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Superheroes: Has Anybody Tried It For Real?

MrRING said:
Werner Herzog - superhero!

http://www.imdb.com/news/wenn/2006-02-03/
Herzog Helped Phoenix from Car Wreckage
Oscar-nominee Joaquin Phoenix was rescued from his car wreck last week by German cult director Werner Herzog. The 31-year-old Walk The Line star overturned his car on a canyon road above Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood after his brakes failed and he collided with another vehicle. Phoenix was saved because he was wearing his seat-belt, but has revealed he was helped from the wreckage by the 63-year-old, who has a home nearby. The actor says, "I remember this knocking on the passenger window. There was this German voice saying, 'Just relax.' There's the airbag, I can't see and I'm saying, 'I'm fine. I am relaxed. Finally, I rolled down the window and this head pops inside. And he said, 'No, you're not.' And suddenly I said to myself, 'That's Werner Herzog' There's something so calming and beautiful about Werner Herzog's voice. I felt completely fine and safe. I climbed out. I got out of the car and I said, 'Thank you,' and he was gone."
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Herzog really is a superhero
Source
Herzog Shot During Interview
By WENN|Friday, February 03, 2006
HOLLYWOOD - German director Werner Herzog was shot by a crazed fan during a recent interview with the BBC.
The 63-year-old was chatting with movie journalist Mark Kermode about his documentary Grizzly Man, when a sniper opened fire with an air rifle.

Kermode explains, "I thought a firecracker had gone off.

"Herzog, as if it was the most normal thing in the world, said, 'Oh, someone is shooting at us. We must go.'

"He had a bruise the size of a snooker ball, with a hole in. He just carried on with the interview while bleeding quietly in his boxer shorts."

An unrepentant Herzog insisted, "It was not a significant bullet. I am not afraid."
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:shock: 8) (I'm sure these stories have nothing to do with any films he may be involved with)
 
Real Superheroes

My guess is that a real "Bruce Wayne" wouldn't be out jumping from building to building with a long cape flowing dangerously out behind him but rather sitting in the Batcave in constant radio and even television contact with a dozen or more private detectives and moonlighting cops out solving crimes at his direction. Beats having his neck broken by that damned cape catching on window ledges.
 
Feb 22, 2006 6:19 am US/Pacific

Spider-Man Robs Comic Book Store

Peter Parker Again Sought For Questioning By Police


(CBS) LOS ANGELES With great power comes great responsibility... unless greed overcomes one's better spider-senses.

A robber wearing a Spider-Man mask was caught on surveillance video Tuesday stealing a set of rare comics from a store in Culver City, Calif. Among the issues stolen were Fantastic Four #1, X-Men #1, and the comic in which Spidey first appeared, Amazing Fantasy #15, valued at around $2,500 an issue.

The man walked into the shop around 11:30 a.m., but store employees thought nothing of a customer dressed in partial costume, reports KCBS-TV's Suzie Suh.

"He's wearing a Spider-Man mask, he must like super-heroes," said Alan Gardner of Dream World Comic Books.

While browsing the store, the man took out a hammer a smashed a glass display case housing some of the store's more expensive items. The villain grabbed several comics and fled on foot.

Store owners said they have store surveillance videos showing the same customer coming into the store on Sunday. Police are reviewing both sets of videotapes.

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(© MMVI, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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http://cbs2.com/watercooler/watercooler ... 92249.html

I'm afraid Comic Store Guy kept coming to mind when reading that (either as the thief or horrified owner) ;)
 
Surely he should be in the supervillains thread?
 
Looks like the Who Wants To Be A Superhero show is back in swing, and the winner will now get a film based on the concept!

http://www.whowantstobeasuperhero.tv/
SCI FI Channel and Stan Lee Looking for the Next Big Superhero

The SCI FI Channel, Nash Entertainment (Meet My Folks, For Love or Money, Who Wants to Marry My Dad?), and legendary comic book creator Stan Lee (Spider-Man, Hulk, The Fantastic Four, X-Men) will produce a six-episode, one-hour weekly competition reality series that will challenge a lucky few to create their very own Superhero and reward the winner with the best reality competition prize yet: immortality!

All you’ll need is an original idea for a Superhero, a killer costume, and some real Superhero mojo. The winner of this six-week competition will walk away with their Superhero immortalized in a new comic book created by Stan Lee himself. It gets better! The winning character will also appear in an original Sci Fi Channel movie!

If you think you’ve got what it takes and have an original Superhero inside of you, don’t wait for the bat signal! Put your costumes on now and apply for the show! You can also check out SCI FI Channel's online content for our show.
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Suspect’s aliases found in comics

By Laurel J. Sweet
Tuesday, March 7, 2006 - Updated: 04:27 PM EST

The Big Apple bouncer who has surfaced as a suspect in the despicable killing of Imette St. Guillen answers to several aliases, at least three of which have ties to the fantasy world of comic books.

