 I've had a lot of vivid dreams, you know, where I'm flying. I played a lot of Star Fox as a kid. I don't know, you just get like locked in and like you're inside the drone and then it makes sense. It's like at first it makes no sense and then it makes perfect sense. And you're just flying. I'm going to say three, two, one, go. You're going to say golf on the word go. Two laps, okay? Two laps. Two laps. Two laps. Two laps. Two laps. Two laps. Two laps. Two laps. Two laps. Hey everybody, it's Ben Popper from The Verge. I'm here at CES 2015 out in the middle of the mountains in Las Vegas, Nevada enjoying a beautiful sunset and my first ever drone rodeo. On the count of three. Three, two, one, go. So we've been out here doing drone racing. Is that a thing? Is that a sport? Is that what hobbyists do? What is drone racing? It's definitely in the hobby world right now and it's starting to become more and more popular and it's kind of reminiscent of hot rodding days where there's a lot of tinkering required in the tools typically. Pretty much all drone racing now is done first person because it's very immersive as you saw, but it also forces you to really project yourself into the vehicle. If you race off the tablet or another display, there is a tendency to look up a lot and that really takes you out of the feel of the whole race. We do find that spectators who come, they want to piggyback, they want to put on a set so they can watch them race and people who have gotten really into it are so good it's ridiculous. It's really awesome, you should try it. Should I give this one a test? Sure, go nuts. You're not going to hurt it so feel free to let loose. Nice shot. You can stomp on it, you can roll your car over it. When we all started flying a few years ago, we would meet together, a bunch of artists and robot guys meet on Friday nights and we'd have a fight club. We'd be smashing our robots together. When we started working with drones, we immediately started fighting our drones. But a couple of years ago we were using commercial products and they didn't really hold up very well, they would crash and break and that really inspired us to figure out how to make an airframe that could take that abuse. The basic drone combat game that we play is kind of like sumo wrestling. The arena is the ring and if you get knocked onto the ground or if you get caught up in the net, that's a point against you. So each player starts with three points, the first person to reach zero is eliminated. So you're doing anything you can, flying, maneuvering, knocking the other guy down to get him to either crash or fall into the net. Once that happens, the player has 90 seconds to get their drone flying again and that could mean just turning it over and turning it on, but it could also mean replacing motors, replacing internal components and it's amazing to see some of these pilots who can do these total teardowns and rebuilds in 90 seconds. In the design and development process we shot it with 12 gauge shotguns, landed it on the water just to see if we could submerge it and fly away, we flew it through flamethrowers, dropped it from hundreds of feet, smashed it thousands of times. And the original airframe is actually the airframe that I normally fly in the combat arena today. After all that abuse, shooting it and everything, it's still good enough to fly in the arena. Sad, sick. Dead but not forgotten. For more awesome sunset and mountain range videos, be sure and subscribe to the YouTube channel.
 I've had a lot of vivid dreams, you know, where I'm flying.
 I played a lot of Star Fox as a kid.
 I don't know, you just get like locked in and like you're inside the drone and then
 it makes sense.
 It's like at first it makes no sense and then it makes perfect sense.
 And you're just flying.
 I'm going to say three, two, one, go.
 You're going to say golf on the word go.
 Two laps, okay?
 Two laps.
 Two laps.
 Two laps.
 Two laps.
 Two laps.
 Two laps.
 Two laps.
 Two laps.
 Two laps.
 Hey everybody, it's Ben Popper from The Verge.
 I'm here at CES 2015 out in the middle of the mountains in Las Vegas, Nevada enjoying
 a beautiful sunset and my first ever drone rodeo.
 On the count of three.
 Three, two, one, go.
 So we've been out here doing drone racing.
 Is that a thing?
 Is that a sport?
 Is that what hobbyists do?
 What is drone racing?
 It's definitely in the hobby world right now and it's starting to become more and more
 popular and it's kind of reminiscent of hot rodding days where there's a lot of tinkering
 required in the tools typically.
 Pretty much all drone racing now is done first person because it's very immersive as you
 saw, but it also forces you to really project yourself into the vehicle.
 If you race off the tablet or another display, there is a tendency to look up a lot and that
 really takes you out of the feel of the whole race.
 We do find that spectators who come, they want to piggyback, they want to put on a set
 so they can watch them race and people who have gotten really into it are so good it's
 ridiculous.
 It's really awesome, you should try it.
 Should I give this one a test?
 Sure, go nuts.
 You're not going to hurt it so feel free to let loose.
 Nice shot.
 You can stomp on it, you can roll your car over it.
 When we all started flying a few years ago, we would meet together, a bunch of artists
 and robot guys meet on Friday nights and we'd have a fight club.
 We'd be smashing our robots together.
 When we started working with drones, we immediately started fighting our drones.
 But a couple of years ago we were using commercial products and they didn't really hold up very
 well, they would crash and break and that really inspired us to figure out how to make
 an airframe that could take that abuse.
 The basic drone combat game that we play is kind of like sumo wrestling.
 The arena is the ring and if you get knocked onto the ground or if you get caught up in
 the net, that's a point against you.
 So each player starts with three points, the first person to reach zero is eliminated.
 So you're doing anything you can, flying, maneuvering, knocking the other guy down to
 get him to either crash or fall into the net.
 Once that happens, the player has 90 seconds to get their drone flying again and that could
 mean just turning it over and turning it on, but it could also mean replacing motors, replacing
 internal components and it's amazing to see some of these pilots who can do these total
 teardowns and rebuilds in 90 seconds.
 In the design and development process we shot it with 12 gauge shotguns, landed it on the
 water just to see if we could submerge it and fly away, we flew it through flamethrowers,
 dropped it from hundreds of feet, smashed it thousands of times.
 And the original airframe is actually the airframe that I normally fly in the combat
 arena today.
 After all that abuse, shooting it and everything, it's still good enough to fly in the arena.
 Sad, sick.
 Dead but not forgotten.
 For more awesome sunset and mountain range videos, be sure and subscribe to the YouTube
 channel.