live on the French Riviera. I’ve been a snowboarder since I was 9, and a skater too. But more than anything, I love motorsport. I realized a bit late that it’s what I want to do, and that I have skills for that. That’s why I’ve founded MyRacingDriver.com, a website that has nothing to do with my Gumball entries but aims to be the first motorsport program to be funded online. Because more than anywhere else, budget is the big topic in motorsport, and you don’t do anything without money. What is the Gumball 3000? Gumball is a rally, and not a race on open roads like most of the people think it is. It’s inspired by movies “The Gumball Rally” (1976) and “The Cannonball Run” (1981), that were dealing with underground races from one coast of the US to the other. We leave from an A spot to reach a B spot through one week and 3.000 miles. For example, in 2012, we took the same route as in “The Gumball Rally”, from New York to Los Angeles. Via Toronto, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Santa Fe and Las Vegas. Back in 2011, we were doing London to Istanbul, and in 2013 it will be from Copenhagen to Monaco. Each evening we have a little (or bigger) party, and we leave the next morning for the next stop. It’s almost as physical as 24 Heures du Mans! There’s no winner in terms of timing, but the winners are those who receive an award when it’s over. THE winner is the team earning Spirit of Gumball Award, given to the team that made the most of show during the week with the most amazing car possible of course. There are also other awards, decided along the route most of the time, regarding what happened. This year, for example, my team received the Help Max Award, because we helped Maximillion Cooper, Gumball founder. His Cobra Shelby had troubles, so we’ve lent him and Eve, his co-driver, our second Rally Fighter. Some people say we should have had Spirit of Gumball Award… Who can take part, and how? Anybody can take part as far as they’re accepted by organizers. And have a bit of money, because entry fee increased a lot through the years… If it was $8.500 back in 2004, it was £25.000 in 2012. If most of the cars are supercars, it goes from Bugatti Veyron or Aston Martin One-77 to VW van with a Porsche engine or Citroën 2CV. By the way it’s a 2CV “General Lee” that won the Spirit of Gumball Award back in 2004! But there are cars even more crazy, like in 2012 the Audi R8 of my mate skier Jon Olsson, all carbon body with his signature ski-box on the roof and 710 horsepower! Or even my Rally Fighter, the first car ever made on open-source, online! I think we’ve put everybody OK this year with this baby! I thought I had the closest thing from Batmobile, but some friends are building a replica of Batman’s Tumbler for 2013! The spirit of Gumball? Freedom. Enjoy every moment, live the adventure in style, drive all day and party all night. What’s your personal story with the Gumball? I’m a born Gumballer… Most of the entrants are rockstars, actors, sport stars, en- trepreneurs who take part with their cars. Back in 2004, I had had the idea to take part with a car manufacturer backing me, because for me this event was a great platform to communicate in terms of marketing. So I had offered Gildo Pallanca- Pastor, who owns Venturi manufacturer, to do something like this. Gildo made Ven- turi the first electric supercar manufacturer way before Tesla, and with electric cars it wasn’t possible to do about 700 kilometres a day… But the idea stuck in my mind, and I’ve put this together with Peugeot back in 2011, and then in 2012 with Local Motors, who made the first car ever online, in open-source. When we saw the Rally Fighter, I said my girlfriend: “This year, I’ll do Gumball with this, baby!”