What does it feel like to get hit by a 10 pound lance wielded by an armored rider charging at full speed? "It's basically like getting hit by a mack truck," says Shane Adams, host of History's latest competition show, Full Metal Jousting, which premiers at 10 p.m. on Sunday, February 12.
"It's actually very difficult to explain to people because very few people wander into a highway and get hit by a mack truck going 50 miles per hour and lived to tell about," Adams says. I'm not sure if a mack truck has ever clobbered him, but I don't doubt his experience with a horse and lance. Adams has been a champion jouster for years, and he and his team traveled far and wide to find the 16 contestants who will each be competing against one another for the $100,000 cash prize.
A few weeks ago I saw a jousting exhibition at a packed Madison Square Garden in preparation for the show. When the two jousters collided, the bone-rattling crunch was audible from dozens of feet away, and a giant "whoosh" escaped a crowd that earlier in the evening had seen a bull rider tramped into the dirt.
Jousting is no joke, and Adams says it takes a rare combination of physical strength, determination and heart to succeed. Qualities he looked for in his contestants, who come from a range of backgrounds including former marines, bull riders, horse trainers and dinner show jousters from places like Medieval Times.
I had the chance to chat with Adams about playing chicken, getting knocked down and the importance of a good horse. Here are some highlights.
On the importance of mental strength:
"You can be the best jouster in the world but if you doubt yourself going into a joust and are nervous then you have a good shot of losing... [I]t's very hard to do given the fact you're riding a horse, you have very limited vision and you're wearing a 80 pounds of armor and you're holding onto a solid wooden lance and you're aiming it at another human being watch them aim their lance at you. So it's the ultimate game of chicken."
Getting knocked off your horse:
"[In] this true form of jousting that we've put together in Full Metal Jousting, you are going to get hit and you are going to hit the ground. And a lot of these [contestants] are coming from different backgrounds and different years of experience whether it be in the dinner show world or the jumping world or the western world and they've never really hit the ground before. It's a real psychological shock to be unhorsed from your horse without wanting to come off on your own. So to rip into these guys and explain to them that to be a champion in this sport, you will hit the ground. It's a matter of the true champions getting back on."
On the likelihood of contestants learning advanced jousting techniques during the 10-episode season:
"Not really. These guys are all amateurs, they've never done this style of jousting before. Some of them have never even seen a joust before. So to expect these guys to come down and learn all the tricks of the trade, well that's not going to happen in the first episode let alone the first ten episodes. But what the program does do is show the audience the different training implements that need to be set in place and the different mindsets the competitors have to have."
The relationship between horse and jouster:
"It's not necessarily the riders controlling the horses; the horses know their jobs. It's a matter of how the horse and rider communicate with each other and become a team. Sometimes going down the jousting list you can be on a horse that doesn't like you and upon the point of impact that horse will dodge left or dodge right and basically leave you off balance just before the hit even comes.
"And then there are other horses that like to throw their weight into a hit and work with you. And just like a hockey player throwing his weight into an opponent on the boards, that's what some of these horses do and if the rider himself is rocked off balance and seems to be coming off you can see the horse step to the side and pick him up again."
Catch the first episode of Full Metal Jousting at 10 p.m. Sunday, February 12 on the History channel.
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