when night falls. Mukesh Mills This abandoned factory is a common film location, but some directors refuse to shoot there. In 2009, an actress possessed by a ghost asked the crew to leave in a deep voice that was not her own.
Chhaang This rice beer is drunk warm. Its name means ‘Nectar of the Gods’. Legend has it the Yeti has raided Himalayan villages to get his hands on it.
Chaprah Chilli peppers, salt, ginger, red ants and their eggs. In the province of Chhattisgarh this protein-rich chutney is a basic condiment. Taste varies from sweetish to very spicy.
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Travel
And anoth er thing Aprés heliski
Hot water Switch to a jet-ski on the world’s second largest mountain lake, Issyk-Kul. The former Russian torpedo test site never freezes over thanks to its thermal springs. issykkul.kg/en
Boards & blades
Snow body else around: heliski on Virgin powder
Heliskiing Snow lovers ready to push the boundaries should take a chopper ride to the powder of Kyrgyzstan’s unexplored mountains
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Head to capital Bishkek’s largest venue, The Sports Palace, for a game of basketball and a dip in the Olympic-sized pool, or just a welldeserved sauna. ianbek.kg/?p=7393
Advice From The Inside Quick fix “It’s absolutely key to have a fixer,” says Nick Armstrong. “Sergei Dubovik from Fantastic Asia sorted everything out for us, which made our lives so much easier. We wouldn’t have known where to start if we were doing it ourselves.”
Smooth operators
“Since you’re transferring money to a stranger in a country you’ve never visited, make sure you use a reputable company,” says Armstrong, who travelled with Fantastic Asia. Or try Austrian-based company Fit and Fun, which offers similar heliskiing packages. www.fitundfun-outdoor.com
Super noodles Try the hearty Afghani-Dungan noodle dish Laghman, which has been officially adopted by Kyrgyzstan, at one of Bishkek’s many traditional restaurants. thespektator.co.uk
the red bulletin
getty images, fitundfun-outdoor.com, shutterstock (2)
Kyrgyzstan is referred to as the Switzerland of Central Asia thanks to the mountains that cover 95 per cent of the country. Unlike its snowsportsavvy European equivalent, Kyrgyzstan’s ski resorts are still small, two-lift affairs. That’s where a fleet of Mi-8 helicopters comes in. These Russian-built beasts open up the miles of unskied snow to the adventureloving riders they drop into uncharted territory. “I’d heard that there were these great mountains there that no one had ever been on, so me and some friends went to check it out,” says Nick Armstrong, from Sydney, Australia. “It was amazing. I’ve been skiing in Japan for five years and this was totally new. Everyone was so welcoming and amazed to see foreigners, especially snowboarders. It was a real adventure. We stayed in a base camp resort in the south, in Suusamyr at about 3,000m, and went up to about 4,500m. The whole area around there is pretty much unexplored and covered in soft powder. Because it’s all unpatrolled Prices start terrain we had to be careful, but at US$499 the guides really know their stuff. for a single day They had the latest safety gear for of heliskiing us. The riding was wild, we did in Suusamyr three first descents. Here it’s so or Karakol with easy to just go out and find a new Fantastic Asia. heli-ski.kg peak no one’s ever ridden before.”
Steam clean
Action!
workout
Keeping it simple snowboarding superstar of the slopes perfects his record-breaking tricks with a trampoline and a medicine ball
Tim Zimmerman/Red Bull Content Pool, Sebastian Marko/Red Bull Content Pool, shutterstock
Heri Irawan
Mark McMorris, trick pioneer and X Games winner
“There’s a champion inside everyone,” says snowboard pro Mark McMorris, “you just have to discover how to find it.” The 19-year-old Canadian has uncovered his inner achiever. He landed the first-ever backside triple cork 1440 – a triple flip with triple twist – in 2011, and used it to win gold in big air at the 2012 Winter X Games, where he also won slopestyle gold. He took silver in slopestyle at the Winter X Games in 2013. In August, in Encinitas, California, he began preparing for the new season, which begins in December and ends in May 2014. As well as four weights sessions a week, the training schedule also involves daily surfing. The reason, says McMorris, is that “any board sport is good for a snowboarder”. markmcmorris.com
tramp champ being the best is child's play
Three-mendous: McMorris’s backside triple cork 1440 made history
SNOWBOARD BLITZ WORKOUT “Elasticity, balance, co-ordination and core stability are essential for jumps,” says McMorris, “and the best thing is, you can train all of those with just two exercises and a medicine ball.”
