VeloVID Select

If you’re chosen as the Best Cycling City in The Netherlands*, it’s a pretty safe bet you’re also the best cycling city in the world. That’s the case in Nijmegen, the oldest city in the Netherlands, population 180,000 and proud as all get out about their transition to a cycling/pedestrian paradise over the last 40 years.

This is the first instalment of Pro BMX rider Nigel Sylvester’s video series, GO! It’s probably the best of the lot, which has since expanded to Los Angeles, Tokyo and Dubai. What makes it the best? It might be what one Youtube commentator said, “This editing is dope.” Maybe. The editing is definitely dope. But the

This is produced by Blackburn Media so you might be expecting an 18 minute long commercial for Blackburn racks but this video is simply a loving look at bicycle touring. Jim Blackburn gets a brief mention in the excellent historical overview but more attention is paid to other pioneers, like touring bike builder Bruce Gordon

The Col Collective is at it again. This time climbing a little know col in Switzerland— the 2,253m high Col du Sanetsch in Valais. With local expert Alain Rumpf, Col Collective host Mike Cotty narrates this 33km ride while the camera cuts from nice shots of the riders to astounding shots of the scenery. Most of

This video really gives me the warm and fuzzies. Maybe it’s because it was my son who sent me the link, but you don’t have to be a Dad to appreciate the glee in four-year-old Malcolm’s voice when he shouts “I’m doing it! I did it Dad! I loved it!” while clearing the first ramp

This trailer for Rebecca Rusch’s recently released feature, Blood Road, is powerful and dramatic. Rusch is one of toughest endurance riders in the world and the task she sets for herself—to bike the 1,900 km Ho Chi Mihn Trail in search of the 40-year-old wreckage of her father’s plane—is perhaps the most challenging she’s ever

Critical Mass-style wheelie riding is a thing in a lot of big cities and this is certainly big city riding with a big city soundtrack. On big wheels. And say what you might about scaring innocent bystanders, this kid can ride the wheelie. There are moments in this short video that look and feel as

I love road riding. I’d lamented not finding many good road biking videos till I discovered the Col Collective. They have a pretty extensive library of videos of famous mountains (cols) from around the cycling world. Beautifully shot, most of their videos are climbs but a few are descents. This col, Passo Gavia, in the Italian Alps is

I’m writing this on April 20, better known to many as 4-20—so we’ve got a day for that. I wondered if we had a day for bikes. Google informed me that there was indeed a Bicycle Day and it was yesterday—April 19. But its inspiration is more along the lines of 4-20 than you might expect.

Music. Sometimes it’s all that separates an artistic bike video from a vaguely irritating one. Especially if we’re talking BMX and mountain bike videos. I love the way this video mixes big trick BMX riding with very cool, laid-back  music. Lars Veenstra is already in my good books for his Thank You, Bicycle video. His first video about the

This video puts a smile on your face that gets wider and wider till you can’t help but laugh at some point. Which is exactly how this little girl reacts. What a great idea Dad had. The video playing in Dad’s virtual reality machine is one of Claudio Caluori’s riotous narrated downhill runs, which are pretty popular on YouTube.

OK kids, don’t try this at home. Especially if home is Trollstigen, Norway. And it’s been raining. But as long as someone is crazy enough to try this, I’m glad they got it all on video. The scenery is stark and beautiful. The music works. The riding looks terrifying, even if the rider looks fearless. Not surprisingly,

This is a pretty clever concept and it’s Canadian so perhaps it’s no surprise it feels like it came out of Hollywood. Lots of clever Canadians there. But this is 100% Canadian and there’s even a ‘Behind-The-Scenes’ video to show you how those clever Canadians did it. Cycling Canada sponsored the video and the idea here is

Man, I wish there were push bikes when I was a kid. These things make so much sense as a kid’s first bike. Maybe not only as a first bike—can you imagine an adult-sized one? I’m sure it would be a blast. Just like the adult-sized Jolly Jumper I think someone should invent. This is a sweet

Somehow the season of advertising and Christmas carols is a lot easier to like when a it’s a bike company that goes there. I’m not sure how a wheel with such range could spin so true but, in the spirit of Christmas, I’ll suspend my skepticism and just enjoy this perfect little carol.  

Vittorio Brumotti continues the tradition begun by Martyn Ashton of trials riders trying their skillset on road bikes. Proving once again the old adage that it’s not the bike, it’s the rider. Like his other videos, he pulls this off with Italian panache and a sense of humour—not to mention the kind of mad skills

Never mind Peter Sagan, who’s no slouch at bike tricks on a road bike, Vittorio Brumotti’s got kung-fu even Danny MacAskill would admire. Not surprising given that they are both world-class trials riders, but to see this done on a road bike is shocking nonetheless. He’s probably got 28c tires on that bike but he could

My introduction to Chris Van Dine was GoPro’s 2013 Combing Valparaiso’s Hills, an adrenalin and testosterone-powered tear through the steep streets of the Peruvian mountain town. As I’ve confessed, I absolutely love the video, even if the riding is a bit reckless. And I was intrigued by C.V.D.—he was fluent in Spanish and seemed to have a

A clever commercial for a bike shop Crofton, Maryland. A family bike shop actually, so don’t be judging a book by its hipster cover. Definitely watch it to the end.  

