SW Entertainment by Ray Schmidt The Tribe has spoken
Standing in glacial fed waters wearing a Speedo, immunity only lasts so long There’s nothing more satisfying than Saturday night at the Kananaskis Whitewater Festival: slugging Sleeman’s from a bottomless beer cup, gorging on BSE-free Alberta beef and watching a rabbit-eared image of the Calgary Flames notch another win in the quest for the Cup. Until Sunday morning, that is. “Survivor Kananaskis,” scheduled for 8:30am, is sure to shake the cobwebs out of any parched and partially sleepy paddler.
Unique to the dammed Kananaskis River—site of the 11th annual festival—is an on and off switch that commands the flow. Like flicking on the bathroom light at two in the morning, the Kananaskis shocks a trickling gravel channel with 30 cms of water within minutes. Enter the influence of reality TV. Switching to the “on” position at 8:30am on Sunday morning, event organizers challenge scantily clad entrants (drysuits discouraged, PFD and helmet mandatory) to battle the inevitable tidal wave. The river casts the votes.
Real people doing silly things will always entertain the masses.
Fed by snowmelt and chilled by glaciers, this event is a cross between the running of the bulls and duck hunting. “Survivor Kan” fully exploits the notion that real people doing silly things will always entertain the masses.
There was no shortage of hungover people willing to throw themselves into the morass. Eighteen soft skinned adults, with a full capacity for choice, huddled above a significant river feature and awaited the charging Toro. Within 30 seconds, the icy waters had risen to near capacity. Like geese falling from the sky after a flurry of buckshot, losers hopelessly succumbed to hydrological gravity.
And then, there were two. Jesse Berg and Dave Manning had somehow managed to hoist themselves above all others and maintain solid footing. While Berg’s nether regions were setting up like raisins, Manning was likely feeling a bit insecure in his lingerie.
“I’ve been training with as many polar bear swims as possible,” commented a down-clad Berg after the event. That off-season training proved to carry the winning formula. He and Manning wrestled in a classic battle for “Survivor Kananaskis” supremacy, akin to that of Brad Pitt and Eric Bana in the recent Hollywood epic, Troy. Manning, however, couldn’t outmuscle the buffed Berg who received the final vote. Despite his obvious despair, Dave Manning managed a final, voiceless farewell with a radiant duck dive in his butt-floss panties. The crowd went wild! The winner received a water bottle.
2004 Fall //
17
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52