For extreme athletes, Vince Reffet was "not a hothead"

Soul Flyers Vince Reffet and Fred Fugen, here during a wingsuit flight in Dubai in 2017. Max HAIM -

• During training in a Jetman (equipped with mini-reactors), Vincent Reffet died at the age of 36, Tuesday in Dubai.

• Six-time freefly world champion in the 2000s, the native of Annecy has received many tributes from athletes from the world of extreme sports.

• "Vince was not a stuntman or a hothead," says Dino Raffault, who has directed and produced several Soul Flyers films, true wingsuit virtuosos.

The world of extreme sports mourns its “flying man”.

Died at the age of 36, Tuesday in Dubai, during training in a Jetman (a motorized wing), Vince Reffet has since received many tributes.

In addition to "the ball of energy and smile" unanimously recognized by the athletes contacted by

, the sidekick of Fred Fugen in the spectacular air duo Soul Flyers is seen as a "monstrously professional" champion, according to Enak "Rancho" Gavaggio.

“He was our Iron Man, our Superman, and above all he was an inseparable couple with Fred,” adds this freestyle skier and base jump enthusiast, who was able to rub shoulders with the late wingsuiter as a Red Bull athlete too.

Author of his first tandem jump with his father, at the age of 14, Vince Reffet met Fred Fugen the following year.

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A post shared by Fred Fugen (@fredfugen)

"They managed to democratize their discipline"

Together, the two paratroopers will win six world freefly titles from 2004 to 2009. This is only the first chapter of 20 years of living together in the air for the two Soul Flyers of Haute-Savoie.

Breathtaking feats in wingsuit and more recently in Jetman followed, with almost every time millions of views on the web.

“By flying alongside an A380, for example, they pushed the creativity of their discipline very far and they managed to democratize it,” indicates Richard Permin, a freestyle ski reference also at Red Bull.

In extreme sport, we always wondered what they were going to be able to get us out of in their next experience.

They have always been very inspiring.

"

"A scene worthy of James Bond" to 300,000,000 views

Even more than a night jump from the tallest tower in the world in Dubai (828 m), than another at an altitude of 10,000 m above Mont-Blanc or in September around a Charentais lighthouse at 280 km / h, Vince Reffet and Fred Fugen sign their probable

wingsuit

in Switzerland in 2017. For 

, they soar from a cliff to slip… inside a plane in flight , in "a scene worthy of James Bond".

Producer and director of this project, as for the majority of films by the two natives of Annecy for ten years, Dino Raffault reveals the other side of the set at

.

It became a kind of climax that collected almost 300 million views on Facebook.

To achieve this result, it took them four months of intensive training and a good hundred jumps next to a plane.

And this in order to control their speed and find the right trajectories to dive inside.

Vince and Fred are not stuntmen or hotheads.

They have always mastered their subject, but in a hyper engaged sport.

"

"I felt like they were still in control"

Dino Raffault points out that his death on Tuesday took place "with the jet engines of the Jetman, or in a laboratory far beyond the wingsuit".

Is this a fate as tragic as it is inevitable in view of the high-risk passion of Vince Reffet?

“There is no more ultimate than the Soul Flyers when it comes to dedication to an extreme sport,” said Richard Permin.

But I wasn't afraid for them because I felt like they were still in control.

They reached such a level of precision that the notion of risk also evolved with them.

They were never suicide bombers.

"

Vince Reffet will also leave this incredible image of a takeoff from the ground, in February in Dubai, to fly to 1,800 m of altitude with a Jetman capable of peaks at 400 km / h.

“In parachute, or with propelled flying wings, Vince has never ceased to question his own ability to exceed the limits of human aerial evolutions,” Red Bull said in a statement.

His field of expression, close to the firmament, was limitless.

"Just like the pain shared since Tuesday by Fred Fugen and so many other addicts to the blows of" the flying man ".

Sport

Soul Flyers 'flying man' Vince Reffet dies at 36 during training in Dubai

World

The "plane man" takes off at an altitude of 1,800 meters above Dubai

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