Sunday, January 25, 2004
Top Five Strangest Sports
With the Super Bowl upon us, sports is on my mind. I'm sure there are a lot of sports out there that I have never heard of that deserve consideration, but to my knowledge and in my opinion, these are the five strangest:
5. Football--Yes it's ubiquitous so it should seem normal. But take a few steps back and look at this game as if you saw it for the first time. It's a very strange game. I remember as a kid, before I knew what it was, football fascinated me. Not because of the speed and athletics, but because of the pylons in the end zone, men dressed up as robots, and all those dogpiles. It was like an alien game out of laff-a-lympics. If it wasn't so ingrained in American culture, it could be much higher on this list.
4. Slamball--Basketball played with a trampoline floor near and under the basket. If you don't have cable and don't know what I'm talking about, see for yourself by by clicking here
3. Haggis Hurling--Men in kilts throwing cow stomachs that are filled with cow guts. Click here for more information.
2. Man vs. Horse Marathon--Like Haggis Hurling, leave it up to those crazy folks on the British Isles to come up with nutty sports. When I ran cross country in college we had a pretty good team. One of the rival coaches once told our coach "I'd love to have that stable of stallions you got." Well, too bad we couldn't have gone to this Man v. Horse Marathon and really find out if we were stallion-worthy. Click here for more information and some great pictures.
1. Motoball--Anyone remember this from the original Goodwill Games? I do. Soccer played on motorcycles. I'm shitting you negative. Click here for more. It looks like there's still some leagues in Germany, Russia, and a few other European countries.
Image from http://digilander.libero.it/cuoccimix
I've also heard of underwater hockey and underwater rugby, but that seems a little forced, so no top five list for those athletes.
