Slashdot Mirror
Meet the New Chess Boxing Champion of the World
Attila Dimedici writes "A Russian man has just been crowned world champion in the sport of chess boxing. Apparently the idea originated in a French comic strip from the early '90s. In 2003 a Dutch artist decided to bring the 'sport' to life. The 'sport' is played by starting a chess match in the middle of a boxing ring. After four minutes, the chess board is cleared and the opponents box for three minutes. A match consists of six rounds of chess and five rounds of boxing. A match is decided by knockout, checkmate, or points."
The chess part is speed chess, which can be quite difficult and heavily favors those who are well practiced in strategy and able to make decisions faster.
Players are given 1 - 5 minutes each to win a game, which generally does not result in a checkmate outcome. Rather, the person whose time expires first loses. The best strategy is to set up complex positions on the board that require ample thought on the part of your opponent and watch his or her time expire.
I would put my money on the chess player who can roll with the punches and make effective 1 second moves on the board. You can do rope a dope sometimes by letting other players move very quickly and eating up their major pieces when they make a mistake.
M
> Players are given 1 - 5 minutes each to win a game, which generally does not result in a checkmate outcome
Do you actually play chess ? Blitz games often ends in checkmate, because the player with the biggest time pressure will blunder.
I have seen my son give otb (=over the board) checkmate in rapid chess to someone 300 ELO higher than him with 3 seconds vs 5 seconds left and 8 moves.
Of course, the player with worst position can choose not to move and lose on time, but it is the stupidest thing to do, because in chess, you can think on the opponent time
Just look at the tie-break in US women championship. 11 seconds vs 2 seconds. Wanna bet who won ?
Lurk around playchess.com. You'll see 1 minute bullets games (ie: 1 minute for each opponents). The average rate of play is higher than 1 move per second, and they generally finish in checkmate.
PS: slashdot formatting is borken for me. Can' do proper paragraphs. Such is life