The comic book link is bizarre to say the least, and, in the words of one comic-book industry insider, “truly disturbing.”

Littlejohn, 41, a 5-foot-7-inch, 210-pound career convict from Queens, provided muscle for the Soho saloon The Falls, where St. Guillen, 24, a 1999 Boston Latin School honors graduate, was last seen alive on Feb. 25. According to New York City police sources, he was asked to escort her from the bar around the 4 a.m. closing time.

His alter ego “Jonathan Blaze” - the name Littlejohn was imprisoned under until two years ago for helping knock over a Long Island bank at gunpoint - is the true name of the Marvel Comics character “Ghost Rider,” soon to be a film starring Nicholas Cage.

In the “Ghost Rider” series, Blaze is a motorcycle stuntman for the circus who sells his soul to the devil to save his girlfriend’s father from death. But when the devil doesn’t honor his end of the bargain, a tormented Blaze is doomed to straddle a chopper made of flames as hell-fire shoots from his skull. Marvel Comics declined to comment for this story.

Littlejohn did time in the 1990s for drug possession as John Handsome. “Handsome John” was the name of a head-turning police detective who gets offered a movie contract in the “Green Lantern” series, circa 1943.

A third alias, “Darryl Banks,” was a famed illustrator for the Green Lantern comic in the 1990s.

A fourth alias Littlejohn has been known to use, “Damon Wells,” was also the name of a California man who ritualistically raped and murdered a 21-year-old female hitchhiker in 1989 as a sacrifice to the devil.

“Who knows why he’s picking these names,” Matt Lehman, owner of Comicopia, a comic-book shop in Boston’s Kenmore Square, said yesterday of Littlejohn. “But remember, the word fan does come from fanatic.”

Lehman said most comic-book characters “tend to be male.”

“It’s easy to menace the damsel in distress,” he said.

But unlike St. Guillen’s twisted rape and murder, during which she was tied, gagged and her head wrapped in packing tape, “in all this kind of literature, the heroes are reactive,” Lehman said. “They’re fighting something that’s already happened.”

Career con

Darryl Littlejohn, 41, of Queens, N.Y., a.ka. Jonathan Blaze, John Handsome, Damon Wells and Darryl Banks, has been convicted on felony charges - most recently armed bank robbery - seven times and spent the better part of the past 20 years in prison: As Blaze, Littlejohn served four years for armed robbery from April 3, 2000, to July 9, 2004, before his legally mandated early release for good behavior.

As Handsome, Littlejohn was incarcerated on Feb. 19, 1993, for drug possession and sentenced to three to six years, but was paroled in 1995.

As Wells, Littlejohn was jailed on Jan. 30, 1989, for drug possession and sentenced to two to four years. He was paroled on April 8, 1991.

As Banks, Littlejohn was sent up for two to four years on drug and stolen property charges on Nov. 22, 1985, getting paroled on Jan. 20, 1987.

As Darryl Littlejohn, the state imprisoned him for robbery on Feb. 5, 1981, to serve three to 10 years, and paroled him on July 12, 1984.

Sources: New York State Department of Correctional Services and New York State Division of Parole.
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http://news.bostonherald.com/stGuillenM ... eid=129350
 
Wertham would be shocked that that, Emps!

---

LINK
Lee Auditions Superheroes

Comic-book creator Stan Lee, producer of SCI FI Channel's upcoming reality series Who Wants to Be a Superhero?, told SCI FI Wire that he was quite impressed with the imagination of the potential superheroes who showed up to audition in Hollywood, Calif., on April 4. About 120 contestants braved a torrential rainstorm to try out at the Sunset Gower Studios, but the weather didn't stop Monkey Lady, Bubble Man or Ice Bitch. "I defend the environment and can imprison you in icicles," said the white-haired woman with "IB" on her chest, who is really Lisa McLaughlin from Sherman Oaks, Calif. "I teach those who are teachable and punish those who are not."

In Who Wants to Be a Superhero?, a group of people dressed in costumes of their own design will take part in a series of weekly challenges. At the conclusion of each episode, Lee will appear and, much like Donald Trump on NBC's The Apprentice, dismiss one of the contestants. The winning contestant will have his character immortalized in a comic book to be published by Lee's Pow! Entertainment.

Lee shook hands with all the contestants, stopping to hear a ditty by Accordion Man—who looked a bit like Grandpa from The Munsters—and he talked to a few along the way. "I feel safe with you here," he told a Ninja. "I look forward to seeing more of you," he said to the scantily dressed Robot Girl. One masked guy in a too-tight yellow leotard with his hairy stomach hanging out said, "I'm such a big fan of yours!" Lee shook his hand and deadpanned, "And I admire your taste."

