World conker champion found with steel chestnut, cleared of cheating

Yes, conkers is sufficiently well-known enough as a children's schoolyard game that I would expect pretty much every newspaper-reading adult to have heard of it. The fact that there is supposedly an "adult" championship event would be a surprise to most. If you're looking for the "story behind the story", other than the fact that it's a seasonally-specific, light human-interest story: there is probably a slight cultural bias amongst those who most fondly remember the game towards the private-school-educated, upper-class types who combine nostalgia for imagined "glory days" with political conservatism, so this is a good opportunity for the left-leaning Guardian to hand-pick someone who appears to belong to that class and expose them as a ridiculously-dressed scoundrel with childish interests and suspect morals. The subtext is: these are the sort of idiots we want you to associate with Nigel Farage, Boris Johnson and co, and thus the Overton Window gets a tiny nudge in the opposite direction.

This is silly. Conkers aren't a rich person's sport, and this article in the guardian isn't pushing any political subversive subtext.

It never occurred to me that conkers could be a class thing and you could be right. But let it be known that conkers was extremely popular at my state school; me and all of my friends grew up to be pretty left wing too by the way. Also they banned it at my school, along with pogs, yoyos, etc.

I think you’re reading way, way too much into this. Read the piece and it seems like just a goofy little oddball story, makes for a light and enjoyable read, I’m really not picking up any political angle in this piece.

The Guardian are certainly a left-leaning, frequently political paper, but that doesn’t mean every story is political, and IMO this one isn’t.

It's not a class thing.

Fox hunting, horse riding, polo and skiing... yes. Conkers, No.

Wherever there is a chestnut tree you'll get conkers. I would imagine it's more of a town/village vs city thing rather than class thing.

Which of those are you imagining doesn't have horse chestnut trees? (Conkers come from those, not plain chestnut trees)

I'm sure there are parts of the country where they're less common, but there's huge numbers of conkers falling off trees in big British cities (even if the majority will be in parks) as well as in the countryside. We played with them at my pre-teen city centre school for sure, and the trees are a common sight on roads and in gardens as well as public parks.

edit: the Woodland trust actually says "Though rarely found in woodland, it is a common sight in parks, gardens, streets and on village greens."

What if you ski in jeans?

News is what you don't get to read.

The rest are political ads.

In Britain, maybe. In the USA, I don’t think so.

Live in London in Zone 2 and there are absolutely tons of conker trees around me including in areas which are not posh. They are very common in an urban setting.[1]

[1] Which kind of sucks for me personally because they cause me really terrible hayfever. I think I'm specifically alergic to their pollen maybe.

Exactly! I used to ski double black diamonds in the Sierra Nevada range wearing jeans, with gaiters to keep the snow out of my boots.

Right on.

Contrast the BBC's take: First American wins World Conker Championships[0], which focuses on the winner's family's pride, the "lovely little village" where the tournament was held, the American visitor triumphing over churlish natives heckling her, and concludes with a cozy panegyric embracing both tradition and the New World Order (of conkers):

> "Our overall champion, Kelci Banschbach, is our first American Queen Conker and David Jakins, previous finalist and long-standing committee member, very much deserves his King Conker title."

In typical fashion, the Establishment's champion declines to even hint at the underlying corruption.

0: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cr75xyn1rd8o

I heard the conkers cheater was an illegal immigrant, the establishment covered it up and now they wont even report on conkers anywhere in the main stream media (/s?)

Eton wall game is a class thing. Conkers is not.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eton_wall_game

Skiing is a much more expensive activity in most of Britain, mainly since it requires taking a week off work, international flights and hotels to be able to participate. And to become good at skiing you'll have to do that once or twice a year for many years. In places where the local ski slope is a bus ride away it is much less of a class/wealth thing.

Considerably more pleasant than the St. Tadger's Day wall game played at Graybridge public school.

https://youtu.be/dDjV9iKmT9k?t=118

Depends where you are - I went to a very modest comprehensive in Scotland and yet we still went skiing at weekend to Cairngorm because it was close.

The height of ski chic in Scotland used to, at least when I skied regularly, consist of offshore foul weather gear emblazoned with the name of the oil company (or oil service company