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Alik Gershon Israeli chess grandmaster on Thursday began a marathon chess match against 520 players in an attempt to beat the Guinness record for simultaneous chess games, currently held by Iran.
The tournament began in Tel Aviv's Rabin Square with grandmaster Alik Gershon shaking hands with every single player as he walked along rows of tables lined with chess boards.
In order to set the world record, the Ukrainian-born Mr Gershon must win at least 80 per cent of the games.
"I'm going to be breaking the Guinness world record for the biggest simultaneous chess game. The record today belongs to an Iranian grandmaster on 500 boards," Mr Gershon told AFP.
"I'm going to make it 520 and hopefully I will win over 80 per cent of the games."
Training for the event, which is likely to continue through the night and into Friday morning, was purely physical and included a lot of jogging and swimming, the 30-year-old former Israeli champion said.
"There are a lot of kilometres to walk and you have to stay focused," he said, noting that his Iranian rival Morteza Mahjoob walked 40 kilometres (25 miles) to secure his record.
Mr Mahjoob set the current record of 500 games in August 2009 in a feat which took him 18 hours with less than five seconds for each move.
"Hopefully all our wars against Iran will be on the chess board," said a smiling Mr Gershon. "For such wars, I am prepared."
Source : Ynetnew
The world’s most expensive incarnation of the Monopoly board game is headed to Wall Street.
An 18-karat gold version of the famous Parker Brothers board game will be on display beginning Friday at the Museum of American Finance. The gold and jewel-encrusted Monopoly is estimated to be worth roughly $2 million.
The set of dice alone is valued at $10,000, with 42 full-cut diamonds for the number dots. All of the properties that make up the game board are also set in gems, with some 165 gemstones in total. The “Chance” and “Community Chest” cards are photo-etched.
The notion of creating a blinged-out version of the board game came about in 1988, when San Francisco jeweler Sidney Mobell heard about a Monopoly tournament taking place in London. He called Parker Brothers (now part of Hasbro Inc.) for permission and then set to work creating the golden game, working every day for a year straight.
An ounce of gold cost between $360 and $460 when Mobell started working on the game set. Now the price of gold has topped $1,300 an ounce.
When Mobell brought the finished board to London, he was closely followed by guards, he says. “I felt like the king of England.” That was the only time the prized set was played on: a showdown between him and Britain’s former Prime Minster Edward Heath, he says.
Mobell, 84, has staked out a career as an unconventional crafter of decadence. He’s made diamond-encrusted yo-yos and mousetraps, as well as solid gold sardine cans, cellphones and eyeballs. Not to mention a gold toilet seat and garbage cans, long before John Thain’s $35,000 commode made headlines. And Monopoly is not his only contribution to the rarefied world of lavish board games: Mobell has also made bejeweled backgammon, dominos and chess sets.
The Monopoly board will be on display at the Museum of American Finance for two years, on loan from the Smithsonian. It is one of 19 works donated by Mobell in January 2003 in honor of his late wife .
Monopoly’s rich history continues to draw avid followers, competitors and discussion, even a century after it was introduced. A tournament for younger players will take place at the museum this Friday as well.
Mobell relishes the notion that such a decadent symbol of capitalism as a game is heading to the heart of the financial crisis. “The timing is fantastic,” he says. But if any financiers are thinking of blowing their bonuses on the Monopoly board, they should be warned: “The set is not for sale.”
Source : WSJ Blogs
Camel racing is a popular Race sport in India, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Bahrain, Jordan, Qatar, United Arab Emirates (Dubai), Oman, Australia, and Mongolia. Professional camel racing, like horse racing, is an event for betting and tourist attraction. Camels can run at speeds up to 65 km/h (18 m/s; 40 mph) in short sprints and they can maintain a speed of 40km/h (11 m/s; 25 mph) for an hour.
Camels are often controlled by child jockeys, but allegations of human rights abuses have led to nationwide bans on underage labor in the UAE and Qatar. This led to smaller jockeys become more widely used. One such Jockey was Grant Owens, who turned his hand to Camel Racing on the back of a highly successful stint as a Pig Racer. Recent controversy over the enslavement of children has led to increased use of robot-controlled camels. A major camel race in Australia is the Camel Cup held at Alice Springs. It is held annually and includes not only the camel races themselves, but also a collection of market stalls and other entertainment.
The biggest prize money camel race in Australia is the "Sheikh Zayed International camel endurance race" held in Hughenden in Queensland.It has a prize purse of AUD$50,000. Queensland also has the second biggest prize purse camel race "The Boulia desert Sands" with a AUD$25,000
The world's biggest Dodgeball Games Team has taken place in the California with more than 1,700 students hurling rubber balls at each other.
well-known form of team sport with modified rules that is often played in physical education classes and has been featured in a movie
Students came up with the idea for the game because they wanted to Organise a mass-participation event and thought they may as well break a Guinness record while they were at it.
After looking at the record books, the student from the University of California decided the dodgeball record - which stood at just 1,198 - was easily beatable.
For anyone who wasn't subjected to ritual humiliation by dodgeball, the aim of the game is to hit all the members of the opposing team by throwing the ball at them.
Source : Newslite Via University of California
The Museum of Soviet Arcade Games is a small basement museum in Moscow that houses vintage arcade games from the Soviet era. Anjel Van Slyke and Connal Hughes of A Dangerous Business visited the facility, played its games, and took many pictures.
