Thrill-Seekers Try to Outsmart the Grim Reaper
–by Wendy Kelly

In the winter of 1999, at 4:30 in the afternoon, Brett Murray Carlson, a young man from Alberta, Canada, fell to his death in a residential neighborhood in Whistler, British Columbia, while attempting a ski jump over a standard two-lane road. The street Carlson chose to jump over was in my former residential neighborhood, a road I frequently walked up with my son. “He suffered multiple injuries to his head, chest and lower limbs and died instantly,” wrote Daniel Sieberg in the Vancouver Sun.

Carlson’s friends were on hand videotaping the event, ready to catch the historic, 30-meter (100 foot) jump on film. His 15 minutes of fame, as it were. These days, it’s possible for all of us to have our 15 minutes of fame — and possibly fortune. You don¹t need lots of money to get started. All you need is a friend with a camera, a pair of skis, and you’re off. And if you’re lucky, you might end up on television making millions of dollars endorsing orange juice or sunglasses. Indeed, sponsorships for extreme sports are now in the millions of dollars, tempting the already daring to new limits of death-defying stunts.

In some ways you could say things have never changed. The 18- to 30-year-old demographic has always been a group of thrill-seekers and dare-devils. In the 1950′s, “playing chicken” was a part of adolescence. In earlier times, young people went off to seek their fortunes: Climbing aboard a ship setting sail for the “New World;” hitching up the covered wagon to head West, young man; becoming a pirate, a cowboy, a soldier. In the accelerated age, however, what is considered extreme is picking up speed. Attempting to outsmart the grim reaper has always been part of adolescence. Putting it on ESPN has not.

In 1995, ESPN developed the $10-million, first annual, Olympics-style Extreme Games. In 1998, snowboarding went mainstream at the Olympics in Nagano, Japan. What had been extreme only three years earlier was now sanctioned – legitimized – by the International Olympic Committee.

Thanks to sports networks and the mainstream media, what used to happen in the wilderness and backcountry is now in-your-face — and in your backyard. And by sanctioning and sanitizing extreme sports, we legitimize them, which is exactly what the young adult demographic doesn’t want. So they further push the limit of what is considered “extreme.”

According to The Seattle Times, Carlson had “started on a 100-foot-high cliff in a residential area of Whistler and had hoped to build up enough speed to hurl himself off a makeshift ramp part way down, fly over a road and land on the other side.” Unfortunately, he didn’t make it. His body lay lifeless on a quiet cul-de-sac while his friends rushed to call the paramedics.

Carlson’s former employer, Jean Hunt, co-owner of the Calgary Ski Cellar, said in the Calgary Sun, extreme skiing “is just like any other sport — it’s something people really want to do even if death is a possibility.”

–Wendy Kelly, bkelly@whistlernet.com