1
Hold the medicine ball with both hands in front of your chest, legs shoulder-width apart.
Crouch down low, then push up in one swift movement, jump and throw the ball upwards.
Land with your legs slightly bent and catch the ball with outstretched arms. Do 10-15 reps.
2
NO SNow? no problem
“As a kid I rarely had the opportunity to train on the slopes,” says McMorris. “A trampoline is a cheap alternative for improving your feel for jumps. I still use mine to this day.”
Lunges help train your thighs and gluteal muscles.
the red bulletin
Important: keep your upper body vertical during this exercise.
Lunge for 30 secs tensing, pause upright for 10 secs, switch legs.
Do 5-10 reps on each leg. (This is a great warm-up exercise for any sport.)
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Action!
City Guide
Be ll St re et
Melbourne Por t Ph i l l i p B ay
brunswick east
B ru n sw ic
S u n sh in
k Ro a d
Royal Park Golf Club
Footscray Park
a n Fre e w E a s te r
5
e Ro a d
1 Y
Fr an ci s S tr ee t
R i v er ra ar
Pr
Bla cks haw s Ro ad
Ko ro r
inc
g hway es Hi
H obsons Bay
o it C r eek
ivanhoe
y
Turning your Melbourne jaunt up to 11
Kew Golf Club
B ar ke rs R oa d
south melbourne
B ur ke R oa d
Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
2
Extr a Kick
To o ra k R oad
Albert Park
H ig h S tr eet
Ro a d
3
4
st kilda
malvern east
fly a fighter jet Soar over Melbourne at 910kph as copilot in a fighter jet. Combat manoeuvres, loop-the-loops and nosedives included. adrenalin.com.au
Bourne supremacyMelbourne Best-kept secrets of Aussie’s ‘culture city’ rules revealed by Amy Findlay of hometown rockers Stonefield Darraweit Guim may sound like the name of an alien commander in Star Trek, but in actual fact it is a small town 50km from Melbourne and the place where the Findlay Sisters – alias Stonefield – launched their music career. “We listened to Hendrix, Zappa and Led Zeppelin as kids, then at some point we began to play music ourselves in the shed at the back of our parents’ house,” says 23-year-old Findlay, the eldest of the four sisters. In 2010, the rock band caught the attention of a Glastonbury manager in Perth and a year later they were wowing crowds of 150,000 at England’s legendary festival. Their long-awaited debut album, Wunderkind, is out now. “In our free time we most like to hang out in Melbourne,” says Amy. “There’s a lot going on in terms of music. There are plenty of concerts to choose from and Melbourne offers a lot more besides, as you’ll see on the right.” myspace.com/stonefieldtheband
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f0und by findlay
3 Twilight MARKET
O’Donnell Gardens, St Kilda “This market comes to life on Thursday nights with fire-eaters, musicians, artists and food stalls on every corner. It’s my favourite outdoor nighttime haunt.”
stare down sharks
1 CHERRY BAR ACDC Lane
“Noel Gallagher wanted to buy this bar on ACDC Lane [named after the Aussie rockers in 2004]. It’s the city’s top rock music nightspot. Many bands throw their concert after-parties here. Thursday is soul night and weekends they play rock.”
2 FOSSIL VINTAGE
57 Sparks Avenue, Fairfield
“A crazy antiques shop which sells industrial equipment. So if you need ancient French hospital beds or Czechoslovak factory lights, you’ve come to the right place. I like their ’70s and ’80s clothes.”
4 LAS CHICAS
203 Carlisle St, Balaclava
“Las Chicas serves the best breakfast. It’s always full, but you won’t wait too long for a table. The menu includes banana bread, buttermilk doughnuts and salmon burritos.”
5 THE TOTE HOTEL
71 Johnson St, Collingwood
“A hotel, pub, concert venue and meeting point for young bands. There’s also a rumour swirling about the hotel that it’s the place the ghost of gangster Squizzy Taylor strikes terror into people’s hearts.”
