MAIN » ARTICLESThe Challenges, part 2
In the first Challenges article we saw a diverse range, from Pringles to Masturbation to alcohol consumption and back again. This second edition is no exception with challenges really taking off the ground and people everywhere embracing them with equally as much thrust. From what we have seen before, and are currently experiencing, I wouldn't be surprised if we see a part 3 sometime soon.
9. The Cracker Challenge
The Challenge: To consumer a regular packet of crackers in the quickest time.
This challenge was the first of all the challenges featured to be filmed on location, live and be presented in its rawest form for public enjoyment. Very similar to the pringles challenge this involved multiple locals competing against eachother for the prize - in this case maximum points in the newly established league of filmed consumption challenges. The 4 people taking part were: Ryan, Lawrence, Ozzy & Shields. This battle was tense throughout, and watching the video myself, personally, I felt a little scared that one of these fine men may not make it through the challenge alive. However, I quickly stopped caring about that and enjoyed what was a great spectacle. This was taking challenges to the next level, and these were exciting times. Lawrence was out of the game quickly, obviously not taking the challenge seriously, taking a big piss over all the other contenders, metaphorically of course. His disqualification from the event was one of the more dramatic but amusing moments, with the agressive-nature of the other 3 competitors resembling that of a lynch-mob rather than the examples of fine athletes we had previously seen.
Eventually the winner was clear well before the end, the quietest of the 3 remaining was the most controlled and purposeful as he stroll to victory. Ozzy became the first winner of this type of challenge, with Shields and Ryan lagging quite far behind even with the champ taking an extra minute out to polish off the crumbs at the bottom of the packet.
10. The Carbonates Challenge
The challenge: To drink 3 bottles of value fizzy drink in the quickest time.
The sequal to the crack challenge, this featured 3 of the original cast, substituting Lawrence's failure for new kid on the block James Davey (seen second from the left below). The set up was the same; 4 men in a line, 1 camera +4 chairs -4 packs of crackers +12 bottles of tesco value coke/lemonade. Initially you can imagine how keen these young boys were to get suck in, confident they could manage all three. Once the challenge got underway however it was clearly this was a nigh on impossible task, battling with both the extreme fizziness of value drinks and the dire taste. Ozzy suffering most in that department being the only man to choose coke, when all educated guesses pointed to the lemonade.
It was evident not long into this challenge that it wasn't going to go all the way. Admitting to themselves that they'd all failed must have been though, however they kept their heads up and set a new target - the one who had drunk the most when Ryan's sister appeared in the garden to find 4 half-naked guys on plastic chairs, was the winner.
As it turned out James Davey who took control of the game about 5-10 minutes in held his own until that very event. Ryan Kent, who was perhaps the cockiest beforehand, confident of victory was shamed into finishing in last position in what was another great filmed challenge.
I still don't know why Ozzy was the only one to keep his top on.
11. Infamous Sit-In Extravaganza
The challenge: To stay seated for as long as possible on Shields' sofa.
This little beast took place at Shields' birthday party this September. Myself and Sir David Randall were sitting on the sofa a few minutes after arriving sipping on a cool beer each. Dave with a San Mig, me with my trusty Carlsberg Export, and all was well. Then I had the stupid idea of challenging Dave to a 'sit-in', in which the first person to get up for any reason was proclaimed the loser. Naturally, always one for a good challenge, Dave said yes and so we sat. And We sat for a while.
Eventually the natural course of drinking took place and around the same time we both announced we needed to visit the bathroom. At first I was sceptical and insistent that we fight through it, then I nearly pissed all over the carpet by accident so we decided to allow one trip each without disqualification. This took place and then it was back to the seats. The next obstacle in our path to success was the movement of the entire party into the patio area outside, underneath the thing. Once again we both agreed to move out together and keep the challenge going. At this point it all goes blurry for me, I think we made one more toilet stop each only a few minutes later and eventually called it a draw when the pizza came out. Somebody around this time also sat on my pizza, but I still ate the onion rings. No pictures available.
12. Courtesy Cup Challenge (McDonalds)
The challenge: Information to come.
Details of challenge on its way soon from David Randall.
13. The XMAS Countdown Text Message Challenge
The challenge: 1 text message from Robert Hendy to Justin King every day until Xmas 2003.
