‘3000 km by Bike’ Review: A Lyrical Journey Beyond Sport and Success

BMX was, until its breakout moment at the most recent Olympic Games—where Argentine rider José “Maligno” Torres took the gold—largely a niche sport in this country, one whose stars were only known within its own tight-knit community. One of those “celebrities” is, or perhaps was, Iñaki “Iki” Mazza, who won the Youth Olympic gold medal in 2018 and then seemed to walk away from the sport, or at least drift far from it. In this inventive, original and quietly lyrical documentary, Iki resurfaces to explain, at least partly, why he stepped back: he grew tired of the formality, the correctness, and even the whiff of nationalism that surrounds the sport and its competitions. He’s so fed up with all of it that he seriously considers pawning his medal.

The film catches up with him years after that victory. He hasn’t touched a bike since, and now he’s set on traveling to Tierra del Fuego to visit a “girlfriend” (the word doesn’t quite apply here) who lives there—his own place of origin—and whom he hasn’t seen in a long time. He rides a BMX that is, to put it mildly, not the ideal bicycle for long-distance touring, let alone crossing the windswept Patagonian roads. But pushed on by his friends, and by a few psychedelic indulgences, he sets out from Córdoba toward the far south, pedaling more than 3,000 kilometers across Argentina, running into setbacks, surprises, and bursts of joy along a visually stunning journey.

This isn’t an inspirational documentary in the Netflix sense. It’s a film that celebrates breaking away from conventions—whether those of professional sport or those tied to traditional ideas of sexuality, identity, and what’s expected of young people who take this kind of path. The BMX culture that surrounds Iñaki has clear affinities with the world of skateboarding: a mix of punk and poetry, something philosophical and something psychedelic in the way they seek a connection between the bike and the landscapes they traverse.

His friend-lover Abyss calls him from a rehabilitation center in Río Grande, reading him intricate poems, while he pushes deeper into the cold, windy south with his tiny bicycle on dangerous roads, trying to reach the person he cares about most. For him, the bike is a tool for getting closer to happiness—something far more meaningful than what most people would call success.