It is very difficult to say for sure when sport appeared. In any case, archaeologists and historians tend to believe that elements of sport originated back in the days when people lived in caves and used the skins of wild animals for clothing. Scenes of purely sporting competitions are sometimes found on rock paintings.
They were different in different communities of primitive people. Over the centuries, the Olympic Games appeared in our civilization, considered the pinnacle of athletic skill.
Currently, the Olympic Games include 28 summer and 7 winter sports. In 2020, another 8 sports are to be added to the Olympic Games.
Of course, in addition to the Olympic Games, sports competitions are held at various world championships, as well as at all sorts of regional levels on a very significant organizational and financial basis. But there are also competitions that are little known in the world, but they are interesting because they cause surprise and a smile. This is what the story will be about below.
It is interesting that these competitions are also held on a very large scale, and some of them claim to be international and, as it were, second Olympic, since they originated a very long time ago.
For example, endurance competitions in a bathhouse . There is such an unusual sport in a number of countries. Only adult males, physically strong and healthy, are allowed to participate. Of course, only after a trial test. It is short and gentle. But not everyone can withstand the main competition.
The temperature in the steam room is raised to 100 degrees and gradually increased. For a slight cooling, a ladle of warm water is poured on the participants every 30 seconds. As for the sensations, they can be described as follows: there is almost nothing to breathe and the skin “crackles” from the hot steam. From such a sauna-stove, they crawl out “on all fours”.
Record: one man held out for 10 minutes and then couldn't catch his breath for half an hour.
According to rumors, the record has not been broken by anyone yet. Apparently, the men have become smaller, not the strongmen.
And somehow, unexpectedly, I remembered that some northern peoples (primarily in Finland) have a popular sport of carrying their wives on their backs . The “technology” is simple, but heavy if the spouse weighs a lot.
First, it must be carried a distance of 253 meters. Why this particular distance, I don’t know. Then the main competition is for distance and endurance. In order for all men to be in an equal situation, the main weight is taken as the weight of the heaviest woman, and the rest are “hung” with a load up to this weight. The peculiarity is that the wives are upside down on their husbands’ backs, holding on to their husbands’ necks with their legs. In Finland, in the city of Sonkajärvi, the world championship in wife dragging is held annually.
The “Beat the Horse” championship has been held in England since 1980. The conditions are simple, but extremely difficult for the participants. Men must overtake a trained racehorse. The race is a marathon, 42 km! The horse has always won. This has been the case for 24 years in a row. But in the 25th championship, the victory was won by a man who managed to run to the finish line first – the horse fell behind, tired. The winner took the prize accumulated over all the years of the amazing championship – 25 thousand pounds.
The ways of human imagination in the field of competition are inscrutable. What other amazing things will be invented?