I have always been a strong believer in pushing people to the limit to make them better individuals. It's why I made Dave sit down on a sofa for ages, and here why I asked Hendry to send me a message every day until christmas. I approached him with this in September, but it was not until the delivery of a new phone and the activation of free messages two weeks later on the 3rd of October that the challenge officially began. The first message was: "fanny. the text challenge is up and running. it was too much hassle to keep my number. so they'll be coming from here now. hendy".
Hendy failed the challenge just 6 days later, with no message on the 10th of October. Some say he was foolish to send 3 on the 9th and yet none the next day, most people agree with this. Here are the 11 remaining messages recieved between the 4th of October and the 9th:
04/10/03 22:01
the free texts have commenced. word.
05/10/03 12:59
"what colour would a smurf turn if you choked it?"
06/10/03 13:31
"perfection is the child of time"
06/10/03 18:03
"there's more than one way to skin a cat"
07/10/03 00:24
ahh, another new day. five more free texts. now only if i could think of some content.
07/10/03 21:00
"j-lo has an ass that looks like it's trying to crawl up onto her shoulders"
07/10/03 22:23
"i never said it would be easy i only said it would be worth it"
08/10/03 00:02
"so how is heaven" "yeah it's ok... not enough chairs..."
09/10/03 01:28
dyk: some parts of the east midlands are more west than parts of the west midlands
09/10/03 01:49
if some fly bitch was like 'hey big man', i'd be all like 'soz m8, on downtime challenge' if you know what i mean
09/10/03 21:26
"my friend ate leaves and had to go to the hospital from leaf poisoning"
14. The Zapper Challenge
The challenge: Lawrence Wheeler to eat 1 whole pack of Zappers at once.
Now, for all who are unfamiliar, Zappers are small sour flavoured bubblegum sweets that get sold in small boxes. I would estimate that somewhere between 50 and 100 zappers in habit each box sold, a box being roughly the length of the average human palm. My memory tells me that Kent challenged Lawrence to this one, but whoever it was you could guarantee that Larry would take up any challenge that get some a lot of attention and involved food of some kind (the yellow ones taste like washing up liquid).
After standing up for a few seconds, the crowd grew quiet as Lawrence raised the box up to his mouth. I took this chance to point out that enlarging the hole in the box was the only way he would get the whole contents out within the next hour. So he did. The pouring began and quickly filled up this tiny man's mouth, at one point a zapper even falling to the floor, which was then retrieved. The chewing began and it became clear that this challenge was extremely doable, it just took time. Later on, our hero showboating infront of the crowd by opening his mouth to reveal the vile contents within. Well done Lawrence.
Written by Jay
9. The Cracker Challenge
The Challenge: To consumer a regular packet of crackers in the quickest time.
This challenge was the first of all the challenges featured to be filmed on location, live and be presented in its rawest form for public enjoyment. Very similar to the pringles challenge this involved multiple locals competing against eachother for the prize - in this case maximum points in the newly established league of filmed consumption challenges. The 4 people taking part were: Ryan, Lawrence, Ozzy & Shields. This battle was tense throughout, and watching the video myself, personally, I felt a little scared that one of these fine men may not make it through the challenge alive. However, I quickly stopped caring about that and enjoyed what was a great spectacle. This was taking challenges to the next level, and these were exciting times. Lawrence was out of the game quickly, obviously not taking the challenge seriously, taking a big piss over all the other contenders, metaphorically of course. His disqualification from the event was one of the more dramatic but amusing moments, with the agressive-nature of the other 3 competitors resembling that of a lynch-mob rather than the examples of fine athletes we had previously seen.
Eventually the winner was clear well before the end, the quietest of the 3 remaining was the most controlled and purposeful as he stroll to victory. Ozzy became the first winner of this type of challenge, with Shields and Ryan lagging quite far behind even with the champ taking an extra minute out to polish off the crumbs at the bottom of the packet.
10. The Carbonates Challenge
The challenge: To drink 3 bottles of value fizzy drink in the quickest time.
The sequal to the crack challenge, this featured 3 of the original cast, substituting Lawrence's failure for new kid on the block James Davey (seen second from the left below). The set up was the same; 4 men in a line, 1 camera +4 chairs -4 packs of crackers +12 bottles of tesco value coke/lemonade. Initially you can imagine how keen these young boys were to get suck in, confident they could manage all three. Once the challenge got underway however it was clearly this was a nigh on impossible task, battling with both the extreme fizziness of value drinks and the dire taste. Ozzy suffering most in that department being the only man to choose coke, when all educated guesses pointed to the lemonade.
