The priceless pursuit

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MARY REICHARD, HOST: A software tester from Canada is now the world champion of an unusual sport. 

Not hockey. Not curling. 

No, for Michael Mena, it’s pogo-sticking.

At this year’s Pogopalooza competition near Pittsburgh, he won both the Big Air and Best Trick championships.

The prize money, not impressive at all: Zip, zero, nada. Organizers say the total purse for the entire event was exactly that much: nothing. 

But it hasn’t stopped competitors from spending years chasing ever more difficult tricks.

Many pro-pogoers hold regular jobs, and they have to, because of the aforementioned lack of prizes you can take to the bank.

So if they ever started to rely on the sport for income, what they’d be bouncing are checks.

Instead, they bounce for joy. The pogo is the payoff.

It’s The World and Everything in It.

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