Words and photos by Fooman
I was pleasantly surprised by an incoming call from Fred (Murray) and even more surprised when asked if I was free to go to out to Spain to spend some time with a few members of the Flybikes team. I was due to fly out in the next couple days to meet up with Sergio, Stefan, Courage and their filmer, Hugo. This was my fifth time to Barcelona. I'd be staying at Stefan's pad and soaking up the Spanish life, and boy was it good! Each day I would be woken by the beautiful Xsipa, a seven month old Red Setter pup who would notify me whenever someone was off to the bakery down the road to collect some goods for breakfast. The trip had already been a week or so long and everyone appeared to be a bit beat. Courage had to go back home after a day which was unfortunate and the crew shrank some more as Sergio also had to go the day after that. This left myself, Hugo and Stefan to spend the next 4-5 days soaking up the sun and getting some last bits on film/photo. This didn’t slow anything down; Stefan went on to tick off some things he had wanted to shoot for a while which was a treat to experience first hand! Here's some of the photos I came home with - enjoy!
A day “off the bikes”. Before I flew out I knew Stefan was into his café racer style bikes but I didn’t know that he was the man that put in the hours building these bikes up. As soon I arrived to his apartment my bag was put in a side room that contained the Kawasaki, I fell in love. I don’t know much about motorbikes but this thing amazed me. We agreed that one day we would have a chill and take the Kawasaki out for a spin for some photos. We found a cool side alley that Stefan ripped up and down whilst Hugo filmed some stuff and I snapped some photos.
If you’ve never had the opportunity to watch Sergio ride in person, in fact anyone from Fly, then un-lucky you. Just watching Sergio cruise this place was a treat and routine lines such as this crazy looking alley-oop 270 didn’t go a miss. Such a different style of riding to what I’m used to shooting - it was a real nice change to be standing up with the fisheye on top of a ramp (outdoors) opposed to lying down at the bottom of some piss stained stairs.
When Sergio flows, Sergio flows! If you haven’t been living under a rock all your life you will know what I mean. So much crazy pump with a stupid amount of style Sergio will make any rider stop dead in their tracks and watch on mesmerised by what is happening, even with a simple kick out like this. Sergio was again just cruising the ramps in a very chilled manner and throwing these kick outs over the box, I couldn’t resist shooting a photo!
"Lloret trails - I don’t think I’ve ever shot a photo of someone going over a pump bump / roller before but after seeing Stefan and Sergio hit this thing I had to."
- Fooman
Lloret trails, where to begin with these? Set up in some wooded area just off the side of the road. They reminded me of some trails I had seen on an old Props video - I have a brain like a sieve so I can't remember which trails these are. Lloret had a real good vibe, everyone doing trains and kickin’ it, it was like how I remember growing up at the local trails except 20x bigger! I even managed to jump some jumps! SCORE! Sergio was doing these dipped out three’s so I set up and climbed up the landing on the last of the big line… for a split second I thought I was going to take out Sergio. Close call but I winged it and was happy I didn’t kill Sergio or crop him too badly!
"When Sergio flows, Sergio flows!"- Fooman
Every now and then you get that member of public being a complete dick. This spot has a bus stop just out of frame to the right and there was a complete chief that wasn’t so into Stefan doing this wall ride. He stood right where Stefan was making contact and said he “had given him one go and he wasn’t going to be moving on”. Luckily the bus arrived fairly soon after and he was on his way so Stefan could carve up from the little anti pop bank behind.
Stefan and myself took a cruise out to meet Sergio and Hugo at “Granollers” bowl. It was quite a drive out from Stefan’s place and the anticipation knowing that I was about to watch Sergio and Stefan rip up a bowl was peaking. “How far now” exited my mouth quite a few times. Whilst we were there a young group of kids seemed to take a shine to Sergio, I don’t know much Spanish but I'm guessing they were doing the whole 100 questions routine. This little dude seemed to like the Red Bull lid and wasn’t so keen to give it back.
The Dragon slide. I would say this is a fairly well known spot and if you have been here you'll understand how retarded this gap to wall is. It’s actually a wall ride to wall ride, so pocket wall from the right hand side. I did shoot this sequence but it didn’t look right so the single frame it is. This was saved for the last day before I flew back home - I was stood in the taxi line whilst shooting this, which I found quite funny. Stefan got this done and I got my taxi. What a perfect send off!
- Fooman
This was the only photo I managed to shoot with Courage as he needed to head off shortly after my arrival. A skinny run up with a deadly drop on one side to 180 bars. I think when someone calls a bar spin every photographer's hands get a bit sweaty, praying to the shutter gods that you one bang the timing of the bar spin, both hands completely off and the bars at 180(ish). Courage sailed this 180 bars perfectly and I couldn’t have been more happy with the outcome!
Stefan lets his back wheel chase so far forward and it looks fucking insane, like to the point of how the hell are you going to get out of this without getting high sided when landing.
When rolling up to this spot I was familiar with the left handed coping ledge that runs out of the banked drive way (namely some A.K bits) I didn’t even notice the gap that was actually the main focus for Stefan. Saying that, we originally went there to shoot the gap wall ride. After scoping out some potential vantage points to compose the photo Stefan pointed out a tall spot light that would be cool to get up on, after a quick monkey climb and a camera pass Stefan threaded this gap. Side note… this sequence does this gap no justice whatsoever. If you have been to this spot you will understand!!
Finding this curved wall turned out to be a slight challenge. Stefan had previously been to this spot (Nike 'Partners In Crime) and showed me the video saying he wanted to tyre slide the top on exiting the wall but couldn’t exactly remember where it was. After a few phone calls and texts and still no luck we went on a whim and luckily rolled past it fairly soon! Stefan was straight in and up top sliding. I asked Stefan to do this a couple times even though we went with the first photo… Sorry Stefan!
- Fooman
A couple days into the tail-end of the trip Sergio and Courage had to leave to do other things so I was with Stefan and Hugo. I personally hate riding on my own and need to have someone to session with to ride let alone try something scary. Stefan came through strong pushing himself to do things he had eyed up before. Hats off to Stefan for getting everything he had lined up - absolute trooper!
This was the first spot I went to after getting off my flight; the drive must have been about 45 minutes from the city centre if I remember correctly. Way up in the mountains and along the most haggard “driveway" I have encountered. I didn’t expect this beaut of a private set up called LaFinca to be at the end. Sergio pointed out this transfer he had been doing, I couldn’t quite understand how you could generate enough speed for this gap let alone three it. Sergio made this look so effortless and actually did a down whip the other way, which is even crazier… I managed to fuck that photo up and felt like an idiot for doing so - Sorry Sergio!
