We've all seen those commercials. The one that goes from ridiculous T. Rice snowboarding clips to a dirty surfing lip bash and then some MMA dudes and cars racing and by the end you're out of breath. Or the new one, with the dancers and skaters, the mad urban stylee of lifestyle redefining what's considered sport. Seriously, I stop my DVR when I see these commercials come up and I've noticed I'm drinking more Red Bull.
These bull-piss-fueled bastards are smart about how they're doing this. They know they're already well-established amongst party people looking to mix some super-uppers with their vodka or Jaegermeister or rum (Jesus, Red Bull seems to mix with everything). The next A-adopters they need to get in with are the crazies and luminaries, the athletes pushing the boundaries of what's possible as far as human intensity, toughness, explosion. And they're doing this by building a goddamn media empire for pennies because, other than their Wild World of Sports-esque NBC extravaganzas, Red Bull's new extreme sports lifestyle series (and what's Red Bull all about if not living life to the extreme?) have all been created for their own goddamn web channel, using no distribution channels more complex than fucking YouTube. A brilliant marriage of content with consumers, a brilliant marketing move that skips the bloated broadcast networks and goes to work reaching out to the real movers and shakers and A-adopters who are actually out living.
Here's just a little rundown of a few ways in which Red Bull is re-shaping the world of athleticism, entertainment, and physical and technical possibility:
- Again, I'm well aware of the fact that I've all but vaunted Travis Rice to the level of a demi-god. But in my defense he is. And while I've rambled on and on about how extreme sports are the future of athletics, in my defense the kings of the actions sports world are proving it is. Check out T. Rice in this Bleacher Report video combining some of his highlights with a run down about why he snowboards and how it's going through a revolution right now. Most of the most vivid footage was made possible by Red Bull bankrolling his paradigm-changing mind-blowing ART OF FLIGHT and certainly the extensive travel, money-is-no-object plethora of aircraft.
- I wrote about the Jackson Brothers' ambitious new web series roadtrip from AK to Chile shredding and surfing everything in between, BROTHERS ON THE RUN. Just in case you're not following, here's Week 2: Epic Alaska Shredding. One of the smartest and coolest parts of this: eschewing standard practice of having all snowboard teams on steep and deep Alaska runs, they've thrown big time (and big wave) Red Bull surfer Ian Walsh into the mix. Not only does he still rip it up, but he gives an average snowboarder like myself a taste of how it would be to be thrown into lines that will most likely only ever exist in my dreams. His concerns before, his concerns about the fact that the line looks a lot different from up top than when you were down below (it really does), his gut-check charging of the line anyway, and finally his effusive rantings that this was the best day of his life.
- Which transfers nicely to just another brilliant series, this one following surfers (see how I did that? snowboarder to surfer/snow crossover to surfer? That's called a transfer, very important in such sports). Following reality show format, it follows 4 surfers each at a different point in his career. Showing the struggles of being at the top of one's game, of going beyond the game into entrepreneurship, of struggling with a freestyle sport that has to become serious to make a living at it, and of being a kid and an international globe-trotting extreme sports star. With requisite footage of pro hos, exotic beaches and dirty waves, this is sure to keep the kids riveted.
And then there's their guy who's gonna skydive from the stratosphere. And a globetrotting motocrosser. And the snow-hijinks series named after my favorite mountain. And their "all-alternative-sports" series Momentum. And they have a site for photography. And an airplane racing league.
And so on and so forth, all mindblowing, life-affirming, limit-busting, sanity-questions fucking fan-fucking-tastic. This is the future of sports, no doubt - without limits, without lines, without a safety net. And Red Bull's fucking bankrolling it.
Not to sound like a corporate shill but I'm just gonna put it out there: if you're need an extra boost, why not pick up a drink where you know at least a portion of your purchase is going to advancing what's possible for mankind as well as exploring and discovering a world of athletics more colorful and diverse and life-affirming than anything that's ever existed before?
Happy Friday. Get out and do something this weekend, you lazy fuck. (Red Bull)
- Ryan
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