So as you probably guessed, I’ve never heard of any of these sports before I wrote about them; found them searching the Internet. One thing that kept coming up over and over was chess boxing. I thought it was probably dumb or uninteresting so I continually skipped over it. Being that it came up once more, I decided to use it. So let’s take a closer look at the battle of brains and brawn.
The history of chessboxing is very debated. Some say it was a comic artist who decided to take a joke to a whole new level, and some say it was a couple of dudes in a gym who decided it’d be fun. Either way, chessboxing is actually a pretty popular sport, especially since it’s the only sport on the list to be part of a Wu-Tang clan’s ‘song’ (Da Mystery of Chessboxing). But through a series of fortunate events for the sport it became internationally recognized as the World Chessboxing Association (WCBA), headquartered in London, UK. So let’s skip the boring stuff and go right to how the sport works.
Most of the rules stated by the WCBA website pertain only to chess. I’m not sure how international chess is played, but I’m sure the rules are quite similar in that you have to move the piece you firs touched, you cannot stall, and so on. Chess is an intricate game in itself, so I’m not going to get into the details. But, if you don’t know how to play and want to get an idea, click here. So other than the specifics on chess, here’s how the sport works in its entirety. There’s a total of 11 rounds, 6 rounds of chess, with an intermission of boxing (5 rounds total). Every round lasts three minutes, and there’s one minute between each round. A player may win by knockout or technical knockout (TKO) during the boxing rounds. During the chess rounds, a player may win by checkmate or disqualification (going over time limit, breaking rules, etc.). If no checkmate or knockout occurs, then the bout is decided by judge points, just like a normal boxing match. Should the judge points be tied (which has yet to happen in the WCBA), the winner is black by default (I guess since he moves second).
So overall the point is that if you can mentally stand a game of chess after you’ve had your head beaten in, you’re tougher than most.
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Another great one Kyle. I always used to play chess as a kid and I really enjoyed it. Who knew that one day I could take my skills into the ring with me and try to survive the boxing rounds while playing for checkmate. As you mentioned was a possibility, I think this is definitely a sport that was created as a result of a joke by some guy wrote comics or performed comedy, but either way, I’m glad this sport came to be!
This sport actually seems incredibly demanding, as it forces the players to face both mental and physical stress that is on a completely different level. To continuously switch between the two sports of chess and boxing with little rest would have to be absolutely exhausting. I actually have a lot of respect for this sport after reading about it, despite perceived novelty of the game. Having just started playing chess with my friends, I couldn’t imagine how intense this sport gets.