Phil Keoghan’s LE RIDE Tours USA
Phil Keoghan, New Zealander extraordinaire, host of ten-time Emmy Award-winning show The Amazing Race, travels the U.S. in April to screen his critically-acclaimed documentary feature film LE RIDE.
LE RIDE recently screened at SXSW, was the second highest grossing film at the New Zealand Film International Festival, opening night film at the Louisville International Film Festival where it won the Festival Favorite Award, and winner of the Best Director award and Festival Favorite at the American Documentary Film Festival.
LE RIDE is about the first English speaking team to ride in the toughest sporting event on earth, the Tour de France. In 1928 a small under-resourced, untested team from New Zealand and Australia lined up in Paris next to Europe’s best riders. 168 riders started only 41 finished.
Phil Keoghan has literally brought this remarkable underdog story back to life riding an original 1928 steel bicycle with no gears, retracing the exact route and sticking to the same schedule – an average of 150 miles a day, completely circumnavigating France, involving 3,338 miles in 26 days including the ‘Death Stage’ which took Phil almost 24 hours to complete. “It’s the most brutal challenge I’ve ever faced, insane distances over the world’s toughest mountains, but this is a story I really felt I had to bring back to life!”
“Many experts considered the Australasian team to be a complete joke. More riders failed to finish the 1928 tour than any other in history. This was a hell on wheels race of attrition that was designed to eliminate as many riders as possible, most of the roads were unpaved; the course was almost twice as long as today’s Tour de France and the bikes weighed twice as much as a modern racing bike,” says Phil, who produced LE RIDE with his wife and producing partner, Louise Keoghan.
LE RIDE features stunning cinematic aerials shot in the Pyrenees and French Alps, the first 4K (equivalent to Super 35mm film) documentary feature shot with Sony’s F55 camera and supported with Angenieux Optimo Lens that deliver a true love letter to France.
LE RIDE plays in Salt Lake City on April 6th Minneapolis, April 13th; San Francisco, April 14th; Sacramento, April 15th; Modesto, April 16th; Chicago, April 17th; New York, April 18th; Washington D.C., April 19th and in Los Angeles on April 20th and 29th.
Regal Entertainment Group is giving 100% of LE RIDE’S Box-Office to charity including Variety; Multiple Sclerosis; iMentor and the Huntsman Cancer Institute. Keoghan, who is helming his 29th season of The Amazing Race, has been named by Richtopia as one of the “200 Most Influential Philanthropists & Social Entrepreneurs 2017.”
Article Source: The Salt Lake Tribune, Scott D. Pierce, April 3, 2017
Photo by Doug Jensen.
