Why Walking on Legos Hurts More Than Walking on Fire or Ice:
In 2006, Scott Bell earned a spot in the Guinness Book of World Records for the longest-ever barefoot walk over hot coals—250 feet of glowing hot embers, at 1,200 degrees Fahrenheit. Eight months later, he smashed that record with another fire-walk, this time 326 feet.
Now, he runs an events company in the United Kingdom. guiding other people over hot coals and the occasional bed of broken glass as part of corporate team-building exercises and charity events. But walking just six-and-a-half feet over 2,000 Lego pieces? Bell usually gets someone else on his team to do it.
"Out of the three that I do on a regular basis, it's before I step on the Lego that I think 'Oh, this is going to be a bit uncomfortable,'" he says, laughing.
Lego walking is increasingly popular at charity events, Lego-themed events, team-building workshops, on YouTube, and even in cabaret sideshow acts. It is exactly what it sounds like: stepping barefoot on a pile or path of Legos, usually of all different sizes. But unlike fire-walking or even glass-walking, walking over a bunch of Legos actually does hurt. Why? And an even better question—what do we get out of it?
[...] But the first intentional Lego walks started to pop up on YouTube about four years ago. In June 2014, a Portland, Maine, video store ran a promotion: Brave the 12-foot-long "Lego Firewalk" and get The Lego Movie at half-price. The promotion lasted only an hour and a few dozen people, including kids, did it, but Star Trek's George Takei posted a picture of the Firewalk and a link to the store, Bull Moose, on his Facebook page. Within a few days, the picture had earned more than 186,000 likes and was shared more than 76,600 times (four years later, that figure had ballooned to 257,000 likes and 150,000 shares).
[...] Bell says that for fire-walking, he and his team use hardwood logs, letting them burn down for about 45 minutes to an hour, until they're just embers. Though the coals will give a temperature reading of between 930 and 1,100 degrees Fahrenheit, that isn't the level of heat one feels when walking over them, provided one doesn't stop for a selfie. Hot coals, Bell says, are very slow conductors of heat, and the time the foot is in contact with them is too little to cause damage. This isn't to say that there is no risk of burning—Bell says that he endured serious blisters when he did his first world record walk, and in 2016, more than 30 people suffered burns to their feet at an event led by motivational speaker Tony Robbins. Similar incidents, Bells says, can be attributed to improperly prepared coals.
[...] A neurochemical explanation even undergirds the pro-social benefits of shared, ritualistic pain. During these high arousal states, humans are flooded with all kinds of intense neurotransmitters and hormones, including dopamine, oxytocin, vasopressin and serotonin. Some of these are linked to the creation of social trust and even love—oxytocin and vasopressin have both been popularly (and somewhat myopically) labelled "love" or "cuddle" hormones. Oxytocin is associated with inducing feelings of trust in those around you, reducing fear, and increasing empathy, and serotonin is implicated in reducing anxiety. Meanwhile, dopamine, which is linked with the brain's management of reward and risk, also makes you feel good about the whole thing. All of this means that evolutionarily, shared painful experiences can stimulate bonding and group cohesion, and create meaning for people.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Opportunist on Monday July 11 2022, @07:49AM
The "crunch" that tells you that you're not only in physical pain now but also get to suffer again when your 8 year old finds out that you destroyed that one piece that cannot be replaced easily.
(Score: 1, Redundant) by Frosty Piss on Monday July 11 2022, @09:13AM (4 children)
I’ve often wondered how this sort of nonsense has anything at all to do with “team building”
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 11 2022, @11:39AM
My dog stepped on a bee.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Opportunist on Monday July 11 2022, @11:47AM
I have this hypothesis that some engineer had the idea that it would be fun to see some managers be in pain and pay for the privilege, too.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 11 2022, @01:10PM
Well, you see, if you don't do it you're fired. MKay? So let's all walk on the lego.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Monday July 11 2022, @02:54PM
Right at the end of the summary:
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by MIRV888 on Monday July 11 2022, @11:44AM
Well it's on now.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Rich on Monday July 11 2022, @12:12PM (3 children)
Done the Legos? Try BS 1363 (UK-style) mains plugs. They may be the safest, electrically, but they always fall prongs-up. I stepped on a single one of those, twenty years ago, and it was an experience memorable enough to write this post now...
