Shocking Death at Championship

A Russian finalist Vladimir Ladyzhenskiy in the sauna world championships collapsed and died after withstanding a temperature of 110 degrees Celsius for six minutes.



How crazy is this?? He basically cooked himself to death while spectators cheered.

The point of the competition is to see who can last the longest in the hottest sauna. But don't forget that steam is actually hotter than boiling water. The whole idea seems crazy no matter how you slice it.

One man died of severe burns.

And the "champion" is hospitalized in serious condition.

What are your thoughts?

To be honest I just do not see the point of this contest? Is it just a pain tolerance contest - if so you could make things much safer. Just seeing how much of a scalding you can take isn't really a great thing in my view. I have no idea why you'd do it

...I spent some time in one of those extremely hot saunas in Kazakhstan. Had to breath slow to avoid burning my nostrils. It had stairs and the higher up you sat, and the more water you put on the rocks in the fire the hotter it was. The people there said it was very good for their health. I don't think people normally just fall over dead. I'd imagine they pass out (heat stroke) and are quickly then removed. As to a "Sauna World Championships" I wonder if you're pulling our leg.

It is on the webpages of the tabloids over here - thank you google for digging it up

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1301281/Vladimir-Ladyzhenskiy-dies-World-Sauna-Championships-Finland.html
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/europe/russian-man-dies-during-world-sauna-championship/article1665909/
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/aug/08/sauna-championship-russian-dead

Well crap. It's real.

That's insane!

I mean, I've done it. Just like that. But not as a competition. Clearly something really bad was going to happen sooner or later. The adding of the water... I guess water transfers heat much faster than dry air. Perhaps the humidity was much higher than they realized this time.

It is a nice feeling by the way. Except for the skin actually burning. I remember they would hit each other on the back with leaf covered switches. The idea just being moving the air faster over your body would transfer more heat to your skin.

Such a dangerous thing to do in general. I imagine it takes a certain maturity for an entire culture to practice it. Can't imagine such being done in the US.

i can't believe it