#206- A Walk (and Fly) down Memory Lane with Paul Guschlbauer

October 27, 2023 by Gavin McClurg

Paul Guschlbauer has been on the podium more than anyone in the Red Bull X-Alps other than of course Chrigel. He began his X-Alps journey back in 2011 when by his own account, he was a pretty beginner pilot. But that year the weather was horrific and he is a beast on the ground and he managed to nab 3rd place. This result lead to becoming a Red Bull athlete, a spot in that year’s Dolomitimann, and the rest is…well at least history in the making as Paul is far from done! This year’s Red Bull X-Alps was Paul’s 8th edition of the incredible race and a lot has happened over the more than a decade of racing.

#201- Calef Letorney and Community, Confidence, and Cloudwhispering

August 17, 2023 by Gavin McClurg

Calef Letorney was a professional paddler back in the early 2000’s who made the switch to flying and has never looked back. When you think of places to fly in the world you don’t often put the North East US on the list. There’s a lot of trees, cloudbase is low, weather if fickle. But that’s where Calef found himself after learning to fly in the Colorado Rockies and his desire to send meant the first thing that had to happen was to get good at flying, and it’s hard to get good without other good pilots to fly with, so he had to get others up to snuff as well. So Calef became an instructor, then an SIV instructor, then a guide…and the rest fell into place.

#200- Going pear shaped in Pakistan

August 4, 2023 by Gavin McClurg

Pilots and friends Pierre Carter, Jeremy Holdcroft, Scott Baker, Richard “Barbs” Barber and legendary mountaineer Andy De Klerk set off this June to attempt to break the altitude record by flying up the Baltoro Glacier to K2 in Pakistan. Everything was going well…until it wasn’t. Andy suffers a heart attack (in the air!), and Scott breaks the rule of not making a tricky situation worse by blowing a landing on the wrong side of the river and suffers a broken ankle and leg, which turns into an epic on its own. A wild story from a wild part of the world and we break it down into everything that went right, everything that went wrong, and lessons we can all take on board to make our community safer and more prepared in the mountains.

Episode 194- The Spring Tune up with Nick Greece and Russ Ogden

May 2, 2023 by Gavin McClurg

This week we dive into spring with the current World Champion and long-time Ozone test pilot Russ Ogden and multiple US National Champion Nick Greece. Year after year we see accidents in free flight spike in spring. Spicy conditions, rusty skills, new unfamiliar gear, heightened stoke, another year behind us, lack of confidence… we explore the many things that might have an impact on why we see the spike and what you can do to make sure you’re not in the data set.

Episode 191- A Walk (and Fly) down memory lane with Gaspard Petiot

March 21, 2023 by Gavin McClurg

Gaspard Petiot is a mountain guide and very accomplished pilot who competed successfully in the Red Bull X-Alps in 2015 (5th, Monaco), 2017 (broken wrist, withdrawn after leading day 6) and 2019 (7th, Monaco) despite having very bad knees. In this episode we rewind the clock as we have done with the others in this X-Alps series and hear the behind-the-scenes stories that the fans didn’t see on live tracking.

Episode 190- A Walk (and Fly) down memory lane with Manuel Nubel (Ger 1)

March 6, 2023 by Gavin McClurg

Manuel Nubel has competed in four Red Bull X-Alps, starting in 2015. On Team USA 1 we call him the comeback kid. He often starts in the middle or back of the pack but gets stronger and more crafty as the race goes on. We rewind the clock to 2015, his first race and find out the back story of landing in a tree on his way to Monaco and the hilarity that ensues, the ups and downs of his campaigns, (for example having to quit due to exhaustion in 2017, and making a series of magical moves in 2021 which saw him climb from 16th to 6th in the final days of the race) and his decision to not compete in 2023, but why we may see him again in 2025.

Episode 189- Flying the Himalaya with Debu Choudhury

February 24, 2023 by Gavin McClurg

Debu Choudhury hails from the small village of Manali, India, a gateway to Ladakh and the infamous Karakoram pass. Pilots the world over know the region because of nearby Bir, one of the most reliable big-mountain flying sites in the world. Debu began flying there 29 years ago and chases it just as hard today as he ever has. In the world of paragliding he’s done and continues to do it all. Acro, high-level comps, tandems, guiding, instruction, vol biv and flying huge lines in the Himalaya.

Episode 183- A walk (and fly) down memory lane with Honza Rejmanek

December 2, 2022 by Gavin McClurg

We’re continuing the theme of radical stories from radical people this week with Honza Rejmanek, who competed in 5 Red Bull X-Alps from 2007 to 2015. Honza begins the storytelling in 2007 with what has to the hardest start in the history of the race after eating some questionable food the night before the event even started, puking (and worse) all night, spending the night on the Dachstein because he could barely move, and then the long fight back. We learn about his podium in 2009 shared with Red Bull X-Alps legends Chrigel Maurer and Alex Hofer…

Episode 182- A Walk (and Fly) down Memory Lane with Tom De Dorlodot

November 18, 2022 by Gavin McClurg

Tom De Dorlodot has done more Red Bull X-Alps than everyone other than Toma Coconea (who has done them all!). The Belgian explorer extraordinaire started at the tender age of 21 in the 2007 race and hasn’t missed one since. He is currently training for the 2023 event, which will be his 9th! We got together recently to dive into his campaigns just after he and his family moved into their new home on the island of Faial in the Azores. We rewind the clock to a time where teams didn’t have GPS, athletes used paper maps (in the air!) to navigate, and a Russian athlete carried over 20 kg on his back! As we wander through Tom’s highs (getting to Monaco in 2019…) and lows (getting evacuated in 2015…) of his campaigns we tap into all kinds of great advice for pilots dealing with risk (who doesn’t?), family (ditto!), and living life to its fullest.

Episode 172- Andy Baumelt and the mistakes we make

June 3, 2022 by Gavin McClurg

Andy Baumelt is a Swiss pilot who reached out to me because he loved the show and said that while he would probably never be one of the top ranked pilots or do something big and wild in the sport he loved to fly, was firmly in the throws of intermediate syndrome and had made some mistakes that many pilots make in their journey. Andy’s story is probably one that most pilots can relate to and we had a lot of fun just talking flying- and life.