Yesterday in my sixth hour class, this gentleman came up. At the time, I couldn't remember his name, which is Jure Robic. Nor did I correctly recall his home country, though I knew it was formerly Soviet: it was Slovenia.Anyway, many of my students seemed to interested in his case, as we were using it to discuss the role of pain in restraining physically damaging behavior. The here's the link to the New York Times article about him from February 2006: That Which Does Not Kill Me Makes Me Stronger.
What makes him such an interesting figure? He doesn't stop...even when he should. Take the excerpt below as an example:
"Around Day 2 of a typical weeklong race, his speech goes staccato. By Day 3, he is belligerent and sometimes paranoid. His short-term memory vanishes, and he weeps uncontrollably. The last days are marked by hallucinations: bears, wolves and aliens prowl the roadside; asphalt cracks rearrange themselves into coded messages. Occasionally, Robic leaps from his bike to square off with shadowy figures that turn out to be mailboxes. In a 2004 race, he turned to see himself pursued by a howling band of black-bearded men on horseback."
Interested in his recent exploits? Check out his blog.
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