Yeah, might've seen this one coming

There are a lot of stupid contests out there (not this one, though - vote early and often), but I'm going to have to put in my nomination for stupidest contest as the World Sauna Championships.

If you haven't heard about the competition at this point - and it was in the news this weekend - here's the basic set-up.  Morons start off in a sauna at 110 celsius sauna while water is dumped onto the hot rocks every thirty seconds to keep the humidity at 100 percent.  From there they sit still...and suffer in silence.  No wiping the sweat - except from their faces.  No drinking water, no food, no nothing.  Just suffering.

Rick Riley took part in the contest back in August 2007, describing it like this...

A Belarusian started out sane, just sitting there. Every 30 seconds a pitiless stream of water came out from a ceiling shower in the center of the sauna and splashed on the molten-hot rocks, creating a 100% humidity level in the room that would melt gold. About two minutes in our man started rocking a little. At three his eyes started blinking oddly. At four he began twitching. At five his eyes got huge. At six he started swallowing each breath like a gulp of scorching soup. Then he started glancing around wildly, as if to say to the others, Are you mad? Don't you see what's happening? They've locked us in a Crock-Pot! He started wiping his eyes and mouth. He moved his hands out toward his thighs to rub them, then realized that's not allowed and did so anyway, crazily, as though he were covered in lice. The judges flagged him once, then twice. Then he lurched for the door, and he was out. Sanity and cool air whooshed back into his brain, and suddenly he was normal and smiling again. 

...


It was like walking into a bonfire and pulling up a chair in the middle of it. My strategy was to go in and keep time by the 30-second water splashes, but that plan was scrapped approximately seven seconds in. Thinking literally hurt. I tried to stare at the rocks and not blink, because blinking hurt. I tried to take very few breaths, because breathing hurt. I was sure flames were coming out of my mouth. My back seemed to have ignited. I was convinced my ears were literally on fire, but if I moved even slightly, they hurt more. I tried sitting up higher, but it was even hotter. I tried crouching down more, but then I was nearer to the unforgiving rocks. It was so awful I wished Barry Bonds were in there. Then came the hideous, cruel, pitiless splashes of water, each one lasting three seconds. I decided to think of something to get my mind off the torturous pain, so I began naming every National League team. I counted the Jets twice. I was just about to bolt into the fresh air when -- miraculously -- the tall, skinny guy next to me ran out. Amazing! I wasn't last! I had no idea how much time had elapsed -- four minutes? Six? I promised myself: When I get to the point where I can no longer stand it, I'll count 60 seconds and go.

Four seconds later, I decided I could no longer stand it.

So I started counting. One, two, three ... It was the longest minute of my life. At 60 I went barreling out. Watching other heats, I'd wondered why even losers came out grinning and raising their hands in victory, but now I knew. The cool air was so beautiful, so redeeming, so life giving. You could French-kiss Osama bin Laden. 

...(now, describing Rick Ellis, the only other American in the competition after his ouster)...



Then there was Ellis, who entered the quarterfinals with dozens of blisters on his body. "Man, I knew I was in trouble right away," he later said. "When I felt this big, half-dollar-size blister behind my back, I said, 'Okay, that's enough. I gotta get out.'"

He was the first out, at 4:15, and he was melting like the wicked witch. His forehead, his lips and his ears were giant lumps of pus. His triceps were riddled with pebble-size blisters, dozens of them. So much skin was hanging off him he looked like the world's most successful gastric-bypass patient. His forehead was a science-fiction movie. His nose was cooked like a forgotten kielbasa. And this was just what we could see.

He lifted up his shirt and there it was: this horrible, huge, pus-filled sac -- the size of a $3 pancake -- just hanging off his armpit. His wife gasped. TLC turned away in horror. When we dragged him to first aid the guy said, "You must go to the hospital. When these blisters break, you will lose lots of fluid and be highly susceptible to infection. We can't do anything for you here. It is too serious." 

The competition has been going for a dozen years now, but it looks like it won't be lasting any more after what happened over the weekend.  Vladimir Ladyzhenskiy, the sixty-year-old Russian runner up in this year's competition, collapsed and died on his way to the hospital.

Here you can see Ladyzhenskiy (on the left) in the final before he collapsed...(source)

...and just after he collapsed and was pulled from the sauna...(source)...

...(source)...

While it is, indeed, tragic that a man died, I have to say that this may have been one of the most predictable 'sports' deaths we've ever seen.