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World conker champion found with steel chestnut, cleared of cheating

(www.theguardian.com)
424 points notamy | 3 comments | 15 Oct 24 03:12 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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thatguymike ◴[15 Oct 24 04:04 UTC] No.41844833[source]▶
I'm surprised they pick their conkers out of a bag. The whole fun when I was a kid was competing for who could find the toughest conker. Common cheating methods included putting it through the tumble dryer to dry it out (Mum didn't love that) or soaking in vinegar. If you're pulling conkers out of a bag I think each match is basically a coin flip, unless there's much more technique I'm missing?
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andrewflnr ◴[15 Oct 24 04:14 UTC] No.41844882[source]▶
Vinegar makes it stronger? I would naively expect the opposite.
replies(1): >>41845056 #
kimixa ◴[15 Oct 24 04:50 UTC] No.41845056[source]▶
I wouldn't be surprised if many of the "techniques" softened it but made it more resistant to shattering.

An extremely hard but brittle conker would probably make for poor results.

replies(1): >>41845084 #
1. andrewflnr ◴[15 Oct 24 04:56 UTC] No.41845084[source]▶
Interesting. I can certainly see how brittleness is probably fatal. But a soft one won't be any help at breaking your opponent's conker, either, right? Unless speed of your conker can overcome the increased inefficiency of transmitting energy into the opponent's...
replies(1): >>41845179 #
2. ThrowawayTestr ◴[15 Oct 24 05:16 UTC] No.41845179[source]▶
Everything can be a sport if you try hard enough.
replies(1): >>41845905 #
3. blitzar ◴[15 Oct 24 07:40 UTC] No.41845905[source]▶
Everything can be a sport if you can bet on it.