tug-of-war
the journal of Michael Werneburg
twenty-seven years and one million words
My girlfriend and I went to her company 'family barbeque' at Toronto's harbour islands park. They had the usual games for the kids, and a clown and generous amounts of food and the weather cooperated by being lightly overcast and about 20C.
I won two tug-of-war competitions.
In keeping with last month's arm-wrestling victory over a woman, the first tug-of-war was only a men vs women bout that was won with relative ease. Some of the fellows were the types who had to win everything, and they already knew the knack for winning a tug-of-war: apparently if you keep up a steady stream of concerted yanks on the rope you can destabilize the other team into disarray.
The second bout was much more of a challenge - in fact we nearly lost. The teams were six on a side, and the opposition was made up of the ones who'd deployed the 'strategy' in the bout versus the women. Our team was made up of the 'assorted others', the spouses. We were, in the initial phase, dragged to within 20-25cm of the line.
But our guys started to dig in, and the rope took to zigging back and forth sideways as the teams were evenly matched in strength. Then the fellow next to me lost his footing, and had to get a new handhold. This meant that he and I were jostling for the same strip of rope, so I leapt forward a pace (well to the 'front' of the rest of the team, right up to the ribbon on the rope), dug in and pulled in one last-ditch effort.
It was one of those strenous moments which requires pushing against the air in you lungs (this is the only way I know how to describe it - holding your breath with enourmous energy, anyway) and you can feel the oxygen burning in your muscles.
I am 196 cm tall (6'5"). So I was pulling above the level of the rest of the fellows, and certainly above the other team's concerted line. My legs have always been strong (in the high school gym, I discovered that I could walk in and push the maximum weights in the leg press without effort), and once I was clear of my rope neighbour and able to use them, I was able to lift properly.
I don't know if my height in the front helped, but as soon as I started pulling in my new spot - and much to my astonished delight - we managed to haul the rope back about half a metre. Once we had the momentum, we kept at it, and staged quite a comeback. We won within 30 seconds of the turnaround.
It was immensely satisfactory.