An Underdog No More
 FWOMP Interviews Joshua Davis

Interviewed by Byron Merritt

The dichotomy of Joshua Davis is fairly profound. Basically he’s a little guy (129 lbs.) with larger-than-life ambitions--be it Sumo wrestling or bullfighting. His life and experiences have taken him around the world, enabling readers of his first nonfiction book, The Underdog, to meet up with some of the most obscure yet interesting people they’ve probably never heard of (backward running champion, Mr. Veerabadran?) His impressive website also lists an incredible array of bizarre world competitions that most people never knew existed, including wife carrying, the yoga championship, and chess boxing just to name a few.

Josh’s book really grabbed me from the get-go. Not only are the competitions he entered surprisingly interesting, if not downright dangerous at times, but his able writing style and comedic narrative kept the novel moving at a breakneck pace.

Sound interesting? It truly is.

Enjoy the interview.

FWOMP: When you embarked on these rather outlandish world competitions in The Underdog, did you have a plan to write the book? Or did the book evolve strictly from your experiences?

Joshua Davis: At first I wasn’t thinking I’d write a book. It wasn’t until after I got back from trying to be a matador in Spain that it came together. What happened was this: I convinced Wired [Magazine, Ed.] to send me to Iraq for the war. When I got back, I did some radio interviews and talked about my experiences. A book agent heard me talking on NPR, tracked me down and asked me if I wanted to write a book about how the digital revolution is changing the way we fight wars but I really didn’t want to dwell on that. At the time, I was training to be a sumo wrestler. So I told the agent about these things I had been doing (arm wrestling, bullfighting, sumo wrestling) and she said that that could be a book as well. I thought about it for a day or two and realized it would be fun to talk about the competitive spirit and how these things had changed my life. So I wrote a proposal and Random House ended up buying it.

FWOMP: As a child, did you ever watch the cartoon, Underdog? If so, do you think it affected you?

 JD: I did watch it but not regularly. I was more into GI Joe and Transformers. Maybe it had some effect but I think always being the last guy chosen in dodgeball had more to do with my development. 

FWOMP: ***SPOILER ALERT*** You never win any of your competitions in The Underdog, but there’s an inherent message between the written words and these failures that says, "Never give up. Find out who you are by any means possible." Were there any similar thoughts running through your mind as you fought the bulls, wrestled the Sumos, etc.? Or did this come out once you started writing?

JD: I was pretty desperate for awhile to find something I could excel at, because, essentially, my parents (as many parents do) put me in a bind. They told me I was special. But out in the world I was constantly getting knocked down and told I wasn’t all that. So it put me in the uncomfortable position of trying to decide who was right: my parents or the world? The world wasn’t being very nice to me so I wasn’t inclined to listen to it. It certainly sounds juvenile. I mean, my parents told me Santa was real, right? But parents joke about Santa. They don’t joke about their kids being special. And if I wasn’t special, if I wasn’t my own unique person, what did I have to live for? If I was going to sink into the data entry swamp, which is where I was at for awhile, how much better was I than a machine? So yes, I was thinking about these things at the time. It felt like a life or death fight.

FWOMP: I hate to tell you this, but you have won something: Best Documentary at the Telluride Mountain Film Festival for your story, "The Beat Within: One Man's Story". Did this surprise you?

JD: It totally surprised me, in part because it was my mom’s birthday so I wasn’t able to go to the festival. I got a call from the festival director over the b-day dinner at home-- they said they’d mail me the award. In regards to winning things, as soon as I started down this path, things started going differently for me. I mean, I’ve got all sorts of medals and trophies now (though some people would look down on them (for instsance, I won a kilogram of ham for running backwards).

FWOMP: Have you taken on any new challenges since the end of The Underdog?

JD: Last weekend I went to the World’s Fastest Drummer competition in Anaheim. You basically have 60 seconds to pummel a drum with as many hits as you can manage. I posted 526 taps. The winner got 1007.

FWOMP: How tasty was the fish you ate in India that came from the "shit-filled river?" 

JD: Uhhh. Do you have to remind me? I get nauseous just at the thought.

FWOMP: You mentioned that you worked for Wired. Are you still employed with them?

JD: I am. I’m a contributing editor at the magazine and write three or four features for them a year. You can find all my stories for the magazine at www.joshuadavis.net.

FWOMP: I’ve noticed on your excellent websites that you "snuck into Iraq" during the war. How’d you do that and why?

JD: When I went to the Gulf for the war, Wired teamed me up with a superb and seasoned photographer named Ed Kashi. Ed had done the National Geographic cover story on the Kurds and knew the area pretty well. He had a contact in Army logistics who arranged for us to slip into the back of a truck headed across the border. The guy in charge of the convoy had no idea we were there and, when he got the 100-vehicle convoy lost on a one lane dirt road, flipped out to find two journalists walking around the stalled convoy. It wasn’t a good scene.

FWOMP: Did you and Tara get married? Any kids?

JD: We are married. We live in San Francisco in a house that has direct sunlight, a bathtub and a dining room. Tara is very happy. No kids yet though!

FWOMP: What do you think was the craziest/most dangerous of your challenges? 

JD: I think the sauna contest was probably the most threatening. It was certainly the most painful. I felt like if I had stayed in there for another 15 seconds, I would have died. I probably wouldn’t have, but I don’t think I would have been able to stop myself from screaming. It took all I had to keep my mouth shut while I was in there.

FWOMP: How long did it take you to recover from that?

JD: It took me a few days. My skin was splotchy pink and sore, kind of like a sun burn. No fun. But it was nice to be in Finland with the family.

FWOMP: You talk quite a bit about the effects of family dynamics on yourself and how you grew-up during the tournament attempts. Do you and your family now have a closer bond because of this?

JD: I would say that we were always pretty close but we always also had our little tensions here and there. The sauna competition--and in particular the pain we endured together--really put things in perspective. Any minor annoyances we had with each other were dwarfed by the enormity of the physical pain we felt in that hell room.

FWOMP: You met a lot of interesting people during your adventures and travels (Sumo World Champion, World Champion Arm Wrestlers, etc). Do you still correspond with any of them?

JD: I stay in touch with a lot of them. I talk to Wild Bill Serpa (oldest competitive wrestler--now 73) and Jeff Thomchesson (former heavyweight champ) in the armwrestling world. I stay in close touch with Carlos Roig, my bullfighting manager. We monitor the bullfighting scene to stay abreast of any opportunities. In the sumo world, I’m friends with Tyler Tuione, the 500 pound guy on the cover of my book. I’m also friends with Andrew Freund, the head of the US Sumo Association. In backward running, I made a bunch of friends in Poviglio, Italy and am also in frequent contact with Mr. Veerabadran, my coach. I'm actually planning on making a bollywood-style musical in southern India about his life.

FWOMP: What can we expect to see from Joshua Davis in the future?

JD: Well, 20th Century Fox is making the story of my sumo experiences into a film. Jon Heder (the star of Napoleon Dynamite) is starring and the guys who wrote the Wedding Crashers are writing the screenplay. I’m an executive producer so I really feel like I won something there. In the meantime, I’m just doing what I’ve always tried to do--follow my curiosity.  Thanks so much for asking fun questions!