. I’ve contacted Local Motors, I’ve explained them what I was doing, and we made it! The car you drive? Why? How? So in 2012 I was driving the Rally Fighter. The first car made on the Internet by Lo- cal Motors! The manufacturer has, let’s say, its R&D department online, with about 20.000 persons. If you know something about suspensions or else, you can work on it. For design, LM organised a rewarded contest, and a guy called Sangho Kim won and had the chance to get his design built. So far at about 50 copies around the world. I would define it as the baby of an American coupé and a Hummer. It’s a rear-drive, propelled by a Corvette LS3 engine. It was perfect to cross the States! And through the desert, I could cut, as you can see it on Internet! The kind of stuff you can’t do with a Lambo! The route? Speed limits? Cops? Parties? The route changes every year. Back in 2011, we did London-Paris-Barcelona-Mona- co-Venice-Belgrade-Istanbul. Back in 2012, New York-Toronto-Indianapolis-Kansas City-Santa Fe-Las Vegas-Los Angeles. And 2013 will be Copenhagen-Stockholm- Helsinki-Saint-Petersburg-Riga-Varsaw-Vienna-Monaco, where we’ll arrive the Friday before Grand Prix to celebrate Gumball 15th Anniversary till the Monday morning. As the rally isn’t a race on public roads, we have to respect the rules and Max explains it every year in his speech by the way. Well… it doesn’t mean we don’t speed a bit sometimes… I actually had three tickets last year in the US, including a “criminal speeding” one… Big words! What’s the connection with action-sports? Some famous riders took part, didn’t they? Gumball is a mix of car, music, TV, cinema and action-sports cultures. So you find people like Dirty Sanchez or Jackass crews that took part, but also a few riders, yes. Like Tony Hawk, Jon Olsson, Danny Kass, Tina Basich, Rob Dyrdek, Ken Block, Terry Kennedy, Travis Pastrana, Elias Ambühl… and regarding BMX there’s been Dave Mirra, and this year Nigel Sylvester. Jamie Lynn, snowboard legend, is also very into taking part with me. At some point he’s been supposed to be with me in the Rally Fighter in 2012. But if not with him, I’d love to do Gumball with Kimi Räikkönen! Among the non-riders celebrities, there’s been Adrien Brody, Darryl Hannah, Danii Minogue, Jason Priestly or even Kim Schmitz, known as Kim Dotcom nowadays. Gumball is partner of some big contests in skate or BMX. Can you tell us more about that? As Gumball has action-sports in its DNA, organizers develop partnerships with some contests, like Air & Style Tirol for snowboarding or Simple Session for BMX. Contests winners earn their entry on the rally. Explain us the environment… Environment is anything! A few dozens of thousands people at the start, thousands all along the way, The Dudesons or Pritchard and Dainton who make a mess around in panther strings… David Hasselhoff checkering the flag at the start… My co-driver, Saba, dressed as a Sheik with clothes of real Sheiks among our friends like Amro (AKA Sheik Gumball) or Moe Al Thani… Cops arresting you and giving you a ticket before asking you for stickers and photo… It’s pretty hard to explain like that, but it’s something that you live! Any anecdote? It’s a succession of epic anecdotes! Recently, I found on YouTube the video a Frenchman did at the start in Times Square in 2012. The guys explains he came to see the Bugatti Veyron, that is “the most everything car” in the world. The Veyron passes by, and arrives Jon with his Audi R8 all carbon of 710 horsepower with a ski-box on the roof, then his Lamborghini Gal- lardo that was driving Elias Ambül, also with a ski-box on the roof. It’s already one step further… Then Pritchard and Dainton shouting in their convertible Mustang… The guy is commenting all of this and stops suddenly: “Oh… And this… It’s… I don’t know what it is, it is ETs!”. It was us with the Rally Fighter, with my co-driver Saba dressed as a Sheik, sitting on the door shouting “Gumbaaaaaaaaaaaaall!!!!!!!!!!!!!”… The guy didn’t come for nothing! Another one ?This year, to give a tribute to Carol Shelby who passed away, Max and Eve were driving a Cobra Shelby. A capricious Cobra that already needed a whole night on it in Toronto. And at Saint-Louis checkpoint, Max tells me: “Romu, can your guys do something? The Cobra is stuck in fifth gear…”. My guys were from Local Motors, following us with a truck with a second Rally Fighter on it. They didn’t have much tools, so I told Max if there was a problem, he could put the Cobra on the truck and take the second Rally Fighter. Which made Eve absolutely delighted as she doesn’t drive manual gearboxes and was a bit fed up with driving without roof. They made it till Los Angeles with it. Later the same afternoon, we stopped at a gas station with about ten other mates, and Jens Byggmark’s Camaro stops as he’s doing some burns. His drive belt had broken down. So we called the truck as there was 52 - report - worldwide by Chris DietSchy Gumball 3000
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