With almost 40 million views on YouTube, this is probably the video Danny MacAskill is best known for. Imaginate actually has more YouTube views but The Ridge really went viral when it came out. It made it into a lot of mainstream media because it actually lives up to the hyperbole that usually defines click bait. With Danny’s riding, it’s almost always a case

Now this is more like it. Just days after the release of This Is Drop And Roll, Danny MacAskill is back on form riding the amazing streets and rooftops of Gran Canaria, one of the Canary Islands off northwestern Africa. His riding is every bit as eye-popping and colourful as those exotic streets and, unlike This Is Drop And

“That’s definitely not the only issue we have. We got a lot of issues.” Aaron Chase amps up the group dynamics on this follow-up trip to Peru and the result is a more engaging video. Even if you’re just looking for gnarly riding I think this has more than Lost In Peru did. (It finishes with a

After discovering Danny MacAskill through his phenomenally popular 2010 short film, Way Back Home, I went searching for more. Industrial Revolutions came out in 2011 and, though it’s Stu Thompson, not Dave Sowerby and Channel Four, not Red Bull, this video is also a cut above the rest. The abandoned iron works is a striking

What a delightful sip of the North Shore this video is. Wouldn’t you know they make a growler cage for fat bikes? Just the thing for making a beer run to Deep Cove Brewery on B.C.’s North Shore, riding some of the area’s iconic gnarly trails in the process. You might need to let that growler

Tom and Ruby go night riding. Ruby is a dog—a Hungarian Vizsla who can run like the wind. She has her own lights, her own camera and the ride she takes us on is a blast. Tom’s the one on the bike and most of what we see of him is from Ruby’s point of view, which

I know I’m not supposed to approve of this kind of riding but I can’t help it—this is one of my all-time favourite cycling videos. Lead by Chris Van Dine, who I’m coming to realize is a pretty complex guy for a “dude, more speed” freerider, we’re taken on a wild ride through the streets of Valparaiso, Chile.

Maybe the most starkly beautiful of Dave Sowerby’s Danny MacAskill videos, this might be a case of filmmaking that actually overwhelms the riding of perhaps the world’s most inventive trials rider. The setting is dramatic—”the forgotten town of Epecuén in Argentina, a location that has been submerged for the majority of the past 25 years.”

This is the bike video that started it all for me. As I write this, it’s exactly five years to the day since this video went up on YouTube. Since then more than 36 million viewers like me have gaped, open-mouthed, at the astounding, sense-defying riding of Danny MacAskill as he makes his ‘way back home’ from

A great overview of how Amsterdam ‘rejected the car’ and became the ‘City of Bikes’. Riding in Amsterdam for the first time is, for most jaded North American urban cyclists, a liberating experience and this film will give you that same heady optimism. From StreetFilms.org, who produce “short films showing how smart transportation design and policy can result

This is what unites the tribes. It’s what the roadies, the mountain bikers, the commuters and the randonneurs all have in common—our gratitude for where bikes take us, mentally and physically. How, as a metaphor for life itself, a simple bike ride can teach us important lessons. This is a mountain bike video so there’s plenty

“If I could take one thing away from this trip, it would be that oxygen is seriously underrated.” I’m sure on a trip as epic as this there were a lot more profound takeaways than that but, given that this trip in May, 2015 took these two riders over the two highest passes in the

Kriss Kyle is a Red Bull-sponsored young Scot with mad riding skills, so maybe I shouldn’t be surprised how much his new video feels like a BMX version of Danny MacAskill’s Imaginate. Lots of bright colours and black backgrounds. (Admittedly, this video’s healthy dose of OK Go-style optical illusions adds a lot to that mix.) It even finishes with a montage

I absolutely love this video. It’s only about a minute long and it’s exquisite. It’s got so many things I like—cargo bikes, winter riding, that slightly unnerving GoPro point-of-view, great music, brevity—so my opinion might be slightly skewed. You might not find it as tiny and perfect, but I can’t imagine anyone begrudging the minute this

Another good one featuring Danny MacAskill’s otherworldly riding. A fun video that takes you into the imagination of a wee young lad who just so happens to grow up and make everything he imagined real. And as the outtakes at the end show you, for all that otherworldly riding, Danny really is of this world.

It won me over with the H.G. Wells quote right off the top. Great camera work, some crazy-good riders and beautiful B.C. scenery. It’s not as aggressive as some freeride videos and the music works for me, though it might not for everyone. A nicely put together promo for Anthill Film’s Strength In Numbers.  

