Man kills himself after leaving endurance contest
A participant in an endurance contest with a truck as its prize walked away from the event on its third day, broke into a store, found a shotgun and killed himself, police said.
Richard Vega, 24, of Tyler, Texas, left the Hands on a Hardbody contest at a Nissan dealership yesterday, about the time that a break was called, said police Sgt. Carlos Samples.
Except for breaks, the rules require contestants to stand with one hand flat on a truck at all times.
The contestant who holds out longest drives the truck home.
Vega crossed the street to a Kmart store, broke the glass in the front door, climbed through, then went to the sporting goods department and took up a 12-gauge shotgun, police said. Officers were coming in the front of the store as Vega approached from the back.
Vega was ordered to drop the weapon, Samples said.
“He took a few steps back and actually fired the gun at himself and killed himself,” Samples said.
The officer said police don’t know why Vega committed suicide.
Mary Flores, a cousin of Vega’s wife, said in a story in the Longview News-Journal’s online edition that Vega “had no reason to do this at all".
He had two children, ages 5 and 7.
Flores said Vega had promised his wife he would win the Nissan truck. The top prize this year also would have included a pop-up camper. The newspaper reported that Vega had dropped out of the contest last year because of a family emergency.
S.R. Bindler made an award-winning film about the 1995 competition. His Hands on a Hardbody documented the gruelling event. The longest contest took 126 hours in 2000.
The dealership cancelled this year’s contest after the suicide.