Come face to face with the marine predators at Melbourne’s aquarium. You may not get in the water. melbourneaquarium. com.au
launch off buildings Rap jumping, or Australian rappel, is a forward abseil that has you running down a sevenstorey building. redballoon.com.au
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Justin Vague (4), Kane Hibberd/Red Bull Content Pool, shutterstock
Amy Findlay, lead singer and drummer of Australian rock band Stonefield
Top five
Action!
music
year in the mix Egbert Nathaniel Dawkins III, alias Aloe Blacc
Play It Forward Playlist Aloe Blacc is in the business of infectious good vibes. Can we all just be happy for a moment?
1 Stevie Wonder
Brian Dowling/Retna Ltd., Christelle de Castro/Red Bull Content Pool, florian obkircher Robert Snow/Red Bull Content Pool, valerie cherchi
You Are the Sunshine of My Life
the best dj sets of 2013
It’s been a good year for Aloe Blacc. His hit Wake Me Up sold three million copies and topped the charts in 22 countries. After this excursion to the world of dance pop, a new album, Lift Your Spirit, sees the Californian musician returning what’s closer to his heart: soul music as practised by the likes of Al Green and Marvin Gaye. The 34-year-old sees himself as a mediator: just like he discovered his soul heroes by listening to hiphop when he was young, he hopes that kids today will discover the classics through his music. Here Blacc reveals five finds of his own. aloeblacc.com
Headless Heroes Of The Apocalypse
“I’ve known McDaniels since I was young, but I didn’t know it. That’s because hiphoppers like A Tribe Called Quest sampled his music; I discovered this record two years ago. A friend gave it to me while I was searching for inspiration. I fell in love with this psychedelic soul-jazz, which I took as a starting point for my new album.”
4 Cat Stevens
5 DJ Rogers
“I discovered this song on TV when I was a kid. Cat Stevens was looking very seriously into the camera. His singing, and the lyrics above all, instantly had an effect on me. To this day I can’t think of a more beautiful song about parent-child relationships. I wrote my own song, Mama Hold My Hand, as homage to this masterpiece.”
“I heard this song coming from my housemate’s bedroom and was so excited that I transferred it from vinyl to MP3. Hardly anyone knows Rogers, unfortunately. In this soul gem he sings about social problems, and at the end he realises that despite all that, it’s good to be alive: a phrase which is now my motto for life.”
Big Yellow Taxi
“My biggest heroine. The way Joni Mitchell can bring together a pop sensibility and a political consciousness in her songs is fantastic. In this song alone, she takes on issues of consumer culture and urbanisation – issues I dealt with on my last album [Good Things] – because really good pop music also has a social conscience.”
Jamie XX JunE, Berlin Indie-pop gods The xx staged their own summer festival in June; its high point was the band leader behind decks. Style: house, post-dubstep
It’s Good to Be Alive
Cooly G
g o ld en s i len c e come on, feel no noise
Bose QuietComfort 20 The perfect in-ear headphones for travelling. An inbuilt mini-microphone captures external noise – traffic, construction, the urban hum – and uses noise-cancellation to remove it. The world around disappears and only the music remains. bose.com
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May, New York The 73-year-old electronic music pioneer (I Feel Love) and Daft Punk collaborator made his DJ debut. Style: disco, electro
2 Eugene McDaniels 3 Joni Mitchell
“When I was a kid, his music was always playing at home. It’s virtuosic and catchy at the same time. Stevie Wonder also taught me that it’s OK to write good-mood songs. This hit, especially, just overflows with positivity. I get my artistic credo from him: make one person happy with your songs, and they will pass that happiness on.”
Father And Son
Giorgio Moroder
September, Lausanne She mixes up all kinds of funky musical genres, but the common denominator is heavy bass. Style: deep house, grime
Hear these now: rbmaradio.com
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Action!
They’re Back
games
New games for old faves in Feb
The ride choice: the Nissan GTR is one of around 2,000 supercars in Gran Turismo 6
Donkey Kong The aptly named Retro studios are behind Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze Wii U revival of the classic SNES platformer. It’s 2D in HD. nintendo.com
Thief A reboot of the first-ever firstperson stealth game. Brilliant on PC in the late 90s, it’s coming to Xbox One and PS4.
