LUGE?!? To most Yalies, luge is only a tangential jibe at a Kantian analysis of logical-metaphysical univeralism. But for Keelus Miles, BR '95, it's a way of life.
Luge, for those of you hopelessly out of the loop, is the extremely popular sport in which an individual, wearing more lycra and spandex than even the fattest Yale joggers, plummets in an erect position down a long, cold tube and hopefully does it faster than everyone else. Despite the inherent risks - butt chafing, the occasional major hair faux pas, death - luge has become the largest spectator sport in America, surpassing the common tapeworm, according to Francis Guelph, luge activist and author of the play The Phantom of the Luge.
For Miles, the art of luge has given him a ticket out of the poorest section of downtown Philadelphia. "After school when I was growing up, we'd all go down to the playground and plummet in an erect position down a long, cold tube. It was an escape from the violence around us," Miles, an English major, said.
Thousands of kids in America's inner cities dream of a way out and, for most, luge is the only way. "It's what kept me out of drugs," Miles said. "Everyone pressured me to sell coke, but I would just say, 'No, man. Cokeheads don't win gold medals in luge, man.' Eyes on the prize and all that."
The practice paid off. Miles racked up dozens of championships in high school, including the prestigious Harvard/Poulan Weed Eater Luge-Off in 1989. "Winning the Poulan was the turning point for me," Miles said. "Before that, I was thinking about putt-putt golf for a living. But at Poulan there were all the big name coaches - Dick Brodhead, Mario Cuomo, Dean Smith - and I caught their attention."
"He's a talent, all right," Brodhead said. "He's got nice form. When he plummets in that erect position down the long, cold tube, he's always very erect and the tube is always very long and cold." Insiders have speculated that Brodhead's recent resignation as dean of Yale College [see related story, page one] is aimed at making more time available for coaching Miles.
Not everyone made it out of the inner city, Miles knows. He tearfully recounts the story of his best friend in high school, Floyd Turner. "Floyd had it all, luge-wise. Very erect, very cold. ESPN profiled him. 'The next Ranko Dlivits,' they called him. He was that good.
"He helped me a lot. He'd get my competitive fires going. When he'd beat me, it would get me to plummet that much more erectly."
But then Turner's career came to a tragic end. In 1990, when Turner was about to get a luge scholarship to perennial power Arkansas-Pine Bluff to study under the Finnish master Axel Ojala, he lost a finger in a freak sandwich accident. "He was fixing a BLT - God, how he loved those BLTs! - and let his finger slip between the bacon and the lettuce. Then he bit his own finger off." Miles tears up just talking about it. "At first, he just thought 'oh, a tough little tomato, eh?' He was so innocent. The waste."
A severed finger would be mere disfigurement for most, but for Turner, the loss of aerodynamics took him out of the upper echelon of lugers. "I worry about the guy," Miles said. "He's got nothing to live for. Last I heard, he was a Congressman."
So Miles has lived his dream. Now, you may be saying to yourself, "Why would a promising young luger come to Yale and not a school with a more established varsity luge program, like Arizona State or Southwestern Louisiana?" Then again, you may be saying to yourself, "What is that smell? I thought I told that bastard next door to cut the crap with the damned water rats!" I don't know you that well (aside from that one night at DKE - sorry I haven't called), and I can't read minds, all right.
But Miles, who just signed a six-year contract with the Cokato (Minn.) Lugin' Lutherans, isn't worried about losing a finger - or a match. Currently ranked #1 in Branford College Entryway D (3rd floor), Miles can already taste professional victory. Let's hope it doesn't taste like a finger.
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