Hula-Hoop Girl (aka Anah Reichenbach) walked three blocks in her silvery outfit to the audition. "I read a lot of comic books, and Stan Lee is the guy," said the professional hula-hoop champ. "My power is to tele-transport, but my powers are erratic in prisons or insane asylums." One guy demonstrated how he could encase himself in a giant pink bubble, and another escorted his superhero rottweiler. The lineup also included a ballerina, a guy balancing a sword on his head, a rock star, a mouse man and a green-faced, loud-mouthed youth calling himself Slimeball. The six-week, one-hour show is seeking contestants through April 7
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It sounds a bit like Zero to hero we had here recently (which was rubbish):

www.imdb.com/title/tt0436003/

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Tue 9 May 2006

German 'Robin Hoods' give poor a taste of the high life

ALLAN HALL IN BERLIN

A GANG of anarchist Robin Hood-style thieves, who dress as superheroes and steal expensive food from exclusive restaurants and delicatessens to give to the poor, are being hunted by police in the German city of Hamburg.

The gang members seemingly take delight in injecting humour into their raids, which rely on sheer numbers and the confusion caused by their presence. After they plundered Kobe beef fillets, champagne and smoked salmon from a gourmet store on the exclusive Elbastrasse, they presented the cashier with a bouquet of flowers before making their getaway.

The latest robbery is part of a pattern over the past several months, suggesting that the thieves deliberately set out to highlight what they perceive as the inequality inherent in German society.

However, the authorities do not agree. Bodo Franz, a police spokesman, said: "They get off feeling they are just like Robin Hood. There are about 30 in the group. But whatever their motives, they are thieves, plain and simple."

Carsten Sievers, the manager of a luxury supermarket in the wealthy Blankenese area of Hamburg, recently watched the robbers run off with trolleys full of expensive foodstuffs, including Kobe beef which, at more than £100 a pound, is always on their illicit shopping list.

In another recent swoop, the gang emptied a groaning buffet table in a top restaurant into sacks, while one of their number held up a sign saying. "The fat years are over" - the title of a hit film currently doing the rounds in Germany.

In internet statements, the gang have made a point of saying their booty is distributed to Hartz IV recipients - the poorest of Germany's long-term unemployed. The benefit is named after the disgraced Volkswagen personnel director Peter Hartz who, before he lost his job with the car-maker in a prostitutes-and-bribes scandal, devised the new means-testing which is loathed and derided by society's most economically challenged.

When the gang robbed the gourmet store in April - triggering a massive police investigation that cost £20,000 in taxpayers' money without an arrest being made - they left a note behind saying: "Without the abilities of the superheroes to help them, it would be impossible for ordinary people to survive in the city of the millionaires."

Police say they are concentrating their investigation on a loose collective of anarchists and malcontents called "Hamburg in Vain", to which they believe the superheroes belong. But they admit there is a certain panache and skill about their robberies.

The gang are also behind black market cinema tickets which they distribute free to the poor, and they have printed leaflets telling passengers how to dodge ticket inspectors on the city's underground and buses.

Mr Franz said: "They try to make crime fun but are politically motivated."
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http://news.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=692762006
 
So they are robbing from the poor (shopkeeper) to give to the... middle class??

A merry band

Last month Germany's real-life Robin Hood gang struck again, stealing a trolley of luxury food. But who are they - and why do they do it? And how did Luke Harding manage to track them down when the police couldn't?

Wednesday May 17, 2006
The Guardian

Standing inside his delicatessen, Carsten Sievers gestures forlornly to where the giant Spanish cheese used to sit. "They took it," he says, pointing to an empty shelf. "They also took my Ruinart champagne. It costs €99 [£68] a bottle. Fortunately, my vintage wines were all locked up." Late last month Sievers's shop, Frische Paradies in Hamburg, was the victim of one of the most inventive - and possibly the funniest, though not to him - raids in German criminal history. At 10.15am on April 28, a group of activists dressed as superheroes burst into his gourmet supermarket. Wearing carnival masks and calling themselves names such as Spider Mum, Multiflex, Sante Guevara and Operaistorix, they made off with a trolley loaded with luxury goods.

"They took a whole slab of Australian Wagyu Kobe beef. It cost €108," says Siefers. "The cows had been specially massaged. We also have some very fine cheese here from Philippe Olivier. He's a very tough and famous cheesemaker. They took that too."

Their €1,500 haul also included olive oil, bio-cheese, a haunch of Serrano ham and Valrhona chocolate. The group - known as the Robin Hood gang - handed over a flower to the woman at the till. Attached to it was a note, which read: "Although we produce Hamburg's wealth we scarcely enjoy any of it. The sources of wealth are many. So are the opportunities to take it."

Pausing long enough to pose for photographs, the Robin Hood gang then vanished into the warren of houses and stepped gardens overlooking Hamburg's picturesque Elbe River.

