You were the first, and probably the best. Thanks for giving us all the inspiration to try things we never thought possible.
And thanks for teaching us what it meant to be a man... and a bad ass. No Fear. :evil:

Jim Rome: Evel, going into the jump -- the Snake River jump -- what were your chances, in your own mind? I mean, very clearly you understood the danger for all of the stunts, but when you went into that one...
Evel Knievel: Fifty-fifty.
Jim Rome: Fifty-fifty you thought?
Evel Knievel: Fifty-fifty. Yeah. I put a lot of faith in an engineer named Bob Truax who built the rocket for me. He was an egotistical, know-it-all little bastard. He'd worked on that Polaris program for the government for a long time. He worked with the astronauts that thought they knew what they were doing when they burnt Gus Grissom to death with two other astronauts on that launch pad down at Cape Canaveral. This guy, uh, he built the parachute so it absolutely malfunctioned because of the g-load. He's the one that caused the accident.
Evel Knievel: The way I look at it, though, if I'd've made it, everybody would've said, "It was easy." If I'd've missed it and died, everybody would've said, "That's what's supposed to be what happens to daredevils like him." But I didn't. I landed down on those rocks and in that water and I don't see no big long line of daredevils standing up there, wanting to take a shot at it and here it is almost thirty years later.
Jim Rome: Hey Evel, let me ask you something: If you thought it was fifty-fifty, if you thought that you only had a coin-flip's chance of survival, a coin-flip's chance that you might buy it and die...why do it?
Evel Knievel: ...
Evel Knievel: Do you know who the hell I am?

:cry:

"I wear this red, white, and blue number one on my shoulder because I think I'm the best...in my business, you have to think you're the best or you could wind up dead. Because when you do what I do for a living, you've got to have a positive mental attitude. If you don't have that positive mental attitude when you make that jump, then you've got to be man enough to handle the consequences. Anybody can jump a motorcycle. The trouble begins when you try to land it."

Bummer, I didn't know about this until read your post.

Wow. He just settled his lawsuit with Kayne West the other day over the Touch the Sky video. Kayne should have held out a few more days.

Jim Rome: So what did you think your chances [of jumping the Snake River Canyon on a rocket-powered bike] were?
Evel Knievel: Fifty-fifty.
Jim Rome: Fifty-fifty?
Evel Knievel: Fifty-fifty. The rocket had been designed by Bob Truax Jr., an egotistical know-it-all little bastard who was one of the engineers at NASA who was there when they burned Gus Grissom to death on the launch pad. He built the parachute so that it absolutely would fail under the G-load. But the way I see it: If I had made it, no one would've cared. If I'd died, they would've said, "Well that's what's supposed to happen to daredevils." Here it is thirty years later and I don't see no bunch of Daredevils lining up to take a shot at it.
Jim Rome: So if you had a fifty-fifty chance, a coin-flip's chance to survive, why did you do it?
Evel Knievel: ...
Evel Knievel: Do you know who the hell I am?

:cry:

Yeah. I saw some special or something a few months back on Evel and I'm pretty sure that interview was in it. Man, that guy was something else. If ever there was a definition of ego and alpha male, there'd be a picture of him.