Avenue

Texting like a champ

The Avenue Crew put their texting skills to the test

By Adam Trinh
Photography by Anthony Charron and Adam Trinh

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We may be able to weave stories and interviews on the fly, but the Canadian Texting Championship posed a difficult question to answer. How fast can you text?

Sponsored by LG Electronics, the competition is touring across Canada, inviting the masses to use one of their new cell phones and type in a sentence as fast and accurate as possible.

The fastest texter gets a chance to compete for $25,000 at the National Championship in Toronto.

Colleague and ally Tony Charron and I were up for the challenge and set a course to Chinook Mall, the site of the battle. The winner of the media challenge portion of the championship would have $1,000 donated to the charity of their choice.

Not knowing what to expect, we were greeted by a group of cheerleaders and the planners of the event. Fuelled by a fruity and delicious protein shake, I quickly sized up my opponents and felt confident in my abilities.

This round was dedicated only the press - old school media folks who lack experience in the way of texting.

First up was Tony. After several (count: 5) false starts the battle was on. Tony posted a respectable 22.86 seconds for a seven word sentence. But the next competitor obliterated the score, posting a time of 20.17 seconds.

Great. Now, the pressure was on me to represent the magazine.

They called me up to the booth and Frank Lee, the LG PR representative asks, "So, do we text a lot?"

I was immediately taken back by the phrasing of the question and probably over-analysed it. Did he mean we as in, we Asians, or we, as a way of sounding polite and inclusive? Baffled, I quickly choose the latter and responded modestly "Sorta, at least a couple times a week."

In a flash, I was submerged in the keyboard. All I could hear was the friendly, yet bothersome applause from the cheerleaders chanting my name.

Then it was all over. "Adam T: 22.4."

Fail. My days as texting champ ended before they began.

The crowned king would later turn out to be the Shaw TV camera guy, Brendan, texting a day record of 17.38 seconds. Receiving a giant cheque (I've always wanted one of those) for $1,000, he donated it to the Alberta Breast Cancer Foundation saying "there are a lot of people with cancer out there and they could always use more money," a valiant speech for a valiant win.

We left shortly after, reassured that we tried our best and stayed in the top four.