G ran Turismo 16 years after its debut, the realistic racer is back for a sixth lap Gran Turismo, the biggest realistic racing series in gaming, returns this month, with even more stunning new vehicles, incredibly authentic tracks and, most importantly, improved handling. Gran Turismo 6’s suspension and tyre tweaks mean speeding around Silverstone’s Stowe Corner in one of up to 2,000 cars on offer will make you feel the power of a hefty supercar. Especially if you’re racing with a force feedback wheel and pedals. A dozen of these vehicles are from current Formula One Constructors’ Champions Infiniti Red Bull Racing, including a new version of the Red Bull X2010, a concept car designed for GT 5 by Adrian Newey in collaboration with Polyphony’s pro racing president Kazunori Yamauchi. Some of these Red Bull cars will also be available to download after the release of Gran Turismo 6, a feature which Sony hopes will keep players racing and improving their lap times well into 2014. It’s only available on PS3, reason enough to keep the old girl powered up in the face of Xbox One and PS4. gran-turismo.com
Gran Turismo 6 (left) is out now
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thiefgame.com
out soon
We have Rift off
Virtual gaming in the home at last Android compatibility has been announced for Oculus Rift, the virtual reality gaming headset (left) that’s literally been turning developer’s heads since 2012. It will finally become a reality for consumers in 2014.
oculusvr.com
final fantasy There’s nothing final about it: 14 main series games, 40 FF editions and the forthcoming Lightning Returns is the third FF XIII title! lightningreturns.com
Forecast: brain
The thinking man’s thinking game It’s a meeting of gaming’s finest minds as two adventure-puzzle series join forces for Professor Layton v Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney on Nintendo 3DS (left). The prof solves the riddles while the lawyer defends a suspected witch in court. Out early 2014.
level5ia.com
Castlevania The adventure franchise is 27 years old, but Lords Of Shadow 2 in PS3 and Xbox 360 adventure lets you play as Dracula for the first time. konamicastlevania.com
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Tom East
Sweet sixteen
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Š JÜrg Mitter
Li k e What you Li k e
Your MoMent.
Beyond the ordinary
Action!
2. Smart Body Analyzer Scales, schmales. This platform does more than measure weight. It connects to the web to produce and store Body Mass Index (BMI) and fat ratio readings, reprimanding slouchers in the process, tracking heart rate and even telling you if there’s too much CO2 in the air. Its app then turns stats into graphs to help monitor fitness progress. £130/€150 withings.com
buyer’s guide
Stay in, work out winter weather is no friend of exercise. come in from the cold with fitness fixes that make the outside obsolete
3. jaybird bluebuds x There’s no need to subject the rest of the household to your workout soundtrack. These wireless headphones boast sound as good as any of their wired rivals, eight-hour battery life, a signal so strong you can leave your music device in the next room, plus they’re sport friendly, with an overear option to remove the cord from your neck during a workout and a guarantee to stay completely sweatproof. £149/€175 advancedmp3 players.co.uk
Analyse body fat percentage and BMI for a more accurate idea of your fitness
1. menu Magnetic dumbbells These intertwining, matt-polished one-kilo dumbbells are too attractive to chuck in a bag with your sweaty gym kit, and that’s the point. They’re designed by Dane Henriette Melchiorsen as something that can be left as art on display and actually look good, so they’re handy when you need to enhance your home workout. £120/€140 panik-design.com
Research has proved exercising in time to music is more effective. Use a website like jog.fm to find the right tempo for your workout
High-rep sets with light weights burn fat and build endurance, and also create as much muscle volume as fewer reps with heavy weights