The police arrived 10 minutes later. A helicopter and 14 police cars failed to find them. "I went after them. But all I found was a plastic bag," recalls sales assistant Silke Neuhoff. The raid provoked front-page stories in Hamburg and elsewhere - not least because it appeared to be inspired by the hit German film The Edukators. (In it, a group of young radicals stage a series of political burglaries against the rich, leaving behind a note: "Die fetten Jahre sind vorbei - Your days of plenty are over." The group don't take anything but end up accidentally kidnapping a wealthy businessman.) So far, as in the film, the Robin Hood gang hasn't been arrested.

In a note posted on the internet the gang said it had distributed the food among Germany's new underclass - interns who worked for months in glamorous publishing houses without being paid, low-wage nursery assistants, mums forced to take part-time jobs as cleaning ladies and "one-euro jobbers", performing menial tasks under a German government welfare scheme. The gang said it didn't merely object to capitalism. Instead it was making a stand against Prekarisierung or "precariousness" - the uncertainty facing 20- and lower 30somethings as they try to navigate their way through Europe's gloomy neo-liberal jobs market.

"To survive under the present conditions of precariousness you need to be a superhero," says Multiflex, after agreeing to meet the Guardian at a secret location. In her first interview with a newspaper since the gang staged the raid, she tells me that surviving on a low budget in Hamburg is tough. Of all the German cities, it has the highest number of millionaires and at the same time there is a growing number of people who don't share in this wealth. "We wanted to make a connection with the film," she says. Wasn't she afraid she might get caught, though? "It was a risk. But it was a well-planned operation. We were very organised. We tried to do it all with a bit of humour." How did the gang escape? "We flew away," she says, twinkling her eyes.

The group that carried out last month's raid, it turns out, goes under the name Hamburg Umsonst (Hamburg for free). Its slogan reads: "Everything for everybody. And everything for free." They meet in the city's Hafenstrasse, a row of brightly coloured riverside houses, that was once the scene of violent clashes between police and squatters. These days the squatters own the houses, with the grizzled veterans of the original street battles now in their 40s and 50s. But the area - with its rambling front gardens and communal barbecues overlooked by Hamburg's giant port cranes - is still the centre of the city's thriving alternative scene.

But unlike these older leftists, Hamburg Umsonst is a newer movement, loosely affiliated to a growing network of young anti-capitalist protesters from across Europe. The movement started off in Milan in 2001. It has now spread to more than a dozen European cities, including Paris, Palermo, Stockholm, Helsinki and London, and its main event is May Day.

May 1 is a traditional day of workers' protest in many European countries. But the techniques of Euromayday, as has been dubbed, differ from traditional demos. Since it was founded in 2003, Hamburg Umsonst has staged other eye-catching actions. It gives regular tips on fare-dodging, sneaking into the cinema for free and file-sharing. (Fare dodgers are urged to identify themselves with a pink dot.) A year ago, members burst into a Michelin-starred restaurant in Blakenese, a posh Hamburg suburb overlooking the Elbe, favoured by the rich and famous. Around 20 protesters wearing carnival masks marched into the restaurant ballroom and emptied the entire buffet into plastic bags. They then ran off. The protesters wore T-shirts which read: "Die fetten Jahre sind vorbei" - a clear homage to The Edukators and another example of life imitating art.

Protesters staged a similar raid on Borchardt, a Berlin celebrity and politician-filled restaurant. They were chucked out. Santa Guevara, another caped activist, says the gang would like a basic income for everybody, regardless of what people actually do for a living. What exactly is precariousness about? "There are all sorts of people who are affected by precariousness. It's a feeling of uncertainty. More and more people feel excluded from basic things like health care, paid holidays, maternity leave and job security. We are not just talking about the unemployed. We are also talking about graduates."

It used to be the working classes who were mainly affected by precariousness. Now, though, the sons and daughters of Europe's professional middle-classes are affected too.

Like the students in France who recently forced their government to rescind its new employment law, which made it easier to hire and fire young people, the Robin Hood gang say they are fed up with being unable to find proper work. The students were demonstrating against precarité or precariousness - the same sociological cause that prompted the Robin Hood gang's raid on the Frische Paradies. Interestingly, it was students, rather than trade unionists, who led the protest movement. But it is not just the French who are unhappy with the direction that European capitalism is taking. The traditional post-war economic model in France and Germany has been the "European social model" in which high wages, secure jobs, and decent pensions have been guaranteed. But, in the face of global competition, that has come under strain. The prosperity that Europe's last generation of rebels took for granted - the '68-ers - seems to have disappeared.

In Hamburg, meanwhile, the group's special wrath is reserved for German companies that exploit interns. Typically, German interns work for long periods - often to be let go after months of underpaid slogging. They are then forced to take another internship somewhere else, a process that can drag on into a graduate's early 30s. "We gave some of the food to four Praktikanten [interns] who work in a Hamburg publishing house," Santa Guevara says.

