It’s a rare opportunity to be able to bring your sport directly to your fans. Thanks to some daredevil bikers, the sport of “city downhill” is turning some of today’s urban landscapes into tomorrow’s steep challenges. “City Downhill is a new discipline which came from basic Downhill in the woods,” says Filip Polc, a 34-year-old racer from Bratislava, Slovak Republic who is one of the growing sports brightest stars. “It’s the same bike but different obstacles— stairs, concrete, metal barriers, big wooden jumps and other crazy stuff. It’s what makes this new discipline more attractive to people and media. Now it has come to the point that we run the City Downhill World Tour in the big cities all around the world.”
Polc, who has been riding a BMX bike since age 6, and spent 13 years racing BMX’s, tried city downhill and immediately became enamored by the challenge of racing down some of the world’s most picturesque urban settings. To him, the danger is part of the sport’s DNA. “Every mistake can hurt,” he says. “Sometimes you crash at high speed and nothing happens, but sometimes a simple one can make for a bigger injury. In Romania, one accident caused me internal bleeding, broken ribs and liver damage. But I survived; I’m still going fast and learning from my mistakes."
What’s next for Polc and city downhill? “I would like to bring this sport to new cities,” he says. We are looking for new locations in Russia, Canada, the US, Switzerland, Spain, maybe Singapore. There are many more interesting places where we can show this sport on the highest level.”
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