We’ve been teased, taunted and tormented, but at long last, the wait has finally paid off and the new Ken Block Gymkhana video is live and ready for viewing:
Not one to disappoint, this video includes plenty of stunts, danger and destruction, and I caught myself literally staring at the screen with my mouth open in awe at some of the moves that he manages to pull off.
Sure, it takes a bit of a budget and quite the car to pull it off, but if there is anyone out there that can start to compete with Ken in this new sport called Gymkhana, I don’t think the automotive world will know what hit it.
How can you prepare a car for the types of punishment that a driver like Ken Block can dish out while performing Gymkhana 2?
The short answer is that you can’t, but the long answer is that you give it to the guys at Crawford Performance and let them trick, tune and test the car over the course of 43 days and 800+ man hours to build a certified, track ready, punishment seeking Subaru that will do just about anything that you ask it to.
You’ve seen the Subaru Team assemble a WRX STI into a rally-ready machine in just a few minutes, but for some reason, these time-lapse rally racer assembly videos never get old.
Here, we see the Peugeot team take their 307 from zero to hero in a little under four minutes as they get it ready for Marcus Gronholm and Timo Rautiainen to abuse it to victory during the 2004 WRC race in Finland:
Watching the time lapse of the Subaru Rally Team USA strip down a fresh from the factory WRX STi and prep it for rally racing at the hands of Travis Pastrana is a thing of beauty.
Plus, where else can you watch as 800 hours of labor flash by in the blink of an eye:
Ken Block and Travis Pastrana look like they’re trying out for the next superman movie on this cover shoot for Racer X magazine.
The stunt involved Travis backflipping his MotoX bike over Block’s Subaru, and then fire was added in just for fun (and to keep things interesting).
When asked about the stunt, Block replied “Glad Travis [...]