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Interviews

Tim Warwood & Adam Gendle On ‘The Indestructibles’

See the UK snowboard legends on the small screen this Sunday

Few people sum up the recent history of UK snowboarding better than Tim Warwood and Adam Gendle. Since the early days of the Tamworth Snowdome they’ve played an integral part in things, both in front of and behind the camera.

Under the banner of Lockdown Projects they produced some of the best shred videos in British history, including Proper and Bad Ass Big Airs. After bowing out with 2007’s masterful spoof doc Terminal Ferocity, they’ve been spotted all over the action sports world – and even on children’s telly.

Now they’re fronting a new TV show, The Indestructibles, in which they attempt to deliver a big spectacle with barely any money, and even less time. Given their past mastery of the shoestring budget, we couldn’t imagine anyone better suited for the job.

Sunday’s episode features Tim and Gendle attempting to NBD the hell out of Halifax dry slope, with a little help from Swedish slopestyle legend Sven Thorgren. We caught up with them to hear more about it:

How did you get involved with The Indestructibles?

TW: We’d been doing a bit of TV stuff, and our friend Phil Young [aka Brother Phil, Boardstupid fans] gave us a call about a project that he thought would be right up our street. They had Joe Rackley lined up as the crash test dummy to do all the action bits, and they needed two people born without embarrassment muscles to do the presenting.

AG: We came in quite late – we were asked in June and started filming in July, so it was quite last-minute. There aren’t many action sports guys who’ve presented mainstream telly, so we got quite lucky.

“People thought it was going to be a rubbish version of Jackass or Nitro Circus. I love those shows, but ours is completely different”

How has it been, compared to other projects you’ve done in the past?

TW: It’s been the best and the worst rolled into one! But above all else, it’s been amazing – working with Gendo in the sports that we love, doing crazy things and watching Joe build ridiculous stuff – it’s been wicked.

AG: It was a massive learning curve as well – we were feeling things out at first, trying to figure out what the show was. Soon we realised it was about the challenge, rather than the result. The reality is there are people out there spending millions on videos, and you can’t compete with that. It had to be about the entertainment first, with a bit of action sports in it.

TW: People kind of jumped the gun when the first adverts came out – they thought it was going to be a rubbish version of Jackass or Nitro Circus. I love those shows, but ours is completely different, and has more of a story. It’s all about working within the limitations. In each episode we have three days and £1000, and that’s it.

Would you give this a go?

It’s going out on Dave – does this mean we’ll see endless repeats of you guys for years, a la Top Gear?

TW: Ha, they’ll get their money’s worth out of us I’m sure! They’re chatting about series two already, so hopefully you won’t see too many repeats of series one before we have the chance to go again.

 

Who’s the coolest Dave – Downing, Lee or Vincent?

AG: Ooh, good question! I had a Lib Tech Dave Lee – it was yellow and I loved it. It felt like it was made just for me.

TW: I used to ride for A Snowboards, and I had the David Vincent Pipe Pro. But then again, Dave Downing didn’t get appreciated enough. He was killing it. But I’m going to go with Vincent. He invented the frontside rodeo – need we say more?

“Sven Thorgren couldn’t say yes quickly enough. I can only imagine what he must have thought when he got to Yorkshire…”

 

Sunday’s episode was filmed at Halifax dry slope – what can people expect from that?

TW: In a nutshell, it’s us lot trying to do a world first. We enlisted the help of a guy that came 4th in the Olympics but has never ridden on dry slope [Sven Thorgren], a guy who’s crazy [Scott Penman], and someone who hasn’t strapped a snowboard on in over a year [Dan Wakeham]. It’s a really strange episode, but Joe outdid himself by building the loop. It was such a good day – even when the cameras stopped rolling, we kept sessioning the jump.

AG: I’d never been to Halifax before. In fact, it was my first time on Snowflex! I was all over the place. I used to ride Dendix, tried to force a turn and ended up flat on my back. I had to just straightline it, because I couldn’t turn.

 

You have Sven doing some skits – how would you rate him on a scale of one to Daniel Day-Lewis?

AG: He was alright, actually! And he was just brilliant in general. He’d never been on Snowflex either, and when he got there he could have quite easily got all pro-snowboarder about it and said, ‘what is this?!’. There are probably hundreds of pros who wouldn’t have even strapped in, but he was amazing.

TW: We got him on the grass skis and nearly broke his legs, but he was fully into it. He just really wanted to go snowboarding, so when we asked he couldn’t say yes quickly enough. I can only imagine what he must have thought when he got to Yorkshire…

Sven Thorgren is a long way from home...

 

In the episode, Tim claims to be the reigning British Slalom Champion. Is there any truth to that?

TW: Yeah! I won the the last slalom to take place at the Brits, which was when they were in Mayrhofen in 2000. Well, I lost in the final to an Italian guy but I’m still the British champion! However, during the Sochi Olympics, I had a race with Ed Leigh, and the bet was whoever won would get the title. So I’ve technically been dethroned – although I fell over twice in my run and he didn’t even win by a board length. Not that I’m bitter – I’m still the official champ!

“Our ‘era’ was quite special in that we’d film all winter, and no-one would see any of it until the premiere. Now you just go on Facebook and it’s there”

 

Any another highlights from working on the series?

AG: The BMX hole-in-one show was my favourite – we built a ramp into a lake, and got a BMXer to to go off it, lose his bike in mid-air and try to land in an inflatable. That was a really good session.

TW: We do a drift episode as well – I don’t know if I can tell you what we did, but at one point I thought I was going to die. That was pretty nuts. Also, inspired by Robbie Madison riding his bike in the surf, we tried to do the same with a car…

 

Do you miss the Lockdown days?

TW: Yeah – snowboarding’s a very different kettle of fish now. With the quality of the filming gear that’s out there now, I’d love to have another go.

AG: But it wouldn’t be the same, though, would it? I think our ‘era’ was quite special in that we’d film all winter, and no-one would see any of it until the premiere. Now you just go on Facebook and it’s there. There’s less excitement – it was nice to be part of that buzz each year. If I could go back and do it all again, I wouldn’t change a thing.

TW: That shot me down – thanks Gend… If I could go back and do it again, I’d do it without you!

 

Watch The Indestructibles this Sunday, 15th November at 5pm on Dave.

 

Classic Tim & Gendle from the much-missed Oakley Jib Vid contest

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