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Ken Block's biggest 'Gymkhana' YouTube videos

Ken Block's "Gymkhana" series set the standard for viral stunt driving videos and have racked up millions of views since it started in 2008.

Action sports legend Ken Block died in a snowmobile accident in Utah on Monday but left behind a catalog of amazing stunt driving videos that set the standard for the genre.

Block became one of the early automotive YouTube megastars with his "Gymkhana" series, which launched in 2008.

The first video was a promo for his DC Shoes brand called "Ken Block Gymkhana Practice."

Gymkhana is a type of motorsport that involves performing a series of precision driving maneuvers, including 360 degree spins and reversing, through a course typically set up in an open lot.

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"Ken wanted to take the concept further and on a larger scale," according to the video, which was shot at the El Toro Airbase in California and featured Block driving a Subaru rally car at high speeds through hangars and performing donuts around one of his crew as they rode along on a Segway.

The four-minute video seems sedate compared to the nine that followed, each raising the bar for excitement.

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Here's a look at Block's most-viewed "Gymkhana" videos:

Block built an 845 hp all-wheel-drive 1965 Ford Mustang for his assault on the streets of Los Angeles, which included a trip down the paved banks of the Los Angeles River and driving under a lowrider car as hit hops up and down on its hydraulic suspension.

Gymkhana's third installment took the series to the next level, as Block performed his signature moves in a Ford Fiesta rally car on the high 51-degree banking of the closed Autodrome de Linas-Montlhéry high speed oval track in France.

The first Gymkhana shot on public roads remains far and away the most popular a decade after its release. It opens with a sprint across the Bay Bridge then shifts to the surface roads, where Block tangles with a pair of buses designed like the city's cable cars, drifts up the crooked Vermont Street and makes several jumps on its iconic hilly streets.

Block passed the Gymkhana torch to fellow rally and stunt driver Travis Pastrana in 2020, who has since released two videos set in Annapolis, Maryland, and the Fort Lauderdale, Florida, area.

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