The Athlete: MARTA EMPINOTTI
Episode: Semi-Truck BASE Jump | Premiere: April 16, 2007

Perry's Thoughts:
Marta gained our respect and admiration for being our first woman athlete on Stunt Junkies. She did not disappoint! Marta is the perfect combination of woman and athlete. She is graceful, eloquent and gives the boys a run for their money. It was a pleasure working with her and her husband, Stunt Junkies alum Jimmy Pouchert. They are consummate professionals and had every detail of this stunt worked out to a "T." It was an amazing stunt to watch and I look forward to seeing what they come up with next.

Eli's Thoughts:
Knowing how respected Marta is in the BASE community, I knew she would be the perfect fit for our first female athlete on the show. Marta has devoted her life to BASE jumping. She was jumping before there was gear made for the sport; in fact, she is one of a small handful of people who helped create the sport. So we met at the Auburn Bridge — interestingly enough, the last time we were there was with her husband, Jimmy Pouchert, for the reverse bungee stunt. Jimmy was there as well to film Marta and help with coordinating the event. Marta was going to jump off a moving semi and deploy her chute with about 750 feet of altitude to deal with. We started out by doing some test rides on top of the truck down a closed road. This was fun — it's not every day you get to ride on one of these things. It was a bit bumpy and a little unsettling up there. Jimmy put grip tape on the top — kind of like a runway for Marta. She did some practice jumps to get used to the landing area, but on one she had a slight delay and 180-degree opening, so I had to run to our "C" landing area. I wasn't too worried — she's got lots of experience landing in crazy places under all kinds of crazy situations. Next, we did some runs on the bridge and test drops with a watermelon to check the trajectory of the launch, i.e., to try to figure out the best place to jump. Watermelon was everywhere — the gap Marta had to clear was over 8 feet. Luckily, the semi trailer was 13 feet tall, but nonetheless she would need a good launch. On stunt day we had everything set. We closed the bridge; the semi got up to speed; and Marta went running, jumping and flying off the bridge — she gave it a little delay and had a perfect opening. The landing was perfect and without a doubt she showed us all what true professionals are made of.