Recently there have been many sporting events grabbing headlines: Roger Federer winning his 5th straight Wimbledon, the MLB All-Star Game, and David Beckham’s debut for the Los Angeles Galaxy. But really, who cares about that stuff? Real men compete in contests that involve carrying women, dude.

For some reason, coverage of the 12th annual world-wife carrying championships held in Sonkajarvi, Finland were not televised, even on ESPN2, which is basically the Nordstrom’s Rack of sports television. Although the competition is supposedly rooted in the legend of Finnish bandit Rosvo-Ronkainen who made people run through the forest with sacks on their backs, I have lived in Finland, and I know better. Some Finnish guys drank a  whole mess of Koskenkorva, went in the sauna, cursed Sweden for a while, noted the merits of things that taste like black licorice (see salmiakki), jumped in the lake, had some more Koskenkorva, discussed the implications of changes in the Nokia Networks board of directors, and then decided it would be pretty cool to have a race revolving around the carrying of wives.

The event forces competitors run a course with pools of water and a few different hurdles while carrying their wives however they choose to, and this year’s event was won by Estonian Madis Uusorg. That’s right, Uusorg. Something tells me a guy named “Chance” a) would have a hard time finding a wife at all, and b) will never, ever win the wife-carrying race. Uusorg won with an impressive time of 61.7 seconds to complete the course, and he took home a prize of his wife’s weight in beer and a plasma screen tv. If there is a better reward for anything, I’d like to know it…

The obesity epidemic in this country means that we are unlikely to see widespread participation in such a sport stateside (thank you very much, “Baconator”), so the search for a NASCAR usurper continues. However, with a wife as malnourished as his, Becks might be able to dominate this one too…