Interview by Tobias Hannig | Pictures by Rose, Schaal, Mitter, Romero, Vuckovic |
He is one of the best FMX riders of the world and won the X Fighters title in 2011. He rides save, clean and does the Oxecutioner Backflip - one of the hardest Tricks in the FMX business. We chatted with the spaniard Dany Torres about his NOTJ premier and how the things are going right now...
![Dany Torres](startalk/torres13/closeup.jpg)
Hi Dany, first of all congrats for winning your first NIGHT of the JUMPs in Munich! How do you like the NOTJ Tour and what is the difference between X Fighters?
Hi all and thank you, it was a great result.
I’m really enjoying NOTJ, it’s a good organisation with a good atmosphere and I like it. I think the biggest difference is about the courses. In X-Fighters you can find different course sizes with lots of different options for your run and radius 9 ramps with minimum 23mts jump. At NOTJ all the courses where I rode were indoor with 2 jumps go/back and you don’t have too many different options for your run. But probably the hardest thing for me was to adapt to ramps radius 8 at 21 mts as it is difficult to put my hardest tricks in a shorter distance.
You also won the RB X Fighters Dubai! Levi was a though competitor in the final. But you showed big tricks like the Paris Hilton, Oxecutioner Flip and Double Grab Flip. It seems you are in the right flow now - did you expect to win and what is your new strategy?
Honestly, I don’t have any strategy hahaha. What I always try to do is to have fun on my bike and if you manage to do it, things go normally in the right direction. To tell you the truth, when I went to Dubai I hadn’t practiced since X-Fighters Mexico because of the bad weather but I was very excited to ride my bike and I was really motivated.
![Dany Torres](startalk/torres13/lazy.jpg)
We saw your face when Tom Pages was doing the Helicopter Backflip in his Semifinal Run against Levi Sherwood. What did you think in this situation?
I was really worried about his health. When I saw Tom stand up I said “Ufff, he is OK”.
Do you want to win the X Fighters and the FIM World Championship title this year?
Hahahah, of course! And some gold X-Games medals also… but honestly, it is going to be really hard. I try to work step by step and the most important, enjoy riding my bike.
What are your plans for the rest of the season?
It has been an awesome starting season and I will try to continue in this way. My last result in Glen Helen was not what I expected but I prefer to forget about this event as I did not feel comfortable due to bad conditions.
![Dany Torres](startalk/torres13/portrait.jpg)
Mat Rebeaud made a great comeback in Dubai doing the Flair.
Are you also working on new tricks like the Flair or Body Varials?
I started working on some of them and also new ones during the pre-season but the bad weather stopped the progression and right now I don’t really know when I will be able to show them. I’ve travelling almost every week for the last two months so things go slowly but they will come…
The last a few years too many riders passed away. For example Jeremy Lusk, Eigo Sato, Jim McNeil ... Do you think the FMX sport is getting to dangerous?
We are doing an extreme sport and unfortunately these are things that could happen in this kind of sports. It’s true that they are too many in a short time and that is a real shame but we must learn to handle this kind of bad situations.
ESPN cancelled all Best Trick Competitions for the Future. Do you think this is the right direction and is there anything else what could be changed to make the FMX sport safer?
Honestly, I really don’t know if it is the right direction. I think the riders will still be doing
very hard tricks but they will put them in a freestyle round instead of a best trick competition… I have my doubts.
Sometimes we find new jumps and lines that almost all riders are not used to do, so we really need enough time to practice so we can ride without additional stress.
If we want the sport to progress, I have no doubts we must find this kind of new courses with new elements and we must adapt to them, but it is very important to have enough practice to be confident. Anyway, nothing guarantees that there won’t be any crashes… as I said before we chose to do a extreme sport.
Click on the Thumbnails to discover Dany's Gallery:
![click here to view large picture click here to view large picture](startalk/torres13/9_s.jpg)
Let's make a short jump into the past. When did you start riding FMX and what were your greatest moments im your career?
I started riding bikes at a very young age . When I was 3 Father Xmas offered me my first bike. I spent most of my time doing Mx and SX championships until I tried FMX at the age of 15 and this changed my life.
I have very good memories about my first invitation to an X-fighters, it was in Madrid in 2004, a dream came true. Another one was my first X-Fighters victory in Mexico 2007. But probably the greatest one was in 2011 when I won the Red Bull X-Fighters tittle and I got a medal at X-Games in Los Angeles.
By the way - we have heard about your wedding - we wish you and your wife all the very best for the future ;-)
Yeah! Thank you so much!!!! It was just 2 weeks ago hahahaha…
Is there anything you want to tell the people out there?
First thing, thanks to all FMX supporters because they are making this sport bigger and bigger and without them this would not be possible. From my side would like to thank all my sponsors for supporting me and big thanks to my family for being always there
Dany, thanks for taking time to chat with us. We wish you good luck with your projects!
Thanks to Forty8!
Some more Facts about Dany:
Website: danytorres.com
Facebook Page: facebook.com/danytorresofficial
Favorite Trick: Paris-Hilton Flip, Oxecutioner Flip and Turndown.
Favorite Riding Location: my compound
Sponsors: RED BULL – CEPSA – OAKLEY – TROY LEE DESINGS – KTM – GAERNE – LEATT – BUD RACING – FLY GROUP – ROTU RANCING
Biggest Success: Red Bull X-Fighters title 2011
Date of Birth: 10th march 1987
![Dany Torres](startalk/torres13/portrait2.jpg)
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