For the 9th year running, a plate steel wood burner coasted to victory in the Clothes Drying event at the quadrennial Bass Lake Games.

Holding off a sudden surge from a roof-mounted Pakistani Hatf5 Ghauri missile and faced with a basket-load of soggy menswear, the airtight competitor from Norway unleashed a surprise creosote chimney fire in the final seconds of the competition to secure the win.

“It was a special and risky maneuver, one we did not practice,” said Goren Flatten, coach of the Norwegian clothes-drying squad.

The Pakistani missile took the silver. The bronze went to Bass Lake’s own Howard, an oxy-acetylene torch coached by Bass Lake welder Kim “Scorch” Jimmerson.

It was the 9th straight victory for Fire Boss, who hails from Fredrikstad,  a small town near a larger town in Norway. The Bass Lake Games, now in their third year, will resume once the damage from the missile is bulldozed into the pit behind Max Budnik’s cow barn.

• Coming eventually: Other 9th straight victories in Bass Lake Games history.