Rhys Millen Injured Practicing Backflip For The Red Bull Experiment
Formula D champion meets stunt driver Rhys Millen suffered a back injury doing a backflip… in a truck. And here we were, thinking Red Bull gave you wings (shows what we know). Rhys must have left them at home, because on his fourth practice run he landed in the hospital with five fractured vertebrae. We almost called this an accident, but that’s kinda hard when you’re flipping a truck with yourself in it on purpose.
Rhys was preparing to perform a daredevil event on New Year’s Eve in Las Vegas in cooperation with Red Bull (those guys are everywere) and had been planning to drive an off-road racing truck up a ramp and then into a back flip, before landing safely of course. Some watch the ball drop on New Year’s eve, others (including the folks from the Guinness World Book of Records) were set to watch Rhys secure his place as a Darwin Award winner.
That’s not gonna happen anymore. Instead he’ll be watching his buddy Robbie Maddison, a freestyle motocross rider, at the Rio All Suite Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas jump his motorcycle a distance record of 300 feet for the East Coast crowd. Unfortunately for his ego, but fortunately for his health, Rhys’ injuries are “non-life threatening” and he’ll be walking (and likely flipping) again sometime in the future.