"What we are seeing now is an interesting switch," says Prof Paul Nolte, a cultural historian at Berlin's Free University. "Traditional protests in the 1980s were concerned with post-materialist issues such as the environment, ecology and nuclear energy. Now young people are interested in social issues."

He adds: "We are talking about young, relatively well-educated people whose parents easily attained secure jobs and middle-class status. The situation now is far more insecure. For the first time in many generations, young people in Europe have bleaker prospects than their parents did. They are not as optimistic or utopian as people were in the 60s, or as pessimistic and depressed as they were in the 80s. Instead they find themselves having to walk a tightrope."

The Euromayday protesters, meanwhile, are a media-savvy bunch. Within hours of looting the delicatessen, the Robin Hood gang posted photographs of themselves on the internet. (One showed them sitting in a children's sandpit waving their goodies in the air. Another showed Spider Mum doing a victory leap in front of a Kindergarten). The gang also sent the pictures to Hamburg's main tabloid, the Hamburger Morgenpost. The Mopo, as it's known, put a photo on the front page under the headline: "Class struggle ahead of May Day".

Hamburg's police, meanwhile, are not amused. "Hamburg has always been a very tolerant city which allows many different opinions. We are not Bavarians. This is north Germany. Traditionally this is the freedom-loving part of the country," says a spokeswoman for Hamburg police. But, she adds: "We are talking here about theft. It is forbidden. This was criminal activity. We can't tolerate it, even if they say they were behaving like Robin Hood." Hamburg's Staatschutz, or state protection unit, is investigating. It admits, however, that it stands little chance of identifying the 30 people who raided the supermarket, all of whom were masked.

Sievers feels his shop was the wrong target. It is in the centre of Hamburg's old fish trading area; the road is lined with wholesale shops selling crustaceans. The ferry to Britain used to leave from the nearby harbour. "We were just a symbol," he says. "It's true that a lot of well-off people buy groceries here. But we fight for every cent. We are not a rich company."

The till assistant who was given the flower by the group, Katya Griebenow, says she found the raid a bit scary. "I stood rooted to the spot," she says. "The whole thing took about 30 seconds. They didn't say anything at all. But when they left they started screaming for joy." Did she feel exploited? "I'm not sure," she says.

The shop regularly donates surplus poultry and vegetables to Hamburg charities. "If I had a message for the gang," says Sievers, "I would say, 'Try and come with an idea next time that doesn't involve crime.'"
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www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1776357,00.html
 
Superperv?

Search On For Mysterious Underwear Man

POSTED: 6:17 pm EDT May 26, 2006
UPDATED: 6:46 pm EDT May 26, 2006

ST. CLAIRSVILLE, Ohio -- Police are on the lookout for a mysterious man in St. Clairsville walking around in his underwear.

They said the mysterious man has been seen standing around the fence at St. Clairsville Middle School – not just once, but twice.

What he wore around the school is the strangest part. Police reported that it is almost a costume: red silk underwear with a Superman T-shift.

St. Clairsville Police Chief Martin Kendzora said that they have received two calls in the last two weeks about this man behind the fence during school hours.

Kendzora said his station will be on the lookout because with summer approaching and kids on the play area without faculty supervision, the man could be dangerous.

"We will be constantly alert looking for that individual. There comes a concern to us when we receive this kind of report, especially an individual that's supposed to have red underwear on,” Kendzora said.

Kendzora said as of Friday, they are not looking to charge the man with anything. They just want to understand what he is doing in the area and get him to stop.

Police are asking anyone who has seen this man to contact the St. Clairsville Police Department.

------------
Amy Post, NEWS9

Copyright 2006 by wtov9.com.
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www.wtov9.com/news/9282630/detail.html
 
Ah, everyone's favourite religious right figure head.

Did Pat Robertson Leg-Press 2,000 Lbs?
'700 Club' Host Credits Protein Shake For Feat Of Strength

VIRGINIA BEACH, Va., May 26, 2006
This photo from the Christian Broadcasting Network shows religious broadcaster Pat Robertson leg pressing what is claimed to be 2,000 pounds at the fitness center at Regent University campus in Virginia Beach, Va., Feb. 1, 2003. (AP Photo)

Quote
"Where in the world did Robertson even find a machine that could hold 2,000 pounds at one time?"
Clay Travis
CBS Sportsline


(CBS/AP) Religious broadcaster Pat Robertson says he has leg-pressed 2,000 pounds, but some say he'd be in a pretty tough spot if he tried.

The "700 Club" host's feat of strength is recounted on the Web site of his Christian Broadcasting Network, in a posting headlined "How Pat Robertson Leg Pressed 2,000 Pounds."

