Cheating at Conkers
The men’s world conkers champion is accused of cheating with a steel chestnut.
Comments
GregW • October 16, 2024 8:06 AM
Who guards the guardians?
As mentioned a bit more clearly at https://www.irishtimes.com/sport/2024/10/15/foul-play-alleged-at-world-conker-championships-as-mens-winner-found-with-steel-chestnut/
it does strike me as strange that the top judge is allowed to also participate as an entrant in this sport.
As an apparently long time judge, he would have had a lot of time and experience to think through cheating loopholes. Would one or more of the other four fellow judges who watched him be sympathetic to him winning one glorious game in his final years?
“Say it ain’t so, Joe!”
THill • October 16, 2024 12:40 PM
It seems inadvisable for the Chief Judge of a competition to also be one of the contestants. Hopefully, the sport of Conkers can recover from this setback.
Dot Dip Zing • October 16, 2024 4:13 PM
Thanks, Bruce. Second funniest thing I’ve seen all week.
Daniel Popescu • October 17, 2024 12:44 AM
What Clive said :).
Wannabe Tecguy • October 17, 2024 9:54 AM
I have never heard of “Conkers” before, but it seems odd that:
1) this guy was both Chief Judge AND a contestant
2) he would have the steel conker in his pocket.
Also, I’m a bit confused who actually won given this:
“Kelci Banschbach, 34, from Indianapolis, defeated the men’s champion in the grand final to become the first American to win the competition.”
Sean Ralph • October 20, 2024 5:24 PM
Cheating at conkers in nothing new. I’d argue conkers is about the cheating. When I was a kid in the 1970s people would reinforce their chesnut with epoxy resin.
GregW • October 21, 2024 8:54 AM
Update: King Conker has been declared innocent and the accuser has backpedaled.
htt ps://www.indy100.com/sport/conker-championships-cheating-king-conker
ResearcherZero • November 4, 2024 9:05 AM
How to win at Conkers.
‘https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/campaign-donations-trump-harris-billionaires-b2639226.html
But you may not read about some of the favours they receive in return.
https://edition.cnn.com/2024/10/22/media/trump-strip-tv-station-licenses-punish-media/index.html
–
Others are censoring themselves…
‘https://edition.cnn.com/2024/11/03/business/election-companies-voting-marketing/index.html
How political donors polarise.
https://phys.org/news/2020-10-big-money-donors-political-average-voter.html
“Decades of social science research has also shown that when the priorities of wealthy donors conflict with those of most voters, donor priorities tend to win out, if for no other reason than because elected officials are more exposed to what donors think.”
‘https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/changing-campaign-finance-landscape
They shake your hand and they smile
And they buy you a drink
They say, we’ll be your friends
We’ll stick with you till the end
Ah, but everybody’s only looking out for themselves
And you say, well, who can you trust
I’ll tell you, it’s just nobody else’s money
“Money changes everything.” ~ Cyndi Lauper
ResearcherZero • November 5, 2024 11:23 PM
No more Conkers? 🙁
‘https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2024/10/22/un-cop-16-biodiversity-meeting/75778940007/
At least 16,425 of the 47,282 tree species studied could soon die out forever.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/one-in-three-tree-species-is-at-risk-of-extinction/
The ripple effect of the extinction of a single species can affect countless others, disrupting vital ecological functions.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/one-million-species-risk-extinction-threatening-human-communities-around-world-un-report-warns-180972114/
–
Countries fail to slow extinction rate costing billions.
‘https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cy9jdpep4ydo
Economic costs likely to be underestimated.
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/cambridge-prisms-extinction/article/economics-of-species-extinction-an-economists-viewpoint/E1EE7B4EFDF370C62483AFAE1A6700F4
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Clive Robinson • October 16, 2024 7:41 AM
The game of conkers is an odd one and untill mobile phones came along sort of confined to bored school boys mainly in England.
Yes the “conker” is a cheastnut, but not of the “sweet cheastnuts” eaten at Xmas since long before Dickensian times.
To win you need a hard conker of high density preferably with a non uniform shape so as to give a higher impact energy. But it also should not be too dry as they become brittle.
Many many years ago a friend was in France and there the conkers just fall on the ground and mainly rot. My friend collected around two shopping bags full to bring back and the French just thought my friend was shall we say “one acorn short of an oak tree” 😉
The reason for gathering them my friend helped run a “Scout pack” and they used the conkers as a meetup activity.
Also when they are fresh, you can stick cocktail sticks in them fairly easily so you can do that weird model making like that chemistry students are said to use to visualise molecules.