Two-Wheeled Mountain Biking Extravagant, Self-Indulgent, Say German Extreme Mountain Unicyclists

Do you speak German? No? How sad for you. I do. And I have done you the favor of translating the narration of this incredible video of 26-year Lutz Eichholz his friend Stephanie Dietze unicycling in the Dolomite Mountains in northern Italy.

Eicholz: “Attention! I am Lutz Eichholz!”

Dietze: “Unt I am Stephanie Dietze!”

Eicholz: “We are German unicyclists, who have come to Italy to teach our neighbors to our south an important lesson about the value of austerity.”

Eicholz: “It is very sunny in Italy, so we must apply sunscreen to our fair skin to avoid the harmful effects of ultraviolet rays. Once we have done that, though, we are ready to conquer the world! I mean, the Dolomite mountains.

The Italians do not keep their mountains as well-groomed as we Germans keep our beautiful Alps. Look at all this loose gravel! Many races complain that such conditions make it prohibitively dangerous to negotiate the steep ravines and jagged cliffs of the terrain on self-propelled wheeled vehicles. “We need more wheels,” they say, like whining babies. “We need handlebars to control the direction in which we travel!”

This is as one would expect of a people who allow their mountains to fall into such a state of disrepair, while they spend their nation’s resources on frivolous indulgences like wine and sunglasses and sex parties for their politicians.

The clouds move very quickly here in Italy. We are ready to begin our descent. High five!

We Germans need but one wheel on our vehicles. It may look silly, like a circus clown that should be juggling sports equipment. But it requires balance and self-discipline and close attention to detail. And these characteristics form the basis of a healthy economy. For all of Europe.

We like to listen to techo music while we ride. The cold, mechanical beats help us concentrate.

We camp for the night in a small red cabin. We need no electricity or running water. We can survive on what little rations fit in our knapsacks. We prepare a meal of schnitzel and go to sleep. A black Italian bird picks scraps from the dirt outside before lazily taking wing.

We wake up early, while most Italians are still asleep — snoring away after a decadent night of sweaty disco dancing — to continue our descent. It is not easy, unicycling down a mountain, the rocks are bumpy and the crags are sharp, but we have conserved our energy, and our leg muscles are strong.

Pretty yellow flowers grow in these mountains. The Italians would perhaps stop to smell them. We do not stop. To do so would waste time. We have a schedule to keep.

A careless Italian uphill from us has spilled some water. A stream blocks our path. Under normal circumstances, we would stop to mop it up with the paper towels we always travel with, but today we ride through it, splashing the single wheels of our unicycles. Again, our schedule. We will carefully clean and oil our equipment when we get home.

The terrain flattens and becomes greener at the bottom of the mountains. We storm through the farmland like smaller, one-wheeled panzer tanks on our way back to Germany, and a more stable economy. We hope that all of our European neighbors will follow our example. High five again! [Via]