According to the CBN Web site, Robertson worked his way up to lifting a ton with the help of his physician, who is not named. The posting does not say when the lift occurred, but a CBN spokeswoman released photos to The Associated Press that she said showed Robertson lifting 2,000 pounds in 2003, when Robertson was 73. He is now 76.

The Web posting said two men loaded the leg-press machine with 2,000 pounds "and then let it down on Mr. Robertson, who pushed it up one rep and let it go back down again." The Web site said several people witnessed the event, and shows video of Robertson leg-pressing what appears to be 1,000 pounds.

Clay Travis of CBS SportsLine.com called the 2,000-pound assertion impossible in a column this week, writing that the leg-press record for football players at Florida State University is 665 pounds less.

"Where in the world did Robertson even find a machine that could hold 2,000 pounds at one time?" Travis asked.

Andy Zucker, a strength-training coach at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, said leg presses of more than 1,000 pounds represent "a Herculean effort, and 2,000 pounds is a whole other story."

"If he was able to lift that much weight, I take my hat off to him, but the numbers suggest that people who lift that much weight are few and far between," Zucker said. "One would have to see what type of leg press it was on and under what parameters it was done."

CBN spokeswoman Angell Vasko said Friday that Robertson was not available for comment because he was "out of pocket" for the long holiday weekend.

Vasko said she has not seen Robertson leg-press 2,000 pounds but that it's not "a huge shocker" that he could.

"Pat is so healthy," she said. "This is something he trained for over an extended period of time. He lives a very healthy, regimented life."

One of the photos Vasko released had a digital date stamp of 1994, although she said Robertson performed the leg press in 2003. Vasko said that perhaps the date was not set properly on the camera.

The CBN Web site attributes Robertson's energy in part to "his age-defying protein shake." The site offers a recipe for the shake, which contains ingredients such as soy protein isolate, whey protein isolate, flaxseed oil and apple cider vinegar.
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source

Feats of superhuman strength? An age-defying protein shake?
Pat is clearly God's own superhero.
 
ProfessorF said:
Ah, everyone's favourite religious right figure head.

Did Pat Robertson Leg-Press 2,000 Lbs?
'700 Club' Host Credits Protein Shake For Feat Of Strength

VIRGINIA BEACH, Va., May 26, 2006
This photo from the Christian Broadcasting Network shows religious broadcaster Pat Robertson leg pressing what is claimed to be 2,000 pounds at the fitness center at Regent University campus in Virginia Beach, Va., Feb. 1, 2003. (AP Photo)

Quote
"Where in the world did Robertson even find a machine that could hold 2,000 pounds at one time?"
Clay Travis
CBS Sportsline


(CBS/AP) Religious broadcaster Pat Robertson says he has leg-pressed 2,000 pounds, but some say he'd be in a pretty tough spot if he tried.

The "700 Club" host's feat of strength is recounted on the Web site of his Christian Broadcasting Network, in a posting headlined "How Pat Robertson Leg Pressed 2,000 Pounds."

According to the CBN Web site, Robertson worked his way up to lifting a ton with the help of his physician, who is not named. The posting does not say when the lift occurred, but a CBN spokeswoman released photos to The Associated Press that she said showed Robertson lifting 2,000 pounds in 2003, when Robertson was 73. He is now 76.

The Web posting said two men loaded the leg-press machine with 2,000 pounds "and then let it down on Mr. Robertson, who pushed it up one rep and let it go back down again." The Web site said several people witnessed the event, and shows video of Robertson leg-pressing what appears to be 1,000 pounds.

Clay Travis of CBS SportsLine.com called the 2,000-pound assertion impossible in a column this week, writing that the leg-press record for football players at Florida State University is 665 pounds less.

"Where in the world did Robertson even find a machine that could hold 2,000 pounds at one time?" Travis asked.

Andy Zucker, a strength-training coach at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, said leg presses of more than 1,000 pounds represent "a Herculean effort, and 2,000 pounds is a whole other story."

"If he was able to lift that much weight, I take my hat off to him, but the numbers suggest that people who lift that much weight are few and far between," Zucker said. "One would have to see what type of leg press it was on and under what parameters it was done."

CBN spokeswoman Angell Vasko said Friday that Robertson was not available for comment because he was "out of pocket" for the long holiday weekend.

Vasko said she has not seen Robertson leg-press 2,000 pounds but that it's not "a huge shocker" that he could.

"Pat is so healthy," she said. "This is something he trained for over an extended period of time. He lives a very healthy, regimented life."

One of the photos Vasko released had a digital date stamp of 1994, although she said Robertson performed the leg press in 2003. Vasko said that perhaps the date was not set properly on the camera.

