Phil Kmetz is an old friend of Mtbr, based in the East Coast. He created this fascinating pump track in the woods that inspired us and many others to convert backyards and idle tracks of land into a playground. He is a burly guy with skills to match, racing Pro Downhill with results seen here. https://philkmetz.com/#about

He creates videos about his passion and his latest one delves into the unknown as he takes a $179 fs bike down an advanced downhill track at Thunder Mountain Bike Park in Massachusetts. Will the bike survive? Will Phil walk away? Watch on and find out.

Here’s some more stills from his adventure. Phil started by doing the most crucial step when riding a department store bike, a proper tune-up to fix the expected miserable bike assembly by department store workers. All bolts were tightened, components tuned and tested. Then many stoppies and wheelies were performed.

The first big adventure was the twisting of the bars upon landing a jump. This resulted instantly in an unplanned get-off. Undeterred, Phil twisted everything back into place and soldiered on.

Phil risked life and limb to explore the limits of Huffy under $200 technology.