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4. Xbox fitness for xbox One Personal trainers have reason to be worried about this training innovation from Microsoft. Xbox Fitness takes the world’s most popular workout DVDs, such as Shaun T’s Insanity, and makes them interactive. The Kinect Sensor knows how high you’re jumping, how well you’re squatting and whether you’re doing better or worse than you were this time last month. It reads heart rates without a monitor, tracks the transfer of power, force and weight between muscles to correct technique and assess balance to perfect posture. In short, it offers more detailed live feedback than a human trainer could ever manage, making your home into a fitness hub. Xbox One £430/€590 Xbox Fitness TBC xbox.co.uk
The Nike Training Club app offers 100 workouts, set to your own music. Unlock bonus workouts from celebrities including Serena Williams itunes.com
5. Philips 55” 6000 Series 3d smart led tv For those able to resist the pause button, the pixel-perfect HD offerings on the TV market today make a living-room workout feel like being in a gym class. This slimline option has integrated wi-fi, so online workouts from sites such as virtualgym.tv can be downloaded direct to your screen, and it mirrors the screen of your laptop, tablet or smartphone to give videos from training apps such as Nike Training Club (right) a boost. £1,500/€1,760 philips.co.uk
RUTH MORGAN
After sweating it out, give your body a break and your fingers a workout with new releases of old favourites like Call Of Duty: Ghosts and creative offerings such as Project Spark, out in January
LUKE KIRWAN,
6. Wahoo fitness kickr powertrainer Frost-averse riders rejoice: you needn’t leave your lounge this winter. Pop off your bike’s back wheel and the KICKR takes over, via iPhone, iPad, Mac or PC,
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measuring power, controlling resistance and giving a realistic on-the-road feel. £1,200/€1,400 eu.wahoofitness.com Condor Squadra race bike: from £900/€1,060 condorcycles.com
7. TRX Home Bundle US Navy SEALS swear by TRX, a highly portable and versatile training aid which uses body weight and gravity. It comes with six workouts. £141/€165 wickedfitness.co
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P RO M OT I O N
MUST-HAVES! 1
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1 SOREL MEN’S CARIBOU BOOTS Often imitated but never equalled, the original Sorel Men’s Caribou boot features a nubuck leather upper with waterproof construction, seam-sealing and a removable ThermoPlus felt inner boot for warmth, comfort and protection in cold and wet winter weather. Other features of this snow boot are the Sherpa Pile snow cuff, 25mm bonded felt frost plug and the Sorel AeroTrac non-loading outsole. RRP: €160. Member’s Price €152 2 HESTRA CZONE PICKUP GLOVES An extremely supple glove, the Hestra CZone Pickup, has a wide range of uses. The upper section is made from windproof, waterproof and breathable Hestra Flextron softshell fabric and there is a waterproof and breathable CZone membrane. With a polyester fleece lining, Velcro closure and a PU Digital palm, these gloves are designed for winter. RRP: €55. Member’s Price €55.25 3 THE NORTH FACE MEN’S 100 GLACIER PANTS Delivering warmth without bulk, The North Face 100 Glacier Pant is a valuable part of any male athlete’s hiking gear. The trousers are constructed from advanced Polartec Classic micro fleece, which locks in body heat while allowing moisture to escape. Features include an elasticated waist for a comfy fit, plus a UPF rating of 30+ for times when the sun beats down. Resistant to pilling and fading, they will keep your legs happy during miles of hiking, riding or other outdoor adventures. RRP: €55. Member’s Price €55.25 4 ICEBREAKER MEN’S BF200 OASIS LONG SLEEVE CREWE Icebreaker’s Oasis Long Sleeve Crewe is an active base layer made from Bodyfit 200 merino fabric to keep your body at the perfect