This video makes me smile. It pokes fun at our stressed-out selves without being too smug or saccharine. Just the right tack to take if you want to get people back on bikes. Well, that and proper separated bike lanes, but don’t get me going. “When people ride bikes, great things happen.” No argument here.  

OK Thomas, you’re forgiven the awful pun in the title of this video* and the fact that your company is called Poopy Cat and that your your motto is “They’re full of it” and that in said video your ride ends at the launch of your “poop-up store”. You’re forgiven all these transgressions because you

This is such a touching story. One of the fundamental tenets of VeloVID is that a great cycling video is really about more than “just” cycling. This video may capture that better than any other on the site.

It’s hard to go wrong with nudity but this celebration of The World Naked Bike Ride is really well done. Clever editing keeps it PG* and the riding is as good as any Race Face video out there. * As the video notes put it: “Warning: This video does include nudity but thanks to masterful

It’s been a long time since I posted anything to VeloVID and I’m not trying to make up for lost time with a long video. I kind of favour shorter vids here on the site, but this one is a gem and well worth putting aside some time time to take in. After Lachlan Morton’s

In some ways, this is more terrifying than any of Danny MacAskill’s other videos, even if it isn’t credits-to-credits amazing stunt riding. It’s a long, treacherous downhill that Danny treats tactically—and his rush at completing it is as much a release for us as it was for him. In that way, the vibe is more Free

Mountain bike videos these days are mostly about going big. I like those that go beautiful as well. This is no The Ridge but, from the meditative music to the incredible drone shots, it’s pretty beautiful to watch in its own right. Not to say The Ridgeline isn’t about going big. In some respects this

This one’s personal for me. It might be for you too. If you’ve ever lost someone close. If bikes have ever been a part of your recovery from anything. If not, it’s still a beautifully made video that tells a beautiful, tragic love story.  I think it will resonate with everyone. Salsa Cycles released this

Return to Earth is an Anthill Films production, working with Shimano and Trek so the production values are high. But what really elevates this promo for the segment of the film is the riding of these kids from Squamish/Whistler in B.C. Ranging in age from 10 – 15, these kids have mad riding skills, growing

OK, this is really just an ad but it’s a pretty clever one. With a David Attenborough impersonator doing the voice-over this short video looks, and sounds, like a BBC documentary on the “apex predator” Ripley. It’s a refreshing change from the tone of many mountain bike videos and it still has just as much

Danny MacAskill is really having fun in this one. As is Daisy. And as are we, his amazed and amused audience. This is classic Danny MacAskill. Like Imaginate, it gets right inside a kid’s head and features the kind of gob-smacking riding you know Danny dreamed of mastering since he was a kid. He has

MOTHERLOAD “is a crowdsourced documentary in which the cargo bicycle becomes a vehicle for exploring parenthood in this digital age of climate change.” I saw the full-length film recently at the ReFrame Film Festival in Peterborough and I was blown away. There’s a kind of magic when a talented filmmaker tackles the subjects they are

MOTHERLOAD “is a crowdsourced documentary in which the cargo bicycle becomes a vehicle for exploring parenthood in this digital age of climate change.” I saw the full-length film recently at the ReFrame Film Festival in Peterborough and I was blown away. There’s a kind of magic when a talented filmmaker tackles the subjects they are

Very clever Google Nederland. “Only available on April 1” should be your first clue but this is so well done I’m sure it fooled more than a few. Just like another video here on VeloVID that features bikes without riders, this one has a “How we did it” video you can watch if you want

Wow, this is dreamy! Beautifully filmed and released just in time to really amp up the juices of mountain bikers who have waited patiently all winter long!  

If you want a demonstration of the transformative power of BMX, look no further. BMX has steered many people in a better direction, whether they were suburban and privileged, or sub-urban and decidedly not privileged. Like Starboy, KK Money and S-King in Lagos, Nigeria. Instead of “…going to clubs, getting drunk, causing trouble and doing all

The last time we checked in with Missy Giove was two years ago, when we profiled some of the bad boys and girls of cycling. She lives up to her image in that video, cursing up a storm and tossing back Red Stripe through most of the episode. Two years later, it’s a revelation to

This is a sublimely beautiful video of some sublime riders in a sublime setting. As a Canadian, I’ve always thought we and Norwegians were separated at birth, what with our long winters, love of cross country skiing, northern lights, and fjords. But, if we were, Norway is definitely the big brother. With darker winters, deeper

Some pretty slick riding from Specialized rider Matt Hunter. According to Specialized’s video description, this is “another piece of evidence that 29ers really can corner”—but I think it’s a stronger argument for the fact that Matt Hunter really can corner. I suspect he could do this on a Huffy. Nicely shot though with flawless slo-mo

This video is interesting for a couple of reasons. It’s the first 360° video on VeloVID. Using your mouse, you can control the camera angle you see—even turning around 180° to look at racer Cole House as he sprints for the last podium spot at the 2018 Fat Bike Birkie, an annual fat bike race held