ChasingKaz - February 5, 2007

Any other day, the neighborhood street I am standing in the middle of would be busy with local traffic and the sounds of children playing in their yards. But today is different; a few hundred onlookers line the sidewalk. They've come to see the freak show; to watch big men move even bigger things.

I stand staring straight ahead. Fifty feet in front of me sits a white Suzuki Swift. The car is inoperable and all the glass has been removed. It doesn't look that heavy, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

"Are you ready?" The man on my left asks.

"Ready." I say it with authority, but there is always that last second of self-doubt. You are never 100% ready. There is dead silence around me. Sunlight glints off the chrome trim on the windows of the car and a Canadian flag pops in the sharp wind.

"GO!" he yells, starting his stopwatch.

I bend over and grab the 200lb piece of rusted sewer pipe laying at my feet. It comes off the ground like a child's toy. I cover the fifty feet to the car quickly, faster than most 33 year olds can do it without the pipe. Faster, I think.

I fling the pipe from my chest to its target, a tire on the ground. It hits the rubber then flies off making a sick metal on pavement sound. Turning to my left I throw myself at the body of the car, reaching down under the door for the steel bar welded to the frame. In a quick motion I drop my hips and just as quickly throw them forward, every muscle in my body straining.

Everything goes blank and I strain so hard that I can't see. There is a voice inside of me that says "Quit, you are going to hurt yourself, this is unnatural" and that voice is right, it's the voice of sanity. And if I listen to the voice I will
never win. I will be just like everyone else.

I hear metal twist, crunch and squeak as the car gives and rolls to its driver's side and then onto its roof. When it lands the noise reminds me of thunder. I drop down again grabbing through the open window and repeat the motion until gravity quits fighting me and I know it's going to come to rest on its wheels.

I run around the vehicle slapping the palm of my right hand against the back of my left, and then vice versa. Ultra-sticky resin now covers my hands. The bed of a wrecker truck sits at chest-level and on the ground in front of it lays a 250lb stone made from concrete.

I don't have any time to think. The crowd is loud, and that's a good sign. It tells me that I'm moving fast. They are getting sucked into the excitement and they can't believe how quickly I'm moving.

I toss my body down to the stone, bear-hugging it and ripping it from the ground. I roll the rock up my chest in one motion and then arch my back to get the rock as high off the ground as possible. I throw myself forward dropping the rock on the bed of the truck.

"Nineteen point three seconds" the time keeper yells.

My arms shoot up over my head in triumph as the crowd screams. I feel like a gladiator. I just gave the spectators everything I had and they loved it. It's exciting, as good as sex, and I want to do it again.

It's good to be strong.

Posted by Mike Gill at 6:00 AM