Chessboxing Festival | Chox Con 24

Chessboxing adds the thrills and spills of speed chess to the strategic and tactical challenges of traditional boxing, creating a mind-bending hybrid sport that must be seen to be fully appreciated. The ultimate battle of brain and brawn. Two opponents play a round of speed chess followed by a round of boxing, with one minute in between rounds. They continue to alternate between the two with the chess game becoming ever more challenging as the physical battle takes its toll. The winner is decided by checkmate or knockout.

With EU subsidies a distant memory, farmers are looking for alternative revenue streams, none are more alternative than Chessboxing. The 2,000 acre working farm at Worstead Estate will be playing host to the first ever Chessboxing festival across two days of events and activities. Chessboxing Nation will be hosting the event in partnership with Wildcraft Brewery. The sport of chessboxing celebrated it’s 20th anniversary last year and a chessboxing event was held in Norwich in 2017, but this is the first chessboxing festival ever, and the first event on a farm.

“To celebrate the festival we are designing a totally new beer, the Berserker Brew”, Mike Deal, head brewery at Wildcraft Brewery. In stead of a ring girl, chessboxing events use a Berserker, a character which links combat with chess. When chess came to the UK via Scandinavia the rook (castle) was represented by a berserker, this can be seen in the famous Lewis chess set. Berserkers were shock viking troops who worked themselves into a frenzy before running into battle naked wearing only animal firs – that’s exactly what chessboxing is like in the flesh!

Image by Pawel Gawronski