To be honest, we really weren’t sure what to expect. The museum seemed amazing, but the small print was a little strange: It was only open 2 or 3 days a week, and not until 7:30 at night. The articles I’d read never mentioned anyone else being in the museum, so we wondered if the reporters had arranged private tours or we were about to visit a guy sitting by himself in a basement. Regardless, we figured that whatever happened it would be an amusing adventure.
Source : A Dangerous Business
As a means of getting your wife from A to B it certainly isn't dignified but the annual wife-carrying championships 2010 provide plenty of amusement for the casual observer.
And once again, Finland, the home of the competition, clinched the title as Taisto Miettinen sprinted fastest along the 832ft track, carrying Kristiina Haapanen upside-down on his back.
The couple, who also won the world championship title last year, finished the race in one minute and five seconds.
Estonia's Alar Voogle and Kristi Viltrop tripped in the water obstacle and were second some five seconds behind the winners.
Finns Ilpo Haalisto and Satu Juurinen got bronze.
The winning couple trained together throughout the year.
'Before I have been a lot of in a gym, but nowadays I have run a lot and that is the secret,' Miettinen said after Saturday's race in hot and sunny conditions.
The race, held for the 15th time attracted 55 couples from 15 countries, including Australia, Ireland and Poland, to compete in the remote eastern Finnish village of Sonkajarvi, some 302 miles north-east of the capital Helsinki.
The wife-carrying competition has its roots in a legend of Ronkainen the Robber and his gang who lived in the forests and stole food and girls from villages.
Source:- yle.fi
Video :- ABC Local
After 11 hours and five absorbing minutes on court, John Isner wrote his name into the record books as the winner of the sport's longest ever battle when the giant American finally clinched the epic three-day, 183-game thriller 6-4, 3-6, 6-7 (7-9), 7-6 (7-3), 70-68.
After the two men resumed on Thursday at 59-59 in the fifth set with exactly 10 hours on the clock, the conclusion came an hour and five minutes into the third day when Isner threaded a backhand pass up the line. The final shot of the match handed the 23rd seed what had proved an elusive break of serve that finally brought to an end an eight-hour, 11-minute final set.
The last break of serve had come two days earlier when Mahut had taken Isner's serve (to love!) in the second game of the second set early on Tuesday afternoon. That meant the two gladiators had held serve for an astounding 168 games before Isner collapsed to the turf after converting his fifth match point.
As the two men embraced after the final, 980th point of the match fans, media and players rose as one to applaud their heroic effort.
For the record, the match eclipsed the previous longest - a 2004 French Open duel between Frenchmen Fabrice Santoro and Arnaud Clement - by a massive four hours and 32 minutes. The combined ace tally stood at 215, with Isner hammering down 112, just nine more than his opponent on 103.
As the crowd waited for part three of this absorbing battle, there was a buzz of anticipation in the air. All those involved were ready. Swedish umpire Mohamed Lahyani was back refreshed, as were John McEnroe and Tracy Austin, both courtside to witness the drama. Even the scoreboard was in better shape, patched up and back in working order after conking out at 50-all on Wednesday night.
The first key moment came after only a couple of minutes as Isner delivered his 100th ace on his way to holding for 60-59. Fifteen minutes later Mahut matched the statistic as he held to bring the scores back to 62-62.
The match clock ticked over the 11-hour mark just as Isner made it 69-68, and in the next game the match was decided. A miscued drop shot from the Frenchman left him at 15-30, and although a brilliant serve and volley point made it30-all, the end was near.
An Isner forehand pass took him to 40-30 and his fifth match point, and a laser-like backhand that left the Frenchman rooted to the spot brought down the final curtain.
Isner's reward is a second round meeting with Dutchman Thiemo De Bakker, himself the winner of a marathon first match when he beat Colombia's Santiago Giraldo 16-14 in the deciding set. Perhaps they should be made to play best of three sets.
Source:- Wimbledon
About 1500 curious spectators gathered in the southern New Zealand city of Dunedin to watch the Nude Blacks play against the Welsh Leeks -- two amateur rugby union teams who faced off in a naked rugby clash on Saturday.The unofficial curtain raiser to a test match between the two countries took place in fine conditions at Logan Park Sports Ground with a try in the final minutes of the game sealing the win for the Nude Blacks, made up of mainly Otago University students, who were named in honour of the nation's representative team, the All Blacks.
Ex–All Black Richard Loe officiated at the game, which is the seventh annual match for the Nude Blacks.
The game featured a clothed streaker, a naked streaker and a haka, or Maori war dance, performed by the naked New Zealand players before the game. The "Welsh" team responded to the nude haka with some Morris dancing, before brandishing and tossing leeks at the opposition.
In the official game, which took place at Carisbrook in Dunedin several hours after the naked clash, the All Blacks beat Wales 42-9.
Source: Daily Telegraph via Fishki.net
Chinese students release stress in A Pillow Fight Game prior to vital exam is a common game mostly played by young children (but can also occur with teens and adults) in which they engage in mock physical conflict, utilizing pillows as weapons.
Being held from June 6th to 9th every year, the National College Entrance Exam, the most important test for Chinese students, is always considered the only access to a bright future in China, which brings much stress to students.
Many times pillow fights occur during children's sleepovers. Since pillows are soft, injuries rarely occur. The heft of a pillow can still knock a young person off balance, especially on a soft surface such as a bed, which is a common venue. A useful technique in a pillow fight is to bundle the nibs. In earlier eras, pillows would often break, shedding feathers throughout a room. Modern pillows tend to be stronger and are often filled with a solid block of artificial filling, so breakage occurs far less frequently. Pillow fighting became part of flash mob culture with pillow fight flash mobs popping up in cities around the world.
Source;- Imagine China And Wikipedia
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