Two Polish athletes, Piotr ´Grabo´ Grabowski – FIBA 3×3 World Champion in slam dunks, and Łukasz Czepiela – aerobatic pilot and winner of the 2018 Red Bull Air Race Challenger Cup, teamed up to perform the first ever slam dunk with a pass from a flying aeroplane.
This was made possible thanks to Red Bull Assist Platter project initiated by Piotr Grabowski, a basketball player known for his creative ideas in pushing the boundaries of the sport and his relentless pursuit of this goal.
The aim of Grabo’s project is to showcase a series of spectacular slam dunks in an unusual, spectacular way and with assists from athletes representing various disciplines.
The first episode of the series within the Red Bull Assist Platter, merging basketball and aviation, was made at the end of July 2025 at Rudniki airfield, in the vicinity of Częstochowa, Poland.
Grabo’s historic dunk with the assist from Łukasz Czepiela piloting his Carbon Cub aeroplane required several hours of intensive trials. For the successful execution of the stunt, perfect coordination, quick reactions, and absolute trust between both athletes were essential. The greatest challenges they both had to deal with were the weather conditions – primarily the wind, reaching speeds of approximately 18,5 kph, and the laws of physics.
´For me, it was a test of endurance and skill. I had to be ready to catch the ball, which was flying at me from different directions. Throwing it out of the aeroplane perfectly on target was practically impossible, so I had to adjust my running speed significantly each time. I knew that we only needed one perfect attempt and that I wouldn’t leave until we succeeded!‘ – commented Piotr ’Grabo’ Grabowski.
‘To achieve the right speed relative to the ground, I had to fly upwind. This made it difficult to stabilise the aeroplane in the face of strong crosswinds. In addition, it was hard to predict the flight path of the ball. Sometimes it bounced too far to the left or right, other times its speed was completely off. Each assist attempt looked completely different, so I had to stay really focused the whole time.‘ – said the pilot, Łukasz Czepiela.
During the successful attempt, Czepiela flew his Carbon Cub at an altitude of about 6 metres and at a speed of only about 15 m/s relative to the ground. At the right moment and on the pilot’s signal the ball was dropped from the aeroplane. The basketball player then had to predict the trajectory of the ball, adjust his running speed accordingly, and time his jump perfectly. And all of that in just a fraction of a second. The result was a perfect dunk that went down in the history of the sport.
In conclusion, it is worth highlighting the profiles of the authors of this historic stunt merging basketball and aviation.
Piotr ´Grabo´ Grabowski is one of the best dunkers in the world, the 2022, 2023 and 2025 FIBA Dunk Contest World Champion. He specialises in spectacular slam dunks and regularly performs at international shows and competitions, and is known for his incredible jumping ability and precision in the air. Grabowski´s dunks have garnered millions of views online, and he has become an icon of this spectacular discipline. The Polish athlete is also the Guinness World Record holder for the highest between-the-legs dunk of 3.2 metres.
Łukasz Czepiela, who is professionally seated at the controls of a passenger aircraft as an airline captain, is also an aerobatic pilot and a passionate precision flyer known for his extreme aerial feats and bold projects that push the boundaries of aviation. In 2023, he made the first-ever landing of an aeroplane on the helipad of the Burj Al Arab skyscraper in Dubai. Czepiela is also the first and only Polish pilot to have participated in the Red Bull Air Race and became the 2018 Challenger Class World Champion.
More about Czepiela’s aerial stunts, as well as his Carbon Cub aeroplane, can be found in our previous articles linked below:
- CubCrafters CC11-160 Carbon Cub EX
- Łukasz Czepiela makes aviation history again
- Dutch big-air kitesurfer and Polish pilot perform historic feat in South Africa
Cover photo: Mateusz Kuchtyk / © Red Bull Content Pool
Information from the Red Bull company press release were used.
