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These Guys Know Wood
By Steve Bowman
Special to GOG
Standing side by side, they look like the offensive line of the New York Giants. Only bigger.
|  | | Brains, as much as brawn, can spell victory in wood-chopping. |
The competitors in the ESPN Great Outdoor Games timber events epitomize the lumberjack stereotype — huge, burly and downright full of muscle. Looking at them, it would be easy to believe that the lumberjack events, especially those involving the cutting of wood, center solely on strength. Watching a competitor with a Herculean girth smash a log into splinters with blinding speed only strengthens that impression.
For the timber sports competitors in the 2001 Great Outdoor Games, though, strength is a secondary component in the quest for the gold medal. "Wood chopping is a science," says Arden Cogar, Jr., a competitor in the upcoming Games. "Sure it may look like a combination of brute strength and sheer ferocity, but it takes more than that."
Slicing through a piece of wood with a razor-honed axe requires a combination of muscle, speed, precise technique and attention to the tiniest of details. To get an idea of how tiny those details can be, look at how Cogar and other lumberjacks approach a piece of wood in competition.
Wood wisdom
"There are a lot of factors that play into being a good wood chopper, from controlling the axe, having a proper swing to the proper foot work," Cogar says. "And probably one of the least expected is how an axeman looks at and decides to cut a piece of wood."
In the Great Outdoor Games, lumberjacks cut through logs using a cross-cut saw, they stand on a block of wood and chop through it in the standing block chop or they cut through another block in the springboard. In each of these events, attention to the wood and how it is set up for the competitors makes a difference.
"I don't want to jump up there and just start cutting," Cogar says. "Before the match I study the log to know what I'm in for and then I set it up for the quickest, cleanest cut."
At the ESPN Great Outdoor Games, two types of wood will be used in the events that feature wood chopping — aspen and pine. When they're looking at a piece of white pine, for example, competitors will be looking for a few nuances that can make a surprising difference in the competition.
Every log has growth rings that not only divulge the age of the wood, but for a lumberjack's purposes, how well it may cut. Big growth rings in a log usually indicate a soft block of plantation pine, Cogar says. Likewise, a log with small growth rings normally indicates a firmer log.
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Big growth rings in native white pine are the equivalent of the antichrist. ” |
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— Arden Cogar, Jr., timber sport competitor |
"Big growth rings in native white pine is the equivalent of the antichrist," Cogar says. "They're hard as hell. Thankfully they are not used much for competition. Small growth rings in native white pine is normally good as long as the chainsaw does not leave a glassy appearance on the end of the log. In timber sports, if the end of a log is 'fuzzed up,' it's a signal of good, soft wood."
Cogar says it's nearly impossible to get a block with concentric growth rings. More than likely, the tree may have grown faster on one side than the other side. With that in mind when dealing with white pine, a sawyer is better off if he positions the larger growth rings at the top of the log and the smaller growth rings at the bottom of the log.
"That works because most axemen have a propensity to hit the bottom of their logs harder than they do the top," Cogar says. "Plus; the larger growth rings are normally softer than the smaller growth rings, thus leading an axemen to put the harder timber in the bottom where he or she will hit the block harder."
A clue in the hue
It's not all about growth rings, though. The color of wood can indicate how well the wood will cut. Normally, the whiter the wood, the softer it is.
"A light white pine block symbolizes two things: it's dry and it's 'up the tree,'" Cogar says, referring to how high the wood was located in the trunk of a tree. "A dry block is harder to cut than a wet, fresh block; a block that is 'up the tree' is normally softer than a block that is closer to the butt of the tree."
Those are big factors, considering, a block that is closer to the butt of the tree has larger growth rings than the blocks that are further "up the tree."
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If there's a crack in the log you're screwed. ” |
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— Arden Cogar, Jr. |
"If there's a crack in the log you're screwed, because that normally signifies an extremely dry piece of timber," Cogar says. And if the wood has a red color, then it poses even more problems.
"Normally red-appearing white pine is harder than a bull's forehead," Cogar says. "A red seam or a place in the block that looks red contains pitch pockets and may have brittle crispy red growth rings on one side of the block. In that case, the red rings should be placed on the bottom of the log where an axeman can strike a heckuva lot harder."
When the 2001 ESPN Great Outdoor Games get underway and chips begin to fly, it might look like sheer brute strength rules the wood-chopping events. But on top of those blocks of muscle is a strategic brain working even harder.
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