VIDEO ALERT: Enter The Maze, a hydraulic tilting skatepark labyrinth

Vladik Scholz performs a backside kickflip at The Maze in Munich, Germany on August 18, 2020. Image credit: / Daniel Wagner / Red Bull Content Pool

Monday, December 7, 2020

German skateboarder Vladik Scholz is always up for new challenges and he linked up with master craftsman Andreas Schutzenberger to roll out a pioneering indoor skatepark project - a hydraulic tilting Munich labyrinth known as The Maze.

Here is all you need to know:

- Cologne native Scholz, 32, is known in the skate scene for his stylish skating and, in 2019, he and extreme sports photographer Lorenz Holder won the Red Bull Illume photo competition in the "Playground" category.

- For this, Schutzenberger's 40-tonne, 21 square-metre creation - based on the childhood marble game - is suspended three metres in the air on hydraulic jacks.

- Busting tricks on an undulating skate spot - let alone rolling around on it - takes more than nerve: it takes instinctive, reflexive balance to master changing slopes.

- Scholz enlisted Portugal's Gustavo Ribeiro, compatriot Jost Arens and Latvia's very own Madars Apse to travel over and check out what Schutzenberger and his IOU Ramps company had managed to create.

- Ribeiro, 19, experienced a meteoric rise by winning the most renowned amateur competition and is one of the favourites for a gold medal at the inaugural Summer Olympics skateboarding event at Tokyo in 2021.

- Arens, 23, has been involved in the international skate scene for almost 10 years and claimed the title of 2018 German champion in the street discipline.

- Apse, 31, is from Riga and made a name for himself early on with his creative and powerful skating. He also hosted the documentary series "Skate Tales" in 2019.

- The final twist designed into the slanted and enchanted skatepark was a giant chromeball, released to respond to the demands of gravity and pursue them around the labyrinth full tilt.

- Schützenberger, 51, is a carpenter from Passau who created IOU Ramps in 1997 and has built more than 7,500 ramps in over 30 countries around the world including Afghanistan and Mongolia.

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