The CBN Web site attributes Robertson's energy in part to "his age-defying protein shake." The site offers a recipe for the shake, which contains ingredients such as soy protein isolate, whey protein isolate, flaxseed oil and apple cider vinegar.
Click to expand...
source

Feats of superhuman strength? An age-defying protein shake?
Pat is clearly God's own superhero.
Click to expand...

Hmmm, interesting find.

A 1,000 is tough even for worldclass bodybuilders.

"If he was able to lift that much weight, I take my hat off to him, but the numbers suggest that people who lift that much weight are few and far between," Zucker said. "One would have to see what type of leg press it was on and under what parameters it was done."
Click to expand...

True it could depend on the leg press and would the gym he did it at have enough weights to throw 2,000 pounds on the machine.

Any link to the photo?

Notice how he's a religious broadcaster so I wonder.
[/quote]
 
Wonder if it's been Photoshopped as I've never seen a leg press machine like that.

The bottom weights look like they've been added onto it. One looks like a dumbell hanging off it too.

Strange he was 73 too.

I can barely do about 661 pounds on a leg press at the most and I'm a youngin.
 
Mighty_Emperor said:
Superperv?

Search On For Mysterious Underwear Man

POSTED: 6:17 pm EDT May 26, 2006
UPDATED: 6:46 pm EDT May 26, 2006

ST. CLAIRSVILLE, Ohio -- Police are on the lookout for a mysterious man in St. Clairsville walking around in his underwear.

They said the mysterious man has been seen standing around the fence at St. Clairsville Middle School – not just once, but twice.

What he wore around the school is the strangest part. Police reported that it is almost a costume: red silk underwear with a Superman T-shift.

St. Clairsville Police Chief Martin Kendzora said that they have received two calls in the last two weeks about this man behind the fence during school hours.

Kendzora said his station will be on the lookout because with summer approaching and kids on the play area without faculty supervision, the man could be dangerous.

"We will be constantly alert looking for that individual. There comes a concern to us when we receive this kind of report, especially an individual that's supposed to have red underwear on,” Kendzora said.

Kendzora said as of Friday, they are not looking to charge the man with anything. They just want to understand what he is doing in the area and get him to stop.

Police are asking anyone who has seen this man to contact the St. Clairsville Police Department.

------------
Amy Post, NEWS9

Copyright 2006 by wtov9.com.
Click to expand...

www.wtov9.com/news/9282630/detail.html
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Hahah, I thought that said underwater man at first. :lol:

Strange how he's dressed like Superman though.
 
Perhaps he's hoping that the Superman-esque getup will draw kids to him. :?
 
More Super Strength Manifesting
Teacher With 'Superhuman Strength' Arrested By Cops

ORLANDO, Fla. -- A high school physical education teacher was relieved of duty Monday after police arrested him over the weekend for allegedly creating a scene outside of a downtown bar and fighting several officers who tried to arrest him.

Police first saw David McCann, 30, standing in front of a bar Saturday at 2 a.m., shirt unbuttoned and yelling he was "Luke Skywalker" at passers-by, according to the incident report. An officer asked him to leave after McCann allegedly got into a verbal confrontation with two women.

McCann then allegedly charged the officer, who sprayed him in the face with an irritant. Two officers tried unsuccessfully to handcuff him as McCann wildly swung his fists, the report says. The incident further escalated, with McCann continuing to allegedly attack officers after he was repeatedly kicked and struck with a baton. Officers also used a stun gun to attempt to subdue him.

"He continued to attack with super human strength and made no attempt to escape," according to the report. McCann was finally brought under control when two responding officers struck him three times with a Taser and another hit him four more times with a baton, according to the report.

He was arrested on charges of battery on a law enforcement officer, resisting arrest with violence and disorderly conduct. Three officers received bruises and other minor injuries, the incident report said.

The Orange County School District said McCann had worked there for two years, but the district already decided before the arrest not to renew his annual contract for next year.
Click to expand...

... feel the force....
 
MrRING said:
More Super Strength Manifesting
Teacher With 'Superhuman Strength' Arrested By Cops

ORLANDO, Fla. -- A high school physical education teacher was relieved of duty Monday after police arrested him over the weekend for allegedly creating a scene outside of a downtown bar and fighting several officers who tried to arrest him.

Police first saw David McCann, 30, standing in front of a bar Saturday at 2 a.m., shirt unbuttoned and yelling he was "Luke Skywalker" at passers-by, according to the incident report. An officer asked him to leave after McCann allegedly got into a verbal confrontation with two women.

McCann then allegedly charged the officer, who sprayed him in the face with an irritant. Two officers tried unsuccessfully to handcuff him as McCann wildly swung his fists, the report says. The incident further escalated, with McCann continuing to allegedly attack officers after he was repeatedly kicked and struck with a baton. Officers also used a stun gun to attempt to subdue him.

