Michael Demmons (mail) (www):
I've seen this before. In a parallel universe, I believe that REALLY hurt!!
9.30.2006 2:57pm
B. Durbin (www):
pumpupthemovie.com used to have a game based on this, but even with Flash upgraded I can't see the site. Try it and see if it's just my setup.
9.30.2006 4:05pm
MaryJ:
Giggle giggle
9.30.2006 5:35pm
Dean Esmay:
I actually worry a bit when I watch this. I wonder if the girl didn't hit her head on the rim. She seems to be clutching her head a bit and the guys seem to be too preoccupied to noice. I hope she was okay. But I'm hoping it was no big thing and that otherwise they wouldn't have used the footage for the movie.

Still, really, that girl might really have hurt herself. If the back of her head had hit the rim at exactly the wrong point it really could have hurt her bad.

Not trying to be a party-pooper. I'm just saying, it doesn't seem like the guys were being quite protective enough of their partner in this affair.
9.30.2006 8:51pm
Rosemary Esmay (www):
One of my peeps tells me that this video is a CGI fake done more than 2 years ago.
9.30.2006 10:40pm
Ronald Coleman (mail) (www):
It would be monumentally stupid to really try to do this. Like potentially fatal. I bet Rosemary's right.
9.30.2006 11:28pm
Dean Esmay:
It's from this movie: Pump Up The Movie. Which is about college (and I assume late High School) cheerleading.

The official web site includes this clip. If it's faked they did an awfully good job of it. I would agree that it's a dangerous stunt but I'd like to see a source on claims that it's faked. Kids do dumber things every day--just watch any "Xtreme sports" competition.
10.1.2006 12:23am
Ymarsakar (www):
Obviously if the girl and the guys were willing to do this, they were going to have to take some chances. The one thing they should have done was get a neck support strap. Because if she actually had went directly down into the hoop while hitting the back of her head, it might have disconnected a vertebrae or caused hematoma to the autonomic centers of the brain that controls breathing. But since her back hit the rim first and skidded, it removed some of the instantaeous force for when her head hit the rim as well. So it was a good thing for her that she was slightly inaccurate and that she had in fact, a horizontal component to her speed as well as vertical.

The back of the neck, the ganglia that connects to the brain, is one of the critical spots. People are lucky to get whiplash syndromes if they get injured on that spot. Unconsciousness and stunning, if unlucky.
10.1.2006 6:52am
Russell Newquist (www):
I don't have a source, but I do remember seeing this video sometime back along with allegations that it was faked.

As somebody who's worked in CGI before, it *looks* faked to me. Notice her body as she goes through the hoop. It's not straight - she has a slight bend at the waist (although her head and toes do appear to be in a line perpendicular from the floor). At that angle, I don't think she could have fit through the hoop. Even for a tiny girl like that, those things are pretty small to go through.

I can't put my finger on the rest, and this video format doesn't allow good frame-by-frame analysis, but her motion doesn't look natural, either. Something's off about it.

It's a pretty good fake, but my eye still says fake.
10.2.2006 2:05pm