Failure™ Magazine

Joshua Davis is Un-Defeated

Joshua Davis (a.k.a. The Underdog) turns losing into a winning proposition.

Written by Jason Zasky   Filed under Sports

Joshua Davis competing in the 2004 U.S. Sumo Open. Photo courtesy of J. Davis.

Before Joshua Davis penned “The Underdog: How I Survived the World’s Most Outlandish Competitions” his life was going nowhere. Stuck in a low-paying, dead-end job, Davis was just another frustrated guy searching for a way to make his mark on the world. The 129-pound data entry clerk then made a fateful decision to enter the U.S. National Arm Wrestling Championship. Though Davis lost all his matches in .2 seconds or less, he found the competition invigorating. Feeling inspired, he went on to try sumo wrestling, bullfighting and backwards running before braving a 220-degree sauna in the World Sauna Championship. Although Davis never came close to winning an event, he did manage to parlay his losses into a hit book, making him an inspiration to below-average Joe’s the world over. Failure recently spoke with Davis about how failure has been the key to his success.

Do you spend a lot of time thinking about failure?
I do. I’m a proponent of failure. I find it satisfying in some ways. That’s not to say that I go out trying to fail. I definitely try to win. In these contests the logical part of me says I am not going to beat a 500-pound man in a sumo ring. But the emotional side of me is one hundred percent invested in trying to win. And after losing I feel like crap because I’m depressed and defeated.

But there is a trajectory or process of becoming accustomed to losing. Usually I rebound a day or so later. In sumo it was only a matter of a half an hour before people started coming up to me asking for my autograph. I would say, “Listen, I just lost every single match. Why do you want my autograph?” They would say, “You shouldn’t have been in the ring to begin with and just the fact that you got in there was an inspiration.” It dawned on me that sumo wrestling empowered me. Just getting in there and being open to the idea of failing really empowered me and changed my life.

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