"He continued to attack with super human strength and made no attempt to escape," according to the report. McCann was finally brought under control when two responding officers struck him three times with a Taser and another hit him four more times with a baton, according to the report.

He was arrested on charges of battery on a law enforcement officer, resisting arrest with violence and disorderly conduct. Three officers received bruises and other minor injuries, the incident report said.

The Orange County School District said McCann had worked there for two years, but the district already decided before the arrest not to renew his annual contract for next year.
Click to expand...

... feel the force....
Click to expand...

HULK SMASH! :lol:
 
Dinner, dinner, dinner, dinner:

Special forces to use strap-on 'Batwings'


By MATTHEW HICKLEY, Daily Mail 13:33pm 6th June 2006


Elite special forces troops being dropped behind enemy lines on covert missions are to ditch their traditional parachutes in favour of strap-on stealth wings.

The lightweight carbon fibre mono-wings will allow them to jump from high altitudes and then glide 120 miles or more before landing - making them almost impossible to spot, as their aircraft can avoid flying anywhere near the target.

The technology was demonstrated in spectacular fashion three years ago when Austrian daredevil Felix Baumgartner - a pioneer of freefall gliding - famously 'flew' across the English Channel, leaping out of an aircraft 30,000ft above Dover and landing safely near Calais 12 minutes later.

Wearing an aerodynamic suit, and with a 6ft wide wing strapped to his back, he soared across the sea at 220mph, moving six feet forward through the air for every one foot he fell vertically - and opened his parachute 1,000ft above the ground before landing safely.

'Massive potential'

Now military scientists have realised the massive potential for secret military missions.

Currently special forces such as the SAS rely on a variety of parachute techniques to land behind enemy lines - or else they must be dropped by helicopter.

Existing steerable square parachutes can be used - opened at high altitude of 27,000 ft - but jumpers then have to struggle to control them for long periods, often in high winds and extreme cold, while breathing from an oxygen tank to stay alive.

Alternatively they can freefall from high altitude, opening their parachutes at the last possible minute, but that limits the distance they can 'glide' forward from the drop point to just a few miles.

Now German company ESG has developed the strap-on rigid wing specifically for special forces use.

Resembling a 6ft-wide pair of aircraft wings, the devices should allow a parachutist to glide up to 120miles, carrying 200lb of equipment, the manufacturers claim.

Fitted with oxygen supply, stabilisation and navigation aides, troops wearing the wings will jump from a high-altitude transport aircraft which can stay far away from enemy territory - or on secret peacetime missions could avoid detection or suspicion by staying close to commercial airliner flight paths.

The manufacturers claim the ESG wing is '100 per cent silent' and 'extremely difficult' to track using radar.

Once close to their target landing zone, the troops pull their parachute rip cord to open their canopy and then land normally.

Weapons, ammunition, food and water can all be stowed inside the wing, although concealing the 6ft wings after landing could prove harder than burying a traditional parachute.

ESG claims the next stage of development will be fitting 'small turbo-jet drives' to the wings to extend range even further.

According to SAS insiders, very few operational parachute jumps have taken place in recent years, with teams tending to rely more on helicopters or other means of transport.

Supporters of the new mono-wing technology hope it will give a new lease of life to parachute tactics in the special forces world.

The Ministry of Defence would not comment on any equipment used by special forces, but is expected to evaluate the new system for use by UK special forces.
Click to expand...

With piccie:
Source
 
That would rock to wear one of them.

When the Sas drop agents from Helicopters how high can they drop them from without a pacrachute.

Well if those gliders can hold 200lbs of equipment then a fat person can surely glide easily on them.
 
MaxMolyneux said:
When the Sas drop agents from Helicopters how high can they drop them from without a pacrachute.
Click to expand...
Depends. Not very high, though, especially if they're carrying 200lbs of equipment.
Well if those gliders can hold 200lbs of equipment then a fat person can surely glide easily on them.
Click to expand...
A great boon to all the airborne division of Weight Watchers, then.
 
stuneville said:
Well if those gliders can hold 200lbs of equipment then a fat person can surely glide easily on them.
Click to expand...
A great boon to all the airborne division of Weight Watchers, then.
Click to expand...

:lol: Well pretend secret ops missions wearing them could help them be active hence losing weight without meetings were they only just talk.

So they'd move more than just their mouths. :twisted:
 
MaxMolyneux said:
That would rock to wear one of them.

When the Sas drop agents from Helicopters how high can they drop them from without a pacrachute?
Click to expand...
I don't think it's being suggested that they wear these instead of a parachute - after all, even if you could glide almost horizontally with such wings, your air speed would be something pretty huge. There was a guy wearing a suit like this on BBC Top Gear the other week, who jumped from a helicopter and raced a car downhill for a couple of miles. He had to open a lightweight parachute near the end, as much to scrub off horizontal speed as vertical. Still a pretty amazing thing to see, though.
 
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