Football is not everything and for those who hate the most popular sport, there are a number of alternatives that may choose from this list of strangest or obscure sports of the World.
Some games simply do not qualify as sports, but if you put several of these deserve a more prominent place in the history stacks. Moreover, the curling is one that should be on this list unless it includes in the Olympic sports lists.
1 Fierljeppen
Imagine living in a country under the level of channels filled with mud and water, a sea discomfort, you need a bridge every two meters, but this swamp is referred as Holland the participants did not have money for both bridge so they chose to use a stick pole (polsstok) which pass from one side to another through the small canals.
And who says a small channel is encouraged to turn into larger one. Due to the increasing interest of native athletes, this mundane resource has transformed into a sport. So now the Dutch people have a Fierljeppen league and recorded maximum reach of 21 meters, because we are that we can cross a large river and all.
2Hurling
In Ireland, a good idea came up to mix unhinged players with other hockey games and invent the most violent version involving the players with a stick and ball (sliotar).
Now, like hockey, a high ball is “dangerous” in the Hurling and the player has to pass it to your colleagues (15 players per team). Unlike the most games like Baseball, hard ball gloves are not here to receive it, so, fingers, as it comes to manage the risk.
The “caman” is like a hockey stick but is used as one of the baseball, the rules are like a mixture between the rugby and football because the player who takes the ball can also move around with it (four steps) and back, try to carry on goal or take snacking on the stick as the best juggler. Sounds ridiculous? It is also one of the fastest games out there (and dangerous, between balls and batons) but not as fast as Jai-Alai that should be close to insanity.
Hardly a player uses any protection even to face a ball that travels over 150km/h. obviously, anyone outside from the Ireland are encouraged to play this way and few Irish descendants who play anyway. The bizarre game is currently being practiced in some parts of the United States and also Hurling has been played successfully in Argentina.
3 Buzkashi
Afghanistan, Turkmenistan and these regions have the hardcore version of the horse-polo, but really hardcore to the point that our brave gauchos are like children.
And if we compare it to the polo, well, there are two teams of horses, of course, have to play with something like a ball, but instead of being a traditional polo ball they have to play with the body of a headless sheep!
Originally the only rule was – not to throw anyone off his horse and hit him with the whip or boots, but over time the Afghans added some more rules – play ground must be 400 square meters each side, each team allows to consist of 10 riders, two halves in this game and 45 minutes of each, only 5 players can be played in one half, a break of 15 minutes between the period of two halves.
It was in Rambo III when the world knew this unusual sport, hehe! Sounds strange that was the Sylvester Stallone film culture that introduced this sport to the other parts of the World, but remember one thing – he fought with the mujahedeen against the Soviets.
4 Jai-Alai
As I mentioned before, the Jai-Alai is really an extreme game, there is no way to see a game that uses a hard ball with 300 km/h of speed as entertainment, it’s too fast, few categories of racing go so fast, Tennis couldn’t achieve these speeds ever even during the best practices.
The gloves used in this game called Cesta Punta in Spanish and xistera in Basque. It is the Basque version of squash but here the shots made by the player with the most striking speed, is really dangerous and huge glove-shaped nail is worth to see that lets throw the ball at these speeds.
A great hit suffered by the wall and the opponent must be continue until someone fails to send it back.
Expect to receive a ball approaches you at 300km/h with the glove and not fear for your life is crazy.
5 Kabaddi
The Kabaddi is developed in ancient India and it has been spreading widely in several Asian countries.
We understood this game as a cross between “spot” and “interrupted wrestling”, i.e. the idea is that a player of a team from the territory trying to mark or touch a player of the other team and get out of there.
It would be easy to do for a few but the rules are a little more complex, the issue is that the “invader” must hold his breath while doing or shouting “Kabaddi” and must return from the enemy territory to win or collect point. The opponent team tries to grapple the invader that makes you stay away from the team.
In 1975, the game has adapted by Japan and the Kabaddi was completely unusual for them to play.
6 The Cooper’s Hill Cheese Rolling
And finally the cheese rolling festival is not a sport but we will give equal credit for being strangest sport enough. The game is focused on the idea of physical involvement behind the cheese in the race.
You will get a large number of videos on this event than any other strangest sports in this list. The game has been played at Cooper hill near Gloucester in England. 7 to 9 pounds of Double Gloucester cheese is rolled down and people start to fall down the hill while trying to capture the cheese.
This is a traditional event organized and played by the people from the village of Brockworth, where this hill is situated. Now, spectators from around the world participate in this game.
I couldn’t find the origination of this event. There may be many stories behind it’s origination but all was custom.
First the cheese rolls down the hill slowly, but thanks to Newton, final speed reaches up to 112 km/h, it is dangerous to tackle the cheese at the end but trying to capture is more dangerous idea. In 1993 about 15 people were injured solemnly. No, it’s not easy to get the cheese.
7 Wife Carrying Competition – Eukonkanto
It may be hard to carry the weight of a wife, but in the Eukonkanto, the main challenge to carry wives precisely and race with them.
It looks like a family bazaar game but the goal is to creating skills and coordination. This game has different name like eukonkanto or akankanto in Finnish language, naisekandmine in Estonian language, karringkank in Swedish language. All have the same meaning i.e. wife carrying.
The Estonian style has the most fun; the wife is hanged in reverse direction using the legs around the husband’s shoulder. The husband must run with a load on his shoulder and without supporting his wife.
The game has quite interesting rules like minimum weight of wife must be 45 kg, the length of running track should be 253.5 meters, and the track must have two dry obstacles and one obstacle with water or mud. These obstacles must one meter deep.
8 Combat Juggling
See, it even makes me embarrassed to write, but … the title is no joke, I mean actual combat between the jugglers in a field, with rules, until ESPN is broadcasting! This is remarkable!
Professional and sporting tone jugglers created the World Juggling Federation in 2005 and they had already managed to get a space on ESPN for their championships.
The interesting thing is that they could find a way to make it competitive. The game start from a signal when every player starts juggling and the last player marked juggling wins the game.
9 Chess Boxing
Imagine you’re playing chess – quiet game ever, you are playing this brain storming game and suddenly you have to face a hand that can crush the whole skull. This is the Chess Boxing, a hybrid between chess and boxing. The game is now famous in India, Russia, and Great Britain and real tournaments have been arranged from a long time.
This invention is born by the imagination of a French comic book artist, Enki Bilal.
The interesting thing is that the players have to be good at both, because it will not really easy to become good in the ring and on the board simultaneously.
Total eleven rounds are allowed throughout this strangest sport. Six rounds have been reserved for chess round and five for boxing with three minutes each. The winner in any of the two games wins the match.
10 Firematic Ladder Racing
Firefighting job is really an important task. Climb quickly to a window where a weak person waiting to be rescued is really imperative.
Apparently not all the time firemen are working, even in long waiting times between ominous and sinister someone thought of an idea: a sport competition – Climb stairs – strangest sport but interesting!
Rules are quite simple, you have to start from a certain distance from a vehicle, a ladder is deployed and raises a firefighter, the event would happen very faster. The players have to complete the task at this moment like filling the pipe with water that is thrown from the vehicle.