Their passion takes them higher and higher for dizzying adventures. Fans of parkour, the members of the Wizzy Gang have a real fascination for heights and emptiness. Founded in Rennes by a handful of friends, the collective has offered itself an incredible five-month trip to rub shoulders with what is best in the race for heights: Asia. From Hong Kong to Bangkok via Ho Chi Minh, the gang explored the roofs of skyscrapers to escape the constant bustle of these cities that never sleep. On their return to Rennes, the guys from the Wizzy Gang had the impression that the Breton capital had suddenly become completely flat. It is perched on the roof of the old Antipode, where they started seven or eight years ago, that 20 minutes met Jérémy, Louis, Félix and Romain to talk about their vision of the city “seen from above”. Attention, feelings.
This rainy Tuesday in May, they had taken out a ladder to reach the roof of the old Rennes concert hall. Not for them, but for me. “We started our first climbs here. I wouldn’t say it scared us, but it sometimes seemed a little high to us, ”recalls Romain, 22. He, like his friends, laughs today, so the small two-storey building seems anecdotal. “Height, above all, allows you to know what you are capable of. She gives you a challenge. You go higher to see how far your body and mind are capable of going,” adds Louis, just 20 years old. When he was a teenager, he watched the documentary “Roof culture Asia”. The film showing the exploits from the Storror team is considered one of the benchmarks of urban exploration and shows huge jumps several hundred meters above the ground. “When I saw this film, I said to myself that I would never do that. At first, the height, I didn’t like it. »
During the stay in Hong Kong, the boy nevertheless reproduced one of the mythical jumps of his masters, where the slightest misstep would have been fatal to him. “You have to be aware of the void,” continues Louis. It should not be ignored because it is there. But he shouldn’t block you. On the other hand, if you have the slightest doubt, do not do it. You have to be humble with height. »
“You explode, like a pressure cooker”
Basically, the guy is absolutely right. It doesn’t matter if you are 25 meters or 250 meters high, in case of a miss, the result will inevitably be the same. “The important thing is not the fall, it’s the landing”, could we hear in the legendary film “La hatred” released in 1995. “Before the jump, you concentrate so much that all your senses are turned towards that, continues his buddy Romain. You no longer hear and you no longer see what is happening around. It’s like your vision is narrowing. Sometimes you imagine the worst. But by dint of thinking about it, you are more serene, as if you had analyzed all the possibilities. And after the jump, you explode, like a pressure cooker. It suddenly frees you. »
However, they did not really grow with the height. Rennes, their first playground, is not a city known for its rooftops. It must be said that apart from the Horizons and the Spur, the Breton capital has only a few large towers. “Since we got back, everything seems very small here. Whereas the first time we climbed to the top of the Horizons, we were crazy, we saw everything, ”recalls Jérémy. He assures him that he still suffers from “strange” vertigo: “I can climb a crane with my bare hands, but I can’t walk on a beam above the void. I believe that everyone has a different relationship to emptiness. The important thing is to remain aware of the danger. Especially since the vacuum is not the only risk to be taken into account. In Hong Kong, crazy climbers were taken into custody and spent a month on parole. One of them had already been expelled from Thailand, after a stay in prison, for having climbed on a crane.
In the tumult of the megalopolises, the little Bretons of the Wizzy Gang spent an enormous amount of time on Google Earth to identify the roofs capable of accommodating them for their big “roof gap”, which they put performing on their YouTube channel. But above all, they have sought to rise in order to “breathe” and get out of the hustle and bustle of these giant cities, to which they are not accustomed. “Height is almost spiritual, it’s like a meditation, explains Jérémy. Sometimes you’re a little scared when you’re on top of a crane. And then you get used to it, you gain confidence. “Everything is so big that you no longer live horizontally, you live vertically,” adds Romain. You have a vision of a world that you cannot see from below. When you’re up there, you’re in a world apart. You no longer have the noises of the street, the horns, the cars. You observe the city differently. It’s like looking at ants. »
Photographer of the gang, Félix gradually specialized in urban climbing. Chilly at the idea of climbing the facade of a small building a few years ago, the young man from Rennes is now able to climb on a vertical crane 250 meters high just to snap crazy images of the city.
“My first instinct when I’m in town is to get some height to get some air. When I go to Paris for a few days, I always have to climb to breathe, to escape. From above, you have the impression that the little everyday problems are less important. You take a step back, you relativize. It’s like a release”.
By attempting increasingly difficult jumps, the Wizzy Gang knows they are taking more risks. But all these boys that one might think are daredevils are in fact very lucid of their abilities. Very trained, they spend a lot of time preparing each figure. To those who tell them that they are not afraid of anything, the boys respond with a smile. “Everyone has their fears. We love life, we don’t want it to end. When you are up high, you live it even more intensely, your emotions are increased tenfold,” concludes Louis.