You Know What’s Crazy? I’ll Tell You What’s Crazy!™
The world’s oldest extreme sport.
We’re not talking snow mobiles doing flips off ramps. We’re not talking Shaun White ripping a 720 in the half pipe. We’re not talking a skateboarder jumping off a parking garage.
No The world’s oldest Extreme Sport is much more medieval. I’m talking seriously medieval.
I’m talking Jousting till you eat dirt and wipe the stars from your brain Midieval.
If you have ever seen any version of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table then you know what I am talking about.
It’s Lancelot and Galahad battling each other to the death. It’s Lady Guenevere getting all hot and bothered while she watches them fight for her honor.
JOUST!
That’s when Knights in shiny armor stare each other down from across the field of combat. The crowd surges with anticipation as the trumpets sound. Then the Knight’s kick their steeds and race toward one another, bright feathers on top of their helmets flying backward. The combatants lower their lances and prepare for impact.
And when lance tip strikes armor it is brutal, like a rocket propelled grenade from the stone ages.The idea of this barbaric contest is rudimentary. Put your lance on the other Knight’s chest harder than he puts his lance on yours.
Un-horse him and you are the champion.
You remain in the saddle while the other guy is chomping turf.
Well the 15th century is making a comeback and so is jousting.
Is it theatrical presentation, like at the Renaissance Fair or is it a bona-fide Xtreme Sport?
After watching a special feature on ESPN I would argue it’s insane in the membrane.
“I would rather have a few seconds out in this arena than a f***ing lifetime in the bleachers,” said one modern day Knight.
The ESPN segment features super slow mo imagery of horses rushing toward one another with shiny knights bouncing slightly in the saddle. The warriors lower their lances and then in wonderful slow mo anticipation they take aim.
WAM!
Lances shred like tooth picks in a grinder. Suddenly one of the knights is coughing up a lung and falling off his 7 foot steed.
BAM!
That’s the sound of the Knight’s head smashing the ground. He lays motionless, his metallic armor dented to be sure.
Emergency crews rush to the man’s aid and pull his visor up revealing two eye balls spiraling in opposite directions and blood trickling out of a nostril.
This is what an “Un-horsing” looks like.
When asked what it feels like to be hit at full speed with a lance in the chest and then land on your head, one Knight says; “it’s like a head on collision with a Volkswagen.”
With a sense of humor in his voice, he adds “sometimes the armor does its job and absorbs the impact and other times i am not sure where the hell i am at the end of it.”
The replay is impressive. The Knight hits the dirt and his mouth is filled with mud. If he was a football player they would remove him from the game and take him to the locker room for Xrays and concussion tests.
If this was real life, they’d summon a priest to the jousting pit and begin issuing last rights. That’s how damn good this sport is.
If you are a blood thirsty pirate who wishes the NFL was played without helmets while riding on Honda XR 500’s – then this sport is for you.
It’s like pouring gasoline into a shot glass, lighting it on fire and shooting it down your gullet daring people to kick you in the groin!
The Announcer says “the sport of jousting began in the middle ages. A 1000 years later, it is still a testament to humanity’s appetite for inflicting and absorbing punishment”
Nice line. I wish I wrote it.
We love anything that pulverizes and punishes. We love monster trucks that crush. We call them gravedigger and Big Foot. We love Motorcycle jumps with double back flips where the rider can easily separate his head from his shoulders. We love MMA cage matches where blood and teeth splatter across the face of spectators.
So why not a modern day joust?
It’s called a tilt. You are awarded one point for a blow to the chest. Five points for breaking your lance. And the walk off homer for the event is 10 points for an “un-horsing”. This is what each Knight strives for, trying to make his competitor taste a soil sample.
An Un-Horsing is the equivalent of Ray Lewis blind siding a tight end over the middle.
Just like it is Ray Lewis’ job to separate the tight end from his wits. The Knight’s job is to unhorse his opponent in a flash of violence.
Proponents of taking the oldest extreme sport global are men who consider themselves athletes not actors.
“No disrespect,” One Knight says. “But with us, it’s real life. I
Broke my hand and fractured my back and once my heart stopped on the field. At the hospital they said Patrick you can’t joust no more. I said ok. Then I i wrapped up and went out the next day.”
He smiles a Cheshire cat’s smile.
At the world Jousting Championship in Colorado the winner gets $2,250.
The announcer then says with a bit of sarcasm; “His travel expenses total more than three grand.”
Is it the NFL?
Hardly.
But it is definitely fun to watch and brutally extreme. It is as entertaining as bull riding and snow mobile jumping. It beats the hell out of bowling and billiards and poker.
It might never be an Olympic sport like, the heart pounding excitement that is Curling, but it certainly should be on ESPN XGAMES as a blood sport the likes of which the world hasn’t seen in 500 years.
And that is crazy.™