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Thrills and chills.

An adrenaline high produced through sport. From afar, several outdoor Winter Olympics events appear as if they should be banned for potentially suicidal consequences, never mind being sanctioned by the International Olympic Committee.

It can seem as if common sense is on a leave of absence, as if the athletes are Evel Knievels reincarnated.

Yet they live to tell about their NASCAR-on-ice bobsled runs, headfirst skeleton slides, blind luge runs and gravity-defying aerial flips and moguls stunts. They have ice water in their veins — as well as ice under their buttocks.

"For sure, you have to be a thrill-seeker," said U.S. luger Tony Benshoof of St. Paul, Minn., a 2002 Olympian. "It's just the coolest thing."

Even Olympic-caliber athletes, though, were scared as beginners.

Todd Hays, 35, a silver-medal winner at the Salt Lake Games four years ago in four-man bobsled, played football at the University of Tulsa and was a national kick-boxing champion. But he was a nervous dude on his first bobsled run.

"I had this big, long ice roller coaster in my mind," Hays said at a gathering of Winter Olympics prospects in Colorado Springs, Colo., in October. "When we started I thought, 'This is really not that hard.' And all of a sudden, the sled just rocketed like it was shot out of a gun. I thought the driver must be unconscious and that certainly we were going to die. I thought something had gone terribly wrong."

Nope. The bobsled simply picked up speed until it reached 90 mph, throwing the riders back and forth. To Hays, it was the ultimate amusement park ride.

Unlike European spectators, who turn out in droves to watch World Cups and championship competition in non-Olympic years, Americans are exposed to these events once every four years. They may think their countrymen wearing red, white and blue spandex are risking their lives each time they leave the starting line.

But extreme activity comes naturally to some. Skeleton racer Chris Soule, 32, of Trumbull, Conn., a multiple World Cup medalist last season, rides mountain bikes, bridge jumps and has performed stunts in movies.

"There's definitely a thrill-seeking part of it," Soule said of skeleton. "There's calculated risk. We're not throwing ourselves down the hill. "

Certainly there must be a little daredevil in their souls, an innate derring-do to take on sports that don't even look safe. Half the time it seems as if the participants are out of control, as if they're at the mercy of elements such as wind, snow and ice or that they just seem too high to land without suffering bodily harm. Of course, sometimes there are serious injuries.

Moguls star Shannon Bahrke, 25, of Tahoe City, Calif., is a 2003 World Cup champion and a 2002 Olympic silver medalist who has scars from bad landings.

Moguls specialists must keep adding new tricks to their repertoires to compete against the best in the world. It's a trial-and-error process that results in black-and-blue marks on the road to perfection.

"If you land on your head, that was the wrong way to do it," Bahrke said.

The same rule applies in competition. During a World Cup in Inawashiro, Japan, in 2004, Bahrke landed awkwardly on a ski pole and fractured her jaw.

"I kicked my own butt," she said of the back flip she attempted without enough room. "It was awful. I had my jaw wired shut for three weeks. I went from 130 pounds to 108."

Bahrke said she never used to think of herself as a daredevil, but then she found herself drawn to skydiving and dirt bike racing. So yes, she decided, maybe she is.

Bridge jumping, movie stunts, skydiving, kick-boxing ...

Thrill-seeking runs more than snow deep.

Except perhaps for moguls man Nathan Roberts, 23, a 2005 world champion from Park City, Utah. Twice a week he plays golf. His 1-handicap allows him to believe he could turn pro after he is finished with moguls.

Golf? If word gets around, Roberts could be expelled from the Winter Olympics Adrenaline Junkie Athletes Association.