SPEED THRILLS

To the untrained eye, Tom Mason appears relatively sane.

He’s affable and personable, a resonant chatterbox with the smarts to own and operate a construction business.

But behind an otherwise normal facade lurks someone who finds pleasure in rocketing downhill on a glorified skateboard, someone whose nom de guerre is “The Bad Boy of Street Luge.”

As a keen observer of the human condition once said, appearances can be misleading.

Mason, 37, offers a different perspective: “It’s all about image.”

For him it’s also about danger, thrills, adrenaline, machismo and myriad more reasons. It is, in the most extreme instances, about flirting with death.

“I like to push the envelope,” Mason said.

Mason, a Van Nuys resident, carried that attitude to new levels when he averaged 81.28 mph in seven runs over a 2 1/2-mile road at Mt. Whitney, Calif., on May 29, 1998, becoming the world’s fastest street luger.

He did it on a 23-pound aluminum board propelled by four 76-millimeter urethane wheels and with no more protection than a helmet and skintight leathers, all standard street luge gear.

By design, street lugers ride prone on their backs and can barely see the road ahead, their heads resting inches off the pavement, one untimely bump or detached wheel away from disaster.

Mason, a regular on ESPN’s X-Games and other assorted spinoffs, once broke three ribs and punctured a lung during an event. His body is often blotched in the color purple.

“That’s why they have like 30 ambulances at every extreme event I’ve been to,” Mason said, laughing.

That’s not enough to keep Mason from racing, performing TV and movie stunts or trying to cross new barriers. The Mt. Whitney runs, which landed him in The Guinness Book of Records, was a prime example.

“Tom will do anything,” said Bob Pereyra, a street luge pioneer. “If you tell him we’re going to go down Mt. Everest, he’ll be there.”

Pereyra, president of Northridge-based Road Racers Assn. for International Luge (RAIL), witnessed and certified Mason’s record.

RAIL and the International Gravity Sports Assn. (IGSA) are the sport’s governing bodies.

“We knew there were some fast roads up there,” Mason said. “About two weeks before the run, Bob and I drove up there, put the car in neutral and went down the hill about 90 mph.

“We knew this was going to be a cinch.”

Mason didn’t take his wife, Lisa, or their two children to watch the runs because he wanted to spare them the trauma if something went wrong. But Lisa, who has known Mason since they were teenagers, has grown accustomed to his outrageousness.

Well, sort of.

“I was nervous [the record-setting] day, waiting for the phone to ring,” she said. “I haven’t been as nervous about [the races] as the other things he’s done, like skydiving and bungee jumping and motorcycles.”

All of it sometimes seemingly by the seat of his pants.

At Mt. Whitney, he and his buddies walked the course, sweeping away pebbles, rocks and other potential hazards before proclaiming the course ready.

“I even blew off the ambulance because it was $800 out of my own pocket,” said Mason, who is generally backed by several sponsors. “We had no hay barriers, nothing. There was nothing safe about it.”

Neither are some of his stunts. In one, for TV’s “Pacific Blues,” he sped down a street in San Pedro and into the undercarriage of a large truck, hanging with his legs dangling inches from the rear tires that moments before smashed his board.

That would have been a turnabout, since Mason is usually the one doing the smashing, mostly against other lugers.

At ESPN’s X-Games in Providence, R.I., in 1996, Mason angered opponents with his rules-be-damned style. It was his first major event, with national exposure, and Mason was bent on being noticed.

He lost a semifinal race for causing a crash and was disqualified in the third-place race after running Stefan Wagner of Germany into the hay. The bronze medal was gone, but the bad boy reputation was born.

“They had never seen contact in street luge,” Mason said. “It kind of blew their minds.”

Mason’s latest major race was in December in Brisbane, Australia, where he placed third.

And gained a few more bruises.

“In Australia, I broke every seam in my leathers [after crashing in one race] and my underwear came off,” Mason said. “I was there pretty much in the buff and they’re showing my butt on Australian TV.”

It’s been quite a ride for Mason since he took up luge four years ago, since he and teammate Mike Colabella of Studio City, also among the world’s best, roamed the Valley’s hillsides late at night for practice runs.

“The very first day he left and wouldn’t tell me where he was going,” Lisa said. “He came home at four in the morning. And then I get a phone call two days later from some woman asking me about his measurements. He had bought a board and didn’t tell me.

“There are a lot of things he doesn’t tell me. I didn’t even find out he was going to flying school until he was halfway done. That’s Tom.”

Now he’s the fastest, and perhaps craziest, guy in the game. And he’s eager to prove it again.

“I won’t say what it is, but I’ve got a couple of things up my sleeve,” he said.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

THIS IS STREET LUGE . . .

Origin: Supposedly started in California, but no one can say for sure. Gained popularity as part of first ESPN X-Games in 1995.

Luge: Usually about 18 inches longer than the pilot’s height, as wide as the pilot’s shoulders and as low as a half-inch off the ground. The body is made of U-shaped aluminum channels with four urethane skateboard wheels. It has handlebars, a headrest, a seat pan and foot pegs. The weight ranges from about 25 pounds to no more than 40 pounds.

Gear: Racing leathers for aerodynamics, leather gloves, a motorcycle helmet and tennis shoes.

Selected glossary: Melt a wheel, urethane wheels disintegrate because of high speed; puke a wheel, start of a meltdown before a wheel flies off; hit-and-run, practicing illegally on a street; sled, name for a luge; washboard, a rough road; axle bender, a pot hole in the road; wobbs, luge shakes because of high speed.

Governing bodies: International Gravity Sports Assn. (IGSA) and Road Racers Assn. for International Luge (RAIL).

Competitions: Two or four people race downhill on winding streets, usually during extreme games and with speeds up to 70 mph.

Speeds: Tom Mason, 37, of Van Nuys set the world record of 81.28 mph on May 29, 1998, at Mt. Whitney, Calif.

Facilities: There are no practice sites in Los Angeles and practicing on the streets, as some lugers do, is illegal.