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<< Continued From Part 1
They succeeded.
Today, the ProBASE circuit brings together a collection of the planet's most talented, most skilled, most notorious, most progressive, most outspoken and most idiosyncratic air sports athletes in the world. (These qualities often appear in mash-up form in the same person.) The original World Base Race has been folded in to the ProBASE series in a way that allows it to retain its beloved individual character.
As Hubert and Mirko built ProBASE, they met collaborators. The ProBASE team now includes a staff of respected judges, administrative support and two people employed full-time to produce the event.
Hubert and Mirko put together the first ProBASE Wingsuit Race in Switzerland in 2009.
"We had come up with the idea only a few months earlier," he recalls. "We just started moving things. Before we knew it, we had almost 40 competitors showing up to the race. Everyone was super stoked." He gets quiet. "I remember being on the exit right before the finals. Mirko was next to me. We were doing a show jump, with smoke. We looked down at the hundreds of spectators waiting on the ground, and just felt this sense of accomplishment and fulfillment." He takes a long pause. "Simply amazing."
Mirko isn't around anymore.
One evening in May of 2011, Mirko hiked up to a cliff near Chamonix with seven friends. The conditions were perfect. The three-way proximity jump was well within his abilities. He was sunny and cheerful -- "typical Mirko" -- during gear-up.
His exit was a good one.
Something went wrong. He never landed.
"It was a big setback," Hubert remembers, "and a difficult year. I had a lot of support from my wife at the time. I'm grateful for all the help I received." He pauses. "Mirko was the first person to believe in my mad ideas, and was willing to help make them come true. He was a great friend. And he'll always be part of ProBASE."
In the quiet tradition of these sports, Mirko's grieving family, friends, Hubert and the ProBASE team tucked his memory into their hearts and moved ahead.
The heart of ProBASE still cleaves to the vision that Hubert and Mirko crafted in that Benidorm nightclub, but the event is visibly growing. First of all, the series is getting a lot more attention. A South African production company is producing a five-part documentary series about the World Cup tour.
"We're able to pay out great prize money," smiles Hubert. "And we're making the whole tour a lot more professional." The series is also moving its focus this year, targeting wingsuit racing. "It makes for the best footage," Hubert explains. "And ProBASE will provide the best race tracks for the athletes and the spectators. We've come a long way."
They're going to keep going, too.
In the next few years, Hubert sees ProBASE in the context of a rock band going on tour. "I'm visualizing traveling around in a huge motorhome, going from event to event with all the crew on board." He grins. "When we arrive at a venue, the competitors will be there, all with their respective teams, coaches, packers and support staff."
He smiles because it's not a pipe dream. Hubert's plans are in place.
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It's been a long day. We're hungry.
A mess of BASE jumpers has descended upon an unsuspecting Turkish restaurant in an alley just off Taksim Square. The wall mirror behind our sprawling frankentable reflects multiple distinct ethnicities, a veritable sketchbook of tattoos, at least one blue mohawk and a whole lot of beer. The group is surprisingly jovial for having spent the day staring dejectedly from a panel of windows.
Someone checks their phone and makes a funny noise. The noise was prompted by a particularly gnarly X-ray freshly posted to Facebook: a mutual friend has fractured his femur after one week of his summer at Kjerag. The ghostly image of the snapped femur is passed around the group. I see more than one person unconsciously touch his or her own leg under the table in a kind of benediction. I know I do.
We bumble out of the restaurant and up several flights of spiral stairs, finally landing on a rooftop terrace well above the teeming street. More beer flows. A nargile pipe (hookah, as most of us know it) appears alongside the table. The air fills with the woodsy-sweet smell of apple tobacco.
One of the girl jumpers picked up a jet-black jilbab in the city today -- her "ninja dress." Istanbul is a singularly permissive place, but the locals still sneak secretly aghast glances in her direction when she tips a beer beneath the fabric.
Continued in Part 3 >>
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