temperature when you’re hiking or exploring. Complete with offset shoulder seams to prevent pack rub as well as anti-chafe seams, the Oasis Long Sleeve Crewe is lightweight, breathable, odour-resistant and an active fit. RRP: €70. Member’s Price €66.50 5 EIDER MEN’S MARIBOR JACKET Designed for sport and leisure, this has all the essential features of a ski jacket with a very technical look.There’s a removable hood with “Plug In System” and a powder skirt with nonslip band. For security, there is a chest pocket with a waterproof zip, zipped hand pockets under flaps, a goggle pocket and a zipped pocket under a flap to ensure you don’t lose the allimportant ski pass! For a personalised fit, this jacket has an adjustable hem as well as cuffs that are adjustable with Velcro tabs. RRP: €275. Member’s Price €261.25 6 OAKLEY AIRBRAKE SNOW GOGGLES Introducing Oakley Airbrake, a performance snow goggle with an interchangeable lens design that helps you adapt to the environment and enjoy the best vision possible. Oakley Switchlock Technology makes lens changing fast and easy, and two lens colours are included with each goggle so you’ll be ready for a range of conditions right from the get-go. The durable yet lightweight frame has a rigid front and a flexible chassis, so it eliminates pressure in the nasal area and maximises airflow, while the O Matter chassis adapts for a perfect fit. RRP: €250. Member’s Price €237.50
All items available from 53 Degrees North in Blanchardstown, Carrickmines, Cork and online. www.53degreesnorth.ie
P RO M OT I O N
MUST-HAVES! 1
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1 NATO NA6-300T NITE WATCH Featuring highly specialised, sel-powered GTLS illumination, Nite Watches are the brand for men who value adventure and performance. The NATO NA6-300T combines an aviation-grade casing, Swiss movements and extra-thick triplecoated anti-reflective sapphire crystal to bring you a watch that is tough enough to withstand the physical challenges you throw at it. Fitted with Nite’s patented MBS function, and with the option of either the flexible, tough and comfortable polymer strap with double-toothed buckle or the hardened black PVD stainless-steel bracelet with double-locking clasp, you can be sure that maximum strength and reliability is guaranteed.
Visit www.nitewatches.com for more info. RRP: £329.95 €415.00
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2 HELLY HANSEN H2FLOW™ SAILING JACKET The Award Winning Crew H2FLOW™ jacket is a lot more efficient at regulating body temperature than standard sailing jackets, which makes it more versatile and wearable in a broader range of conditions. The Primaloft® insulation and the negative spaces trap air for insulation, whilse sailors can cool down quickly by opening the large front ventilation YKK quality zippers, allowing excess hot and moist air to be released. This enables quicker cooling and quicker drying for maintained insulation over time. RRP: £200. €240 3 HERO3+ BLACK EDITION GOPRO CAMERA The new HERO3+ is 20 per cent smaller and lighter, with new feature settings like SuperView video and Auto Low Light mode. Additional improvements include 33 per cent improved image sharpness and reduced distortion, faster built-in Wi-Fi and 30 per cent longer battery life. Visit: www.gopro.madison.co.uk RRP: £359.99. €449 4 CONCERN WORLDWIDE KENYA TRIADVENTURE CHALLENGE October 23–November 2. Calling all adventurers! Here’s a challenge and a half to get stuck into: trek, cycle and water raft your way around Kenya on this tri-adventure of a lifetime. Travel more than 200 km under your own steam, taking in some of Kenya’s most spectacular scenery along the way. What’s more, it is pretty unique – Concern Worldwide is the only charity offering dynamic tri-adventure challenges.You’ll hike your way to the dizzying heights of mighty Mount Kenya, cycle dirt roads and ride the white-water rapids of the Tana River over a 10-day period.
For more information, contact: siobhan.oconnor@concern.net or call 01 417 8028
Action!
