, , and are jackasses—and I mean that as the highestcompliment. In the new short film Girls Gotta Eat Dirt,from indieapparel brand,the three roommates/best friends/mountain-biking partnersbased in Boulder, Colorado, crush the trails of Silverton, in the state’s southwest.Giddy and gleeful, they ride each others’ wheels as they skid around corners and pop manuals. They give each other shit. They laugh it off when they goassover handlebars. They are crusty and irreverent and carefree.
It’ssimply beautiful. “’Causewhy can’t we be jackasses?” says my editor (who’s also a woman), as we gush about how this videogives us goose bumps. “We are jackasses.”
The spirit of the jackass was perhaps best typified by the eponymous2000 MTV reality show, whose cast consisted of nine youngmendoing outrageous stunts—like attempting to —and pulling pranks on each other.In its most positive connotation, the word jackassrefers to someone who pushes the boundaries of human physical capabilities for the sake of having a good time.
It’s no coincidence thatJackass’s cast consisted entirely of men.Women in the outdoors being portrayed this way isn’t unheard of,but it is rare. Women-centric action-sport vids are often #inspirational sizzle reels, filled with glamour shots of toned bodies and interviewprompts like“How does it feel to be a woman in a man’s world?”Sometimesthey’re grouped in the frame with their supportive spouses and families. Other times, pictured alongside other badass women, they ponder how to make their sport more inclusive.In these films, incredible women athletes get their time in the sun, butthey are routinely positioned asoutsiders breaking into spaces that hold little room for them. To make that space, not only do they have to crush hard, they also have to bemodel spokespeople for the largest questions that face their sport and society. Stoke films like these do serve an important purpose, though: they ignite a drive to fight for the space we deserve. But in them, like everywhere else, women—particularly women of color—are too often saddled with expectations that our societysimply doesn’t have formen.
It’s not that Cupp, Hamilton, and Saslowaren’t good representatives for mountain biking. It’s that for at least these six minutes,they aren’t required to shoulder that responsibility.Girls Gotta Eat Dirtgivesthis trio the video treatment typically reserved for youngdudes, who get to be and and while and .To watch this film is to be filled with the pure joy of seeing women in muddy denim cutoffs alternate between ripping perfect berms—eyes laser focused, bikesa blur—andchugging beers.
“Do you like riding with boys?”someone behind the camera at one point asks Cupp (who the other two insist goes by Donkey,despite her protests).“I love boys,” she says beforecacklinginto Saslow’s shoulder. The implication: but not riding with them.
“We just like to go fast,” Cuppsays. And fast they go, kicking up a cloud of dust behind them.