Air Guitar Championships

In my first two years of college at NM Tech, the motley crew in my dormitory, in particular, the alarming folks at the east end of West Hall, who called themselves "The Hoovers" (because they sucked) would have given these guys a good run for the grand prize:

On sober reflection, Guillaume de Tonquedec probably shouldn't have tried to dive into the audience at the climax of his performance at the Air Guitar World Championships here on Friday night.

Instead of enveloping him in its warm embrace, the crowd drew back in fear, leaving De Tonquedec, the French national champion (stage name: Moche Pitt), to belly-flop directly onto the ground.

...The world championships, which began as an offshoot of Oulu's annual music video festival, have been held for 12 years in this small city of low wooden houses on Finland's west coast. This year, 19 men and one woman from 17 countries competed in the finals, trying to demonstrate to a panel of judges their charisma, technical skill and "airness."

"To be honest, airness is an American term, and I have no idea what it means," said the New Zealand competitor, John Gerrand.

It was hard to gauge how seriously the contestants took the whole enterprise. On one hand, they had all managed to make their way to an obscure part of Finland. On the other hand, at the precompetition news conference, many seemed slightly dazed, as if they had just gotten out of bed, even though it was 3 p.m.

"Let's rock!" they yelled sporadically to the assembled reporters when they couldn't think of what else to say.

The competitors had several hours between the news conference and the competition to gather their wits, mess up their hair and apply their Spandex. Some outfits were more successful than others. The snug red underpants worn by the Spanish contestant, David Moreno Gil, kept riding above his substantial hips even as his shirt and pants - a skintight leopard-print ensemble - migrated unflatteringly in opposite directions.

Moreno Gil, who billed himself as Moreno del Metal, pronounced himself unperturbed. "People say we are freaks, killers," said Moreno Gil, who dubs pornographic films into Spanish for a living. "I say, all you need is air."