Red Bull Charges into France

In 2007, some 3.5 billion cans of Red Bull were sold in more than 140 countries. France was not one of those countries — until Tuesday when Red Bull prend la bastille. The English translation is “Red Bull takes the castle.”

The castle in this case is France, which lightened up a little and finally opened its borders to Red Bull. And Red Bull made a grand entrance with Wings for Paris day.

Swiss BASE jumper Ueli Geganschatz started with a leap off the top of the 1,036-foot Eiffel Tower. A French police officer saw the Red Bull chute and was quickly at the landing spot 650 yards away. He even briefly detained Gegenschatz. Two hours later, rush-hour commuters in Paris’ La Defense business district witnessed French trials rider Julien Dupont defy gravity with a motorcycle ride up, over and down the 164-foot arched roof of the CNIT center building.

The best, however, was the Minis. The blue and silver Minis, 150 of them carrying 300 sampling girls, flooded and circled the Arc de Triomphe, the tricky roundabout at the end of the Champs-Elysees. They parked and surprised curious Parisians with samples of Red Bull. Reportedly, all 300 sampling girls were arrested.