Chess Boxing

The future chess boxer will be a grandmaster and a professional boxer. Chess boxing could even solve the problem in the Middle East. I want to hold a chess boxing match between an Israeli and a Palestinian, and the winner will get to decide what happens to Israel.
--Iepe Rubingh

There really aren't enough sports that originate from a Dutch performance artist bringing things from a distopian French-Bosnian comic book to life. This is what Iepe Rubingh did with chess boxing, taken from Enki Bilal's comic book. I heard about this hybrid of chess and boxing from the excellently titled ESPN article "By Hook or by Rook," but information may also be found at the World Chess Boxing Organisation. It starts with four minutes of chess, and after then the chess board is moved out of the way, the competitors box for two minutes. The two disciplines alternate for a total of 6 chess rounds and 5 boxing round. You win by checkmating your opponent, knocking him out, or by referee's decision or having your opponent exceed the 12 minute time limit in chess.

While I do not necessarily agree with Iepe's ideas about the Middle East, which seem more divisive than unitive, it seems to me that chess boxing is the perfect catalyst for change in the suburban American high school (on television). Think of the groups this unites--the jocks, the chess nerds, the art snobs, the comic book guys, and if you add ring girls, the stereotypical dumb but pretty blondes. What else besides the say-no-to-drugs assemblies brings all these diverse elements together?