Inanimate Wall Dashes Dreams, Realizes Others.

Lindsey, Keely and Sherry carry the hopes (and fears, judgements and nervous aspirations)of the club on the woman's side. Lindsey would seems to have the edge at the wall, Sebastian was overheard speaking to a group of his geologist colleagues after fulfilling his duties as Lindsey's semi-final wall man. "She's as light as a cotton ball dipped in helium she is; threw her to the top of the wall as easily as Matt Reeve jumps on a chance at shameless self promotion, I did". The girls qualifying times are within minutes of each other, a well executed scaling of the wall may be crucial for a victory.

The Men's individual race goes ahead tomorrow with a chance of a sweep of the podium. Daniel, Brendan and Jon have 3 of the 4 fastest qualifying times to date. The latter two times are 4 seconds apart, so it will almost certainly come down to tampering of swim goggles, Tiger Balm in the Speedo or surreptitiously deflating bike tires to gain a significant advantage. It will take a stick (or mid-sized log) in the spokes to bring Brendan down onto a level playing field as he has so far posted the only sub 14:00 time on Campus, a feat the vast majority of teams fail to accomplish. But they have five people to get over the wall, so no one is really impressed.

We won't see much of Daniel after this week; his recent accomplishments have led various religious groups and political leaders to attempt to use his skills for their own promotional purposes. A group of Ultra-Orthodox Jews were outside Sauder today, scouting Daniel to see if they would be able to use his wall mounting skills to raise awareness to their plight. Israel's recent passing of a law enabling the conscripting of Ultra-Orthodox Jews into the military has led to a slew of high publicity public awareness campaigns. Daniel is lined up to tackle Jerusalem's 62 foot Western Wall next month, with sixteen photographers on hand to document the historic feat.

Immediately after the SuperIron event, Daniel accepted a phone call from Chinese President Xi Jinping, inviting him to scale some of his country's 2700 year old National treasure. Not be outdone, Dennis Rodman and Kim Jong-un sent a package with round trip airfare to Pyongyan; provided Daniel pose for pictures with their 12 foot "wall of impenetrable defence" in the demilitarization zone. To prove it exists and silence any sceptical South Koreans, we can suppose.

Apparently there are still some teams competing as well. UBC REC seems to have over-ordered the white cotton T-Shirts this year. You can now get a T-Shirt for taking the best photo of the wall, for being closest to the wall at some arbitrary time and for drinking the most beer while leaning against a wall of any type. An extra thick, white merino wool T-Shirt is awarded to which ever competitor can stuff the most bark mulch in their Speedo while keeping a straight face. We wish any club members still in team events the best of luck.

If you don't think any of the club members are worth watching in competition tomorrow, come on down to the wall anyway. You can get a $7 McDonald's gift card if you give Mr.Lube your SIN Number, shoe size and a photocopy of your passport. The surly men at the booth also give you a strange cup of popcorn if you also sign a contract guaranteeing all of your children and grand children will get their oil changes done at Mr. Lube in perpetuity.

The weather forecast calls for rain until Sunday, but it doesn't really matter anymore since the walls are covered in sandpaper squares. Bring an umbrella, some absorbent socks and watch the most overly publicized and attended intramural event in North America that a few dozen people take way too seriously and the rest of the campus doesn't really care about. Storm the wall hasn't really been worth watching since the late 1980's anyway when chains, ladders, crampons and bear spray were added to the list of prohibited race items. It used to be fun to watch. You can't even use an opponents's team member as a climbing implement anymore.

courtsey Ubyssesy archives