If you've ever wondered what it's like to smash a passenger car with a 9,000-pound truck, Debrah Miceli can clear it up for you.

"The G-force is unbelievable," says Miceli, better known by her pro-wrestling and monster-truck name, Madusa. "When you hit a car, your head can swing forward seven inches. So your neck stretches seven inches."

Neck-stretching, alcohol-burning, car-smashing fun comes to Prague the weekend of Oct. 28–30 with Monster Jam, the first monster truck show in the country. Hot-rodded trucks with enormous tractor tires will compete at Sazka Arena in two events: side-by-side racing and freestyle, in which drivers have an open course to show off what their rides can do.

With modified engines and reinforced suspensions, what monster trucks can do is smash the heck out of cars and jump off ramps, flying 130 feet (40 meters) through the air at heights of over 25 feet.

"It's getting crazier each year," says Miceli, the 2005 side-by-side racing champion. "When you jump, all you see are the fans. You can't see the ground anymore. When you see the eyes of the people in the stadium, you know you're pretty high up there. And it gets bigger and better and higher and faster each time."

It's not just bigger and better. With those massive engines burning straight methanol, the effect can also be quite noisy.

"Oh my gosh," Miceli says. "Loud! Very loud. We have earplugs. It's very noisy — I think newborn babies are not a good idea."

Infants may not be recommended, but Monster Jam — part of the Clear Channel Entertainment conglomerate — promotes itself as a family event: good, clean, smash-and-bang fun for all ages. Before most competitions, a "Pit Party" takes place, allowing fans to meet the drivers, collect autographs and take pictures of the trucks. In addition to Madusa, the competitors in Prague will include one of the legendary Bigfoot trucks (there are 15), as well as Grave Digger, Monster Mutt and El Toro Loco.

If the sight of Madusa squashing a school bus makes you want to try it on your own, be aware that driving a monster truck is not quite like taking your Škoda down to the Quickie Mart.

"It's so different," Miceli says. "You have front steering, and the rear steering is on a toggle switch. You have two different steering mechanisms, so that's pretty weird. And the truck weighs 9,000 pounds, so that's a lot of weight to think of."

But that doesn't mean you can't turn your Škoda into a monster truck: In fact, just about any vehicle can be monsterized. First you're going to need a new engine. Most modern Škodas come with a meager 1.4-liter (about 85-cubic-inch) engine, insufficient for propelling a 9,000-pound vehicle 130 feet through the air. To stand your ground with Grave Digger, you'll want to throw a 540-cubic-inch V-8 under the hood. (You can get one on eBay for about $35,000 [140,000 Kč].)

Your Škodovka is also going to need a new four-link frame and chassis, a new suspension and custom-made shocks from California's Kuster to absorb some of the bus-and-car-crushing impact. Expect to pay around $60,000, give or take 10 grand.

Naturally, you'll need a new set of tires to replace your old Continental retreads, as well as new planetary hubs and universal joints. Monster trucks sit on 66-inch (167-centimeter) Terra Tires from Goodyear with the treads trimmed and cut. Each tire costs about $2,700 without rims, and with the rims, each one can weigh 900 pounds.

And, of course, you'll want a fireproof suit, a helmet, a harness and a neck brace, just in case, with some extra safety equipment for your pit crew.

"We have the radio [remote cutoff switch]," Miceli says. "If you do a jump and it looks like you're going to crash, the crew can hit the radio and the truck will shut off automatically."

That doesn't mean your monster Škoda won't crash, of course — just that the engine won't be running when it does. But with monster trucks, crashes and smashes are all part of the fun, especially for kids.

Sticking pretty close to the script, Miceli says that making kids happy is her favorite part of the job. But anyone who has ever been stuck in traffic would have to ask: Is that really better than smashing cars?