save the date
Buy tickets
Low fly zone Be sure to bag a ticket for the Red Bull Air Race World Championship, which is making a return in 2014 after a three-year break. Ascot Racecourse is hosting the UK stop in August, with a big home crowd likely to support British pilots Nigel Lamb and reigning world champion Paul Bonhomme, who will be hoping to secure an unprecedented third straight title. redbullairrace.com
From December 16
December 31
Horseplay The famous Punchestown racecourse in County Kildare, Ireland, will pack in the ponies, jockeys and plenty of punters to bid a fitting farewell to 2013. punchestown.com
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Unlikely heroes
December 31
TV series Misfits introduced the UK and Ireland to a group of ASBO-laden young offenders who discover they have superpowers following a freak electrical storm. Four series, a lot of action and dark laughs later, it’s a BAFTA-winning hit for Channel 4. Series five is the last outing for the ‘Generation X-Men’ in orange boiler suits, and is out on DVD this month. e4.com/misfits
There’s never a guarantee of a smooth-running New Year’s Eve, but the closest you can get is to see in the New Year with some of the UK’s mostloved DJs at the club voted the country’s number one by Mixmag. The Warehouse Project in central Manchester is filling three rooms with bone-shaking basslines from the likes of Annie Mac, Andy C, Redlight, European guest Tensnake and local hero Jonny Dub. You supply the party poppers. thewarehouseproject.com
Dance ’til dawn
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Nick Laham /Getty Images for Red Bull Air Race, Getty Images, IDIL SUKAN DRAW, Anna Webber, Corbis, Clerkenwell Films, Warehouse Project, Reuters, Getty Images/Red Bull Content Pool
The world’s fastest motorsport series: planes hit speeds of up to 370kph
January 6-8
January 16
Just for men
Jump around
London Collections: Men is a three-day celebration of fashion that banishes stiletto heels and handbags to focus on the male of the species. Expect big names including Tom Ford, Burberry and Alexander McQueen, classic style from Saville Row tailors and top new talent, from Stokeon-Trent’s Matthew Miller to playful duo Agi and Sam. britishfashioncouncil.co.uk
Deer Tick, the indie-rockers from Rhode Island, USA, are making a welcome return to Dublin where they last played in 2010. While new album Divine Providence contains a few lowertempo numbers than their last offering, there’s little doubt the gig will include a beer-spraying, high-energy mosh pit ready to erupt at the opening bars of Let’s All Go To The Bar. whelanslive.com
don’t miss a unique auction and top movie releases
9
december
a good cause Bonhams Oxford will auction F1 race helmets worn by Red Bull Racing drivers Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber this month, in aid of Wings For Life Spinal Cord Research Foundation. wingsforlife.com
January 6-8
Long laughs Award-winning comedian Josie Long’s shows centre around her desire to make the world a better place, but think a ramshackle call to arms rather than worthy ranting. Her Work In Progress tour stops in London in January; she is road testing new material, and there’ll be plenty of willing guinea pigs. josielong.com
17 january
January 9-12
Star cars The Autosport International offers petrolheads the chance to get up close and personal with the world’s best racing cars and drivers. Last year Sebastian Vettel’s championship-winning RB8 stole the show at the Birmingham NEC, while this year newly crowned British Touring Car champion Andrew Jordan will be on hand to show off the motor that got him to the top. autosportinternational.com
August: Osage County A muchanticipated black comedy starring Meryl Streep, Julia Roberts, Ewan McGregor and Benedict Cumberbatch, with George Clooney on production duties. augustosage countyfilm.com
24 january
Tickets available now
Home run The UCI BMX Supercross World Cup is kicking off in Manchester for a second year, after a 2013 event which saw British talent Shanaze Reade and Liam Phillips win in the Elite categories on home turf, with Phillips going on to become world champion. He’ll be back to defend his title in April, and with last year’s event a sell-out, now’s the time to bag a trackside seat. ticketmaster.co.uk/britishcycling
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Inside Llewyn Davis The Coen Brothers are back on top form with their latest offering, the story of a struggling folk singer in 1960s New York. insidellewyn davis.com
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time warp
Drying machine
getty images
Ninety years ago and a world away: a Frenchman who only survives in the record books as ‘Mars,’ airs his wet clothes at 100mph on the top wing of a biplane. The plane, dangling a rope ladder, had swooped down over a pond; Mars clambered up and stripped. But why?
The next issue of the red bulletin is out on january 18 98
the red bulletin
FATE DOESN’T ASK. IT COuLD ALSO bE mE. Or yOu. David Coulthard.
13-time Formula 1 Grand Prix Winner and Wings For Life Ambassador.
SPINAL COrD INJury muST bECOmE CurAbLE. In funding the best research projects worldwide focusing on the cure of spinal cord injury, the Wings for Life Spinal Cord research Foundation ensures top-level medical and scientific progress. We assure that hundred percent of all donations are invested in spinal cord research.
your contribution makes a difference. Donate online at www.wingsforlife.com
Free advertisement.
landrover.ie
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Official fuel consumption figures for the Range Rover Sport Range in l/100km (mpg): Urban 8.3 – 20.5, Extra urban 6.7 – 10.0, Combined 7.3 – 13.8. Co2: 194 – 321g/km. Drive responsibly on and off-road.