Jean Shrimpton’s white dress
When Jean Shrimpton walked out onto Flemington Racecourse in Melbourne, Australia, in 1965, she didn’t know she was about to make fashion history.
Category: Games & sport
Quantum crossword
Most crosswords have a single correct solution. A quantum crossword has several.
Kick volleyball
Sepak takraw resembles volleyball, except you can only use your feet, knees, and head. The kicks are amazing, but you should not let the sons of sultans and prime ministers play.
Cheating chess computer
In 2011, the World Computer Chess Championship banned the four-time champion Rybka chess engine for cheating.
First computer chess cheat
In the 1993 World Open chess tournament, an unknown competitor drew a match against a grandmaster. He used a computer to cheat.
The curse of Colonel Sanders
The ghost of KFC’s Colonel Sanders has haunted a Japanese baseball team since 1985.
Underwater ball sports
If you’re playing underwater rugby or football, how do you keep the ball from floating or sinking?
Computer battle of the heavyweights
The Muhammad Ali vs. Rocky Marciano boxing match was screened in theatres across Europe and North America in 1970. In American theatres, Marciano won. In European theatres, Ali did.
Snowball fighting champions
In 1989 the residents of SÅbetsu, Japan, formalised rules for competitive snowball fighting. Thirty-one world championships have since been played in the town.
Chess of love
The earliest fully recorded game of modern chess – from the 15th century CE – is a poem about love.
All-pawn chess
Lord Dunsany was an early 20th century fantasist whose writing inspired Tolkien, H. P. Lovecraft, and many others. He also invented a chess variant where one side has 32 pawns and no other pieces.
Gaelic Australian football
Gaelic football and Australian Rules football teams don’t have much international competition. So they decided to play each other instead.
Nontransitive dice
Consider three special dice: A, B, and C. On a fair roll, A is more likely to beat B. B is more likely to beat C. But C is more likely to beat A. These are nontransitive dice.
Hu’s on first
When Taiwanese baseball player Chin-Lung Hu hit a single in a game against the Arizona Diamondbacks he fulfilled a promise made in a comedy sketch seventy-one years before.
The game is the rules
To win the game Nomic, you need to change the rules so that you can win the game Nomic.
The end of the tower
According to a popular myth, the solution of a 64-piece Tower of Hanoi puzzle will herald the end of the world.