CAMPBELL IS MAKING HIS POINT IN THE SPORT OF JOUSTING.

Byline: Conrad Grove Philadelphia Inquirer

When it is right, Roger Campbell knows. When those three dangling white rings look as big as bent basketball hoops and Peanut is rolling thunder, it all becomes as easy as one, two, three.

Campbell's sport is jousting, and like the other competitors wielding lances on a dead run, he does not tilt at windmills.

The metal rings they capture are sometimes no bigger than one-quarter inch in diameter, about the size of the hole in a peppermint Lifesaver. The top riders - on steeds that must travel 80 yards in no more eight seconds - are capable of plucking all three on lances held horizontally at eye level.

Many of the best gathered here in western Virginia, as they do annually on the third Saturday in August, for the oldest consecutively run sporting event in the United States, the 175th Natural Chimneys Jousting Tournament. Theirs is a drama played out in Levis instead of armor, the stage a level field adjacent to seven spectacular limestone rock formations that resemble smokestacks from one angle and a medieval fortress from another.

And it is here that Campbell, 43, of Buckingham, Va., a four-time national champion, again tested himself against the youngsters.

At last year's national championships, held annually on the second Sunday in October at Oatlands Plantation in Leesburg, Va., Campbell faced Buddy Wooters, 23, of Denton, Md., in the finals of the professional class. There, in quarter-inch decrements, each had progressed from 1-inch rings to those with the Lifesaver holes. Campbell, on his 6-year-old bay gelding, Peanut, rode first and pierced one. Wooters collected all three.

``Oh, man,'' said Campbell, who began jousting at age 9 on his father's draft horse, ``these young guys are something. And when a guy is riding like that, all you can do is shake his hand.''

Here, Wooters was atop Fire, his 10-year-old pinto gelding. Before they rode onto the field with 16 other competitors in the professional class, Wooters, Campbell and David Snow, 20, of Cordova, Md., who won the Hall of Fame Tournament at Natural Chimneys Regional Park earlier this summer, made small talk as they assessed their chances.

All agreed on two points. ``Eighty percent of this is the horse,'' Snow said. Said Wooters, ``You don't want to worry about anything but the rings.''

Campbell smiled as he tossed out something else. ``I'm tired,'' he said, ``of shaking the hands of you young guys.''

Jousting, most authorities believe, originated in France about 1044, spreading across southern Europe and then England. Tournaments were primarily displays of military skills, but the sport later took on social and political overtones - and chivalry eroded into free-for-all grudge matches between nobility.

The Church of England, in fact, so abhorred the decline in sportsmanship that it forbade Christian burial to any knight killed in a tournament. In 1292, however, a code of conduct was established, and knights abided by rules of fair play until 1599, when King Henry II of France died of injuries received in a tournament. That all but ended the sport.

Jousting was not resurrected in England until 1839 - 18 years after the first competition was held at Natural Chimneys. The U.S. tradition, according to local lore, began when a young woman could not decide between two suitors. Taking the advice of her schoolmaster uncle, she decreed that she would bestow her hand upon the winner of a jousting contest. The swains chose to ride for the rings instead of toward each other.

The National Chimneys event is pure competition, not an exhibition performed as part of a medieval fair featuring drumstick-waving jesters and assorted knaves hawking hocum. Though crowds now are down to several hundred, the event once attracted thousands, in an age when more spectators drew romance and their livelihoods from the land.

Jousting, though, remains Maryland's official state sport, and the reverse side of the state seal shows Lord Baltimore in a suit of armor, presumably battle-ready.

The sport still faces political challenges. As the secretary of the Eastern Shore Jousting Association, Joanne Wooters, Buddy's mother, has testified before the Maryland legislature when enthusiasts of other activities have sought to have their own favorite pastimes named as the state sport.

``So far,'' she said, ``we've beaten back lacrosse and duckpin bowling. I have no idea what it will be next.''

Jousters want to make it clear that, above all, modern tournaments - about 50 are held each year in Virginia, West Virginia and Maryland - are gatherings of family and friends, with four categories that accommodate all skill levels. Snow, for example, arrived with the Wooters family.

``We came down together,'' said Dorsey Wooters, the patriarch of the clan and the treasurer of Caroline County, Md., ``and I expect we'll go home together.''

Wooters, 53, is blind in one eye and thus has reduced depth perception. He has competed since childhood. ``I decided if I've got to groom our horses, I might as well ride them, too,'' he said.

At 65, retired railroad conductor Arthur Siple of Fort Ashby, W.Va., decided something, too: It was time to take up jousting. That was five years ago, and though he has progressed past the novice division, he has taken some lumps, too. His paso fino, a horse of Spanish origins, rolled over on him during a practice run some months ago.

``It only tore the bark off me,'' he said, displaying a few scars on one arm.

Siple also crafts custom lances. His own weapon - 9 feet and 8 pounds - is considerably longer and heavier than those of most jousters, who prefer lances in the 6- to 7-foot range with weights of 5 to 6 pounds. Most lances feature a butt section of wood and a tapered metal front piece; some jousters paint their lance points florescent orange as a visual aid.

In this tournament, competing in the amateur division for only the second time, Siple came in fifth out of 21 riders. He was full of himself - and acknowledged it. ``Not bad for an old guy, was I?'' he said.

Tim Higgs, 18, of nearby Harrisonburg, Va., won the amateur bracket. ``Thank God we didn't have to go for the quarter-inch rings. I don't think they fit on my lance,'' he joked.

Like the other riders, Higgs has bestowed upon himself an honorific. Some titles connote locale - Siple is the Knight of Turner's Run, a mill stream that runs through the farm where he grew up. Some honor fallen heroes - Higgs is the Knight of Turner Ashby, a Confederate general known for his superb horsemanship and who is said to have ridden in this same tournament.

And some are just pure fun. Maria Vogel of Frederick, Md., a first-year rider in the novice category, chose her title after she and husband, Ron, who rides in the professional division, took a skiing trip to Switzerland and ran up their charge card.

She is the Maid of Visa.

Novice riders start with rings with diameters of 1-3/4 inches; amateurs, 1-1/2; semiprofessionals, 1-1/4.

The rings are hung from three poles shaped like an inverted L's, either 6 feet, 8 inches from the ground in Virginia or 6 feet, 9 inches in Maryland. The poles are spaced equidistant over 60 yards, with the riders timed from a starting point 20 yards away from the first ring. Eighty yards in eight seconds is more than 20 m.p.h.; some horses run more smoothly at a faster gait and can pound down that distance in six seconds and small change.

Those in the professional category begin with rings 1 inch in diameter. Six of the 19 riders passed the first test perfectly, including Buddy Wooters, Snow and Campbell.