It was evident not long into this challenge that it wasn't going to go all the way. Admitting to themselves that they'd all failed must have been though, however they kept their heads up and set a new target - the one who had drunk the most when Ryan's sister appeared in the garden to find 4 half-naked guys on plastic chairs, was the winner.
As it turned out James Davey who took control of the game about 5-10 minutes in held his own until that very event. Ryan Kent, who was perhaps the cockiest beforehand, confident of victory was shamed into finishing in last position in what was another great filmed challenge.
I still don't know why Ozzy was the only one to keep his top on.
11. Infamous Sit-In Extravaganza
The challenge: To stay seated for as long as possible on Shields' sofa.
This little beast took place at Shields' birthday party this September. Myself and Sir David Randall were sitting on the sofa a few minutes after arriving sipping on a cool beer each. Dave with a San Mig, me with my trusty Carlsberg Export, and all was well. Then I had the stupid idea of challenging Dave to a 'sit-in', in which the first person to get up for any reason was proclaimed the loser. Naturally, always one for a good challenge, Dave said yes and so we sat. And We sat for a while.
Eventually the natural course of drinking took place and around the same time we both announced we needed to visit the bathroom. At first I was sceptical and insistent that we fight through it, then I nearly pissed all over the carpet by accident so we decided to allow one trip each without disqualification. This took place and then it was back to the seats. The next obstacle in our path to success was the movement of the entire party into the patio area outside, underneath the thing. Once again we both agreed to move out together and keep the challenge going. At this point it all goes blurry for me, I think we made one more toilet stop each only a few minutes later and eventually called it a draw when the pizza came out. Somebody around this time also sat on my pizza, but I still ate the onion rings. No pictures available.
12. Courtesy Cup Challenge (McDonalds)
The challenge: Information to come.
Details of challenge on its way soon from David Randall.
13. The XMAS Countdown Text Message Challenge
The challenge: 1 text message from Robert Hendy to Justin King every day until Xmas 2003.
I have always been a strong believer in pushing people to the limit to make them better individuals. It's why I made Dave sit down on a sofa for ages, and here why I asked Hendry to send me a message every day until christmas. I approached him with this in September, but it was not until the delivery of a new phone and the activation of free messages two weeks later on the 3rd of October that the challenge officially began. The first message was: "fanny. the text challenge is up and running. it was too much hassle to keep my number. so they'll be coming from here now. hendy".
Hendy failed the challenge just 6 days later, with no message on the 10th of October. Some say he was foolish to send 3 on the 9th and yet none the next day, most people agree with this. Here are the 11 remaining messages recieved between the 4th of October and the 9th:
04/10/03 22:01
the free texts have commenced. word.
05/10/03 12:59
"what colour would a smurf turn if you choked it?"
06/10/03 13:31
"perfection is the child of time"
06/10/03 18:03
"there's more than one way to skin a cat"
07/10/03 00:24
ahh, another new day. five more free texts. now only if i could think of some content.
07/10/03 21:00
"j-lo has an ass that looks like it's trying to crawl up onto her shoulders"
07/10/03 22:23
"i never said it would be easy i only said it would be worth it"
08/10/03 00:02
"so how is heaven" "yeah it's ok... not enough chairs..."
09/10/03 01:28
dyk: some parts of the east midlands are more west than parts of the west midlands
09/10/03 01:49
if some fly bitch was like 'hey big man', i'd be all like 'soz m8, on downtime challenge' if you know what i mean
09/10/03 21:26
"my friend ate leaves and had to go to the hospital from leaf poisoning"
14. The Zapper Challenge
The challenge: Lawrence Wheeler to eat 1 whole pack of Zappers at once.
Now, for all who are unfamiliar, Zappers are small sour flavoured bubblegum sweets that get sold in small boxes. I would estimate that somewhere between 50 and 100 zappers in habit each box sold, a box being roughly the length of the average human palm. My memory tells me that Kent challenged Lawrence to this one, but whoever it was you could guarantee that Larry would take up any challenge that get some a lot of attention and involved food of some kind (the yellow ones taste like washing up liquid).
After standing up for a few seconds, the crowd grew quiet as Lawrence raised the box up to his mouth. I took this chance to point out that enlarging the hole in the box was the only way he would get the whole contents out within the next hour. So he did. The pouring began and quickly filled up this tiny man's mouth, at one point a zapper even falling to the floor, which was then retrieved. The chewing began and it became clear that this challenge was extremely doable, it just took time. Later on, our hero showboating infront of the crowd by opening his mouth to reveal the vile contents within. Well done Lawrence.
Written by Jay