Evel Knievel Days: July 27-29th [Archive]

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Coach

07-17-2006, 11:33 AM

OOOOOOOHHHH! Evel Knievel Days are coming!!!!!!July 27-29th 2006:<a href="http://www.knievelweek.com/">http://www.knievelweek.com/</a>(warning music on website..turn down your volume)

This message was edited by Coach on 7-27-06 @ 6:04 AM

Coach

07-17-2006, 11:42 AM

<img height="426" src="http://www.knievelweek.com/smspankyfinal.jpg" width="288" border="0" />Damn! Missed this guy!!!!

Coach

07-17-2006, 11:47 AM

On a related Note:<a href="http://www.motoring.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=751&fArticleId=3255138">http://www.motoring.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=751&fArticleId=3255138</a>How the mighty Knievel has fallen   May 22, 2006 By Mitch Stacy Clearwater, Florida - Evel Knievel has trouble now just walking from his condo to the pool let along leaping canyons on a motorcycle. The 1970's cultural icon and poster boy for fast living and derring-do is 67, his body broken by years of spectacular crashes and ravaged by a multitude of serious ailments. The king of the daredevils can hardly get out of bed most days, let alone straddle a Harley. On bad days, Knievel wishes he had gone into another line of work. On better ones he doesn't regret a minute. Lung disease sometimes makes it hard for him to talk but his stories still drip with swagger <table cellspacing="6" cellpadding="0" width="130" align="left" border="0"><tr><td class="PullQuote"> The king of the daredevils can hardly get out of bed most days, let alone straddle a Harley</td></tr></table>. He can be kind and gracious one minute, irascible and profane the next. Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, an incurable condition, is scarring and hardening his lungs. He's recovering from a stroke and has diabetes. He's broken about 40 bones, is full of plates and titanium parts and is constantly in pain. Multiple concussions have affected his short-term memory. The man who survived 300 perilous motorcycle jumps and once climbed into a rocket-powered cycle to fly over a canyon, now stays close to an oxygen tank, takes 50 pills a day and sucks on lollipops that deliver fentanyl, a heavy-duty painkiller. "People think I've been through something in my life from what they've seen on national television, my accident at Caesar's Palace for instance," Knievel says. "Look at the hell I'm going through now <table cellspacing="6" cellpadding="0" width="130" align="left" border="0"><tr><td class="PullQuote"> 'Look at the hell I'm going through now. How much can the human body endure?'</td></tr></table>. How much can the human body endure?" Knievel is preparing for his annual summer trip to his hometown of Butte, Montana, which celebrates his legend every July with the <a href="http://www.knievelweek.com/">Evel Knievel Days festival</a>. The event gets larger every year, for him the journey gets more difficult. "It's awful hard for me to see him like this," says Billy Rundle, an old friend and executive director of the festival that attracted 50 000 people last year to see the daredevil. His personal appearance days might be numbered but one thing's for sure - some 25 years after his last motorcycle jump people still want a piece of Robert Craig Knievel, American folk hero. The man who made millions risking his life earns a decent living now at the kitchen table signing thousands of autographs for dealers to resell. He endorses a few products and until recently made regular paid appearances with a 12m trailer full of his motorcycles and other curiosities - including the wrecked Skycycle he used in the unsuccessful jump at Snake River Canyon in Idaho in 1974. The Evel Knievel Stunt Cycle, one of the best-selling toys of the 1970's, is being sold again by Ideal Toys. The auction website eBay lists hundreds of Evel items for sale, from jigsaw puzzles to pinball machines.

Furtherman

07-17-2006, 12:07 PM

Yea, the man lived the fast life, what do you expect?  I think it was a bit condesending to title the article "How the mighty Knievel has fallen".He hasn't fallen, he got older, albeit quicker, and considering the life he lived, it's surprising he made it this long.

Don Stugots

07-17-2006, 01:46 PM

its surprising that he even knows his name.  the article is hard on him.  assholes, the man is an icon for living life on your terms.

Coach

07-27-2006, 02:03 AM

Here they come!!!!!Aim for the sky! World-record motorcycle jump attempts set for SaturdayBy Roberta Forsell Stauffer of <a href="http://www.mtstandard.com/" target="_blank">The Montana Standard</a> - 07/25/2006 <table cellspacing="0" cellpadding="6" width="200" align="right" border="0"><tr><td valign="top" align="center"> </td></tr><tr><td></td></tr></table>A 12-year-old boy from Australia and a world record holder from Seattle will attempt to make motorcycle history Saturday as part of the fifth annual Evel Knievel Days celebration. Tyrone Gilks from Newcastle, Australia, already holds the world record for jumping a 65cc motorcycle farther than anyone else. On Saturday around 2 p.m. on East Park Street, he’ll strive for the record on an 85cc bike. Right after Gilks jumps, Ryan Capes, 26, will go for the big time by attempting to jump more than 253 feet on a 250cc bike. Capes already holds the record for jumping farther from a ramp to dirt than anyone else in the world. Last fall in Kent, Wash., he soared 310 feet, 4 inches. “I measured it so I know for sure,” said Butte’s Bill Rundle, lead organizer for the Knievel Days celebration. This time, Capes will go from ramp to ramp and attempt to replace Jason Rennie’s name with his own in the record books. Rundle said he’ll make three jumps, starting around 200 feet and working up from there. “It’s up to him,” Rundle said. “If the weather conditions and the winds are good, he’s going to go for it and attempt the world record.” Rundle said Evel Knievel himself worked out this deal with Capes and his sponsor, Monster Energy Drinks. “My hat’s off to him,” Rundle said. “As sick as he is, he certainly doesn’t give up.” Rundle said he had planned to just invite Capes to jump during the festivities, but Knievel pushed for the record attempt. “It’s a win-win for everybody, and it’ll be crazy as hell to watch,” Rundle said. There was talk of arranging for Trigger Gumm to participate in a jump-off with Capes, but once Knievel learned that Gumm had scheduled another jump right before the Butte celebration, he stopped pursuing that plan, fearing Gumm could injure himself and spoil the Butte event. Rundle marveled Monday over how that proved to be true; Gumm crashed Sunday in his attempt to break Capes’ ramp-to-dirt record at a casino in Miami, Okla. “He (Evel) called it right on the button,” Rundle said. Robbie Knievel is also set to jump Friday around 8 p.m. at the same East Park location, but he declined to release any more details, saying only that it would be a ramp-to-ramp tribute jump to his father.

angelinad128

07-27-2006, 05:03 AM

Evel Knievel brings back such great childhood memories.

Jujubees2

07-27-2006, 05:31 AM

The man who survived 300 perilous motorcycle jumps and once climbed into a rocket-powered cycle to fly over a canyon, now stays close to an oxygen tank, takes 50 pills a day and sucks on lollipops that deliver fentanyl, a heavy-duty painkiller.-----------------------Damn, where do I get me some of those lollipops?  Sure beats a Blow-Pop

This message was edited by Jujubees2 on 7-27-06 @ 9:49 AM