Over the weekend, Istanbul hosted the most recent addition of the Red Bull Flugtag. a competition where teams of amateur builders create human-powered flying machines to see who can fall with style the farthest. Flugtags take place all over the world and are basically just parties where folks get all jacked up on Red Bulls (and probably other imbibements) and watch “pilots” human cannonball themselves into the nearby body of water. It’s as awesome as it sounds.
But there was one team that was just a little more juiced than all the others, and that was The Coffee Lovers, the team fielded by La Marzocco Turkey. Red Bull may give you wings, but coffee gives you creativity and distance, and that’s what allowed The Coffee Lovers to take home the gold.
The Flugtag is scored using three criteria: creativity of the flying machine, performance of the flying machine and team, and the total distance traveled, with the latter being the more critical. But you can’t count out creativity. Working with students from the Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University, the La Marzocco team created with KB90 Straight-In Portafilter plane, presumably for its aerodynamic and ergonomic prowess over say, a Linea-shaped box plane (though that workhorse machine would probably try-hard its way onto the podium somehow. Don’t count it out is all I’m saying). Nailing the performance aspect was pilot Cetin Gurer and human-powerers Aysin Aydogdu, Baris Somer, and Umut Ozturk, who came bedecked in lion costumes, a nod to the LM logo.
According to their team profile, The Coffee Lovers goal was to “fall as beautiful as possible,” which they did, beating out 34 other teams and landing gracefully on the top of the podium via the blue waters of the Caddebostan Beach.
So congratulations to The Coffee Lovers and to La Marzocco to proving once and for all which caffeinated beverage reigns supreme!
Zac Cadwalader is the managing editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.
Photos via La Marzocco
Disclosure: La Marzocco is an advertising partner with the Sprudge Media Network
