By now you’ve probably seen video of 24-year-old New Zealander Jed Mildon pulling off the world’s first (and by process of elimination, best) BMX triple backflip. What you haven’t seen is the amount of landscaping, foam pits and backbreaking scientific research that went into it. This video, courtesy of the Discovery Channel, explains exactly how it worked, rather than just showing you how awesomely it did.
I think this version is actually more impressive than initial video of the jump. I mean, the monkeys and typewriters vibe of life could allow somebody to jump off a skyscraper and live, and while that might be a fun video to stumble upon on Buzzfeed, it’s even more impressive when the monkey shows his work. Then you know you’ve got a truly-evolved sentient typewriter monkey, and building things like a giant bike ramp for triple backflips doesn’t seem some pointless. That example got weird. But hopefully you know what I’m saying. I’m happy knowing he could pull a triple backflip again, because he didn’t just pull it off, he made “pulling it off” a logical possibility.
I’m never going to get a job writing for the new Uproxx science blog with explanations like these. (That should be a real thing. And we should call it ‘With Levers’.)
