After a class, almost off topic, discussion about luge and the alleged luge team run at our school, I decided to do a bit more research about the sport and compose a blog on the topic. This was in part to inform anyone that reads my blog about the sport, but since no one really reads my blog anyway I decided that it was be also in part to simply humor my teacher if he reads the title and decides to actually read the blog under the title.
Believe it or not, Luge is the actual
name of an Olympic sport that has also been described as “extreme sledding.”
There are three “sliding” sports in the Olympics, bobsledding, skeleton, and
luge. Luge is the fastest and most dangerous of the three. According to the ever-reliable
Wikipedia, luge riders can reach up to 87 miles per hour (that is almost as
fast as I go on the interstate! Totally kidding by the way.) A luge itself is a
“small one or two person sled on which one sleds supine (face up) and feet
first.” The people that ride a luge are able to steer the sled by “flexing the
sled’s runners with the calf of each leg or exerting opposite shoulder pressure
to the seat.” Hopefully this doesn’t take much muscle because professional luge
riders would have to have giant shoulders and calves, which is a very strange
combination to have, especially if they don’t require any thigh or bicep
muscles. It would be a strange sight to see if some guy came walking up the
street and was rather slender and scrawny but had the largest calf and shoulder
muscles you have ever seen. It would be like a football player with only some
of his padding.
Well hopefully this blog enlightened you on the sport
Luge. Hopefully my teacher is reading this now and wishing that he hadn’t ever
brought it up Oh well! (326)
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