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Monday July 11 2022, @12:23PM (1 child)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 11 2022, @01:13PM
Exactly. He learned to watch where he steps - a valuable lesson for a good price.
(Score: 2) by coolgopher on Monday July 11 2022, @01:52PM
I'll have to hand it to that huge ugly plug - I've never broken one by stepping on it (unlike the Australian one which needs plier attention afterwards).
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 11 2022, @01:59PM
Current storyline starts here, https://leasticoulddo.com/comic/20220606 [leasticoulddo.com]
Inanity ensues. For more about Rayne you could look here, https://leasticoulddo.com/new-readers [leasticoulddo.com]
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Monday July 11 2022, @03:53PM (4 children)
First of all, when you walk on ice or coals, you stress your skin's temperature receptors. Apples and oranges, let's ignore that.
What makes lego blocks hurts is pressure distribution. Large square pieces will almost always arrange themselves with corners sticking up. When you step on them, all your weight is concentrated on those few corners. Step on smaller blocks, and you'll have a lot of smaller corners to distribute your weight over. The final example of this is sand: it's a whole lot of teeny tiny blocks full of sharp edges (at least desert sand is, not river sand) but there are so many of them none of them has remotely enough force to penetrate skin individually. That's why it's completely easy, safe and painless to walk on sand for anybody, despite the multitude of sharp edges.
At the other end of the spectrum, you have the single largish lego brick. Stepping on it hurts the most because all your weight is on 1 to 4 corners. And beyond lego, the extreme example is stepping on a nail: it's one point that concentrates all your weight - and of course easily pierces the skin.
When I hike barefoot, my least favorite surfaces are coarse aggregate [dreamcivil.com], followed by smooth tarmac with a few bits of gravel here and there (typically, letftover gravel that's been thrown on the sidewalk during winter after the snow and ice have melted) followed by swamps with bits of cut reed and hard grass sticking upward under the water that I can't see or avoid. Anything else is usually fine because it distributes my weight over a larger area.
Always try to visualize how much of your soles will bear your weight, even after your feet automatically bend themselves out of shape to comform to the terrain and "absorb" the offending bits that stick out by reflex, and you'll know how much it'll hurts, and how dangerous it is before you step on it. Anybody who starts walking barefoot everywhere quickly learns the skill of reading the ground ahead to minimize pressure concentration on their soles.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 11 2022, @07:21PM (3 children)
> When I hike barefoot, my least favorite surfaces ...
Another one to add to the list, barefoot on volcanic rock beaches. In my case tide pools in Hawaii. I'm a regular barefooter too and I thought the tide pools wouldn't be a problem, but even moving very slowly and deliberately I managed to get a small cut. If I get back there, I'm taking aquasox or similar for a layer of puncture protection beyond my usual callouses.
(Score: 2) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Tuesday July 12 2022, @02:10AM (2 children)
I use Paleo Barefoot chainmail shoes [maquarius.com] for really rough or dangerous terrain - or not-so-rough terrain I have to walk on long enough that abrasion will become a problem before I complete the hike. I rarely have to use them though, but I keep a pair rolled up in my backpack.
Not cheap, but well worth the money.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 12 2022, @02:29AM (1 child)
Cool! (literally as well as figuratively)
Did you ever forget to take them off before walking on wood floors? I'm guessing they would scratch the finish.
(Score: 2) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Tuesday July 12 2022, @02:58PM
Not really. It's a nice alternative to ordinary footwear for a barefooter, but it's still footwear. I'm always aware of their presence, and I take them off at the earliest opportunity. I can't possibly forget I have them on, because I hate anything on my feet.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 11 2022, @04:24PM
When I want to bond with my co-workers, I walk over burning lego. Can confirm bonding of melted plastic to skin is very painful +1