You may have seen the Stihl Timbersports competition on ESPN. This is the logging related competition where competitors cut through a log the fastest called ‘hot saw’ with souped up chainsaws. They also chop through telephone pole thickness poles with an ax in less than 20 seconds. Like other competitions, rodeo as an example, timber sports have their origins in practical skills.

When I was a kid growing up, our town hosted the biggest timber sports competition in the world and the competitors reflected that. It was called the Albany Timber Carnival. As with the fall of timber in the mid 1990s, so too went the Timber Carnival. But the lasting tradition of the competition and quietly preserved skills can still be found, if you know where to look.

I shouldn’t be surprised but I ran across the Oregon State University’s competition area when I was doing some of my practice hikes. One of OSU’s foundations is a strong forestry school. The hiking I have been doing is in the forest owned and managed by the college for teaching purposes. Why wouldn’t they have a competition program and the facilities to perform?

Ultimately, these competitors have to come from somewhere. My cousin competed on a team in high school in the late 1990s. I remember asking what the secret was to chopping with an axe. He said that there is definitely technique but a lot of it is how you sharpen your tools. That part I don’t quite know but I spent a couple of days sharpening my ax one time. I put a whole new bevel on the blade that was much sleeker. That thing definitely cuts like a house of fire.

I am no expert in this by any means. I have never competed or trained let alone barely watched one of these competitions on TV. I just think it is pretty cool to see this of throwback activity (to me and my past) is still alive. I takes me back to when I was a kid and timber was king. It was a time when my town crowned the world champion in each of these events.

End Your Programming Routine: I would love to be able to climb up a pole and know how to sharpen an ax so that I could whack a giant log in less than ten swings. Even more than my sentimental pride, the point of my writing today is you never know what you are going to find in the world. You have to get out there and explore that world to find it. TV and internet can expose and publicize things but when you just run across it incidentally, it is pretty neat.