This arch is about a meter wide and rises up to 20 meters above the river to the right and 10 meters above the road to the left. One definitely must not fall down on any of the sides.
Due to the fact that this indeed IS a challenge, plus, I’ve had no idea on how to even get onto the arch, clearing the first 1,6 meters of over-vert, this dream of mine has been sort of postponed, at least until recently …
To be precise, this postponement lasted until I have received one of BMW’s brand new 450 Sports-Enduros (Model: G 450 X) a couple of days ago. Motivated by this super-sporty bike, it took me only a couple of minutes of riding in order to be convinced that this bridge-arch should be ride-able with this bike, and not just – as initially planned – with my trials bike.
The question, on how to get onto the arch as such, remained. A wooden ramp up to 1,60 meters would not do, as this would slow it all down and make me an easy catch for the cops. This project by the way has not been authorized, not even attempted to, because this would have never been allowed, anyway. So I’ve decided to do it fast and inconspicuously.
“The ideal way of how to get onto the arch would be from the roof of a car”, I thought. The Red Bull Hummer came into my mind. It has a re-enforced roof-top to either dance on it or strap a bike on, plus – what a coincidence – the roof’s height is exactly 1,60 meters. Perfect!
So the plan has been made and Red Bull supplied us with their Hummer and a very cool driver in order to tackle this project. By the way: Thanks again, guys!
Once we got there, we checked out a remote, quite hidden place near the bridge with a stone-wall which would serve perfectly as a loading ramp for getting the bike onto the Hummer’s roof. It turned out this place wasn’t as remote as we have hoped, as cops came by already after minutes. Luckily, they did not even get out of their car, thinking this was something like a static (posing) photo-shoot.
As soon as those cops, called “Carabinieris”, disappeared, we got started: Bike onto the car’s roof, strapped a little, shuttle-ride to the bridge, very close to the entry of the bridge-arch, free the bike from the straps, adjust, concentrate, clear the gap between car and arch, accelerate smoothly, because the steepness rises immediately. It’s even more steep than the pictures show, believe me!
All went well up to the top of the arch, and once there, I started to slightly relax, even pulled a stoppie on my way down, just for the fun of it. At the end a gas-hop down from the arch and off I went. Yes, I’ve made it!
At this first try, I’ve used my Beta 4-stroke Trials bike, at the second go, about an hour later, I rode the BMW Enduro. I think no one would have expected me to do this again, but I definitely wanted to clear this bridge with the Enduro, too. “Yeah”, I thought, “I’ve just lived another dream of mine!”
Ride on! Chris