If you're not a Brit and have no idea what a conker championship is, or why using a steel chestnut is problematic, let's start with a little education:
The World Conker Championships is held annually on the second Sunday in October in the county of Northamptonshire, England.
Two players use conkers threaded onto a string and take turns to strike the other's nut until it shatters.
Here's a look at a Conker Championship from way back in the day:
Essentially, you tie a chestnut to a string, swing it at your opponent's chestnut on a string, and you try to destroy your opponent's chestnut.
Here are some other basic rules of the game:
If the strings tangle, the first person to scream "SNAGS" gets an extra shot.
If your opponent drops their chestnut, you scream "STAMPS" and then jump up and down on their chestnut until it breaks.
Over the years, there have been many attempts at cheating in Conkers by hardening the chestnuts. Some common techniques are soaking them in vinegar, coating them in lacquer, baking them in an oven, and my personal favorite: passing them through the digestive track of a pig.
But this year, the Conkers Championships have been racked by a whole new cheating scandal: The men's winner was accused of using a steel chestnut.
The man named this year's King Conker is David Jankins, an 82-year old who has been trying his hand at the championship since 1977. This is the first year he's been crowned champion.
His final opponent could not help but wonder if something was squirrely, after the King destroyed his nut with one swing. Said the 23-year-old opponent,
My conker disintegrated in one hit, and that just doesn't happen … I'm suspicious of foul play and have expressed my surprise to organisers.
Well, his suspicious led to a discovery:
The World Conker Championships is investigating cheating allegations after the men's winner was found to have a steel chestnut in his pocket.
Dude had a steel chestnut in his pocket!
But here's the thing: Just because he had a steel chestnut that he made for fun doesn't mean that he used the chestnut in the actual battles. The judges carefully watch each match, which makes it unlikely that he could have used the thing during the event.
The chief umpire of the event explains in this very serious clip that we Americans are definitely not laughing at:
Still seems a bit fishy to me.
All of this is moot, of course, because after the men and women played their respective tournaments, there was a final meetup between the male and female champions.
And guess what? Not only did the woman beat Jankins, but she's from America. Oh, and she beat the Brits at their own dumb game after a single year of interest in the sport:
After playing the game with colleagues, she discovered the annual world championships were held in a lovely little village - and she decided to go along.
THE BEST.
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