Crush of the Week: Double Amputee Athletes and Their Fancy Prosthetics

Bryan Christian — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 21:37:00 GMT

All right, let's get one thing out of the way: we totally agree with the the International Association of Athletics Federations. No one wearing $15,000 anythings should be allowed to use them in competition at the Olympics. We seem to remember something about the Olympics being for amateurs, and somehow we don't feel like cybernetically enhanced supersapiens really count. What's next? Wolverine in the UFC?

However, you're not here to read about the ethical complexities of international sports competitions, are you? No. So. Let's get to what really matters: how freaking hot are athletes wearing the carbon-fiber prosthetics known as Cheetahs? And check it, South African sprinter Oscar Pistorius -- who really does have the driving grace of a cheetah when he runs, except with slightly less of a chance that he'll devour you -- isn't even the first athlete we've been unable to keep our eyes off of because of their hardware. Perhaps fans of video artist Matthew Barney will remember the ravishing Aimee Mullins from her appearance as "the only pretty thing in Cremaster 3"? Or maybe from her stint as an Alexander McQueen model? We fell hard for her and her synthetic gams in one of the many photoshoots she did for Esquire, Dazed and Confused, and ID a few years back, and we've still got some of her clippings in our locker at home. (Yes, we have a locker at home.)

But you know, the coolest thing about Oscar and Aimee isn't that they're attractive or anything. It's that they put the standard dynamic between amputees and "normal" people into a total 180. As in: we love our feet and all, but goddamned if we wouldn't love to know what it's like to run in a pair of those.

And for that, they are our Crush of the Week.

Scanner : aimee mullins

Crush of the Week: Double Amputee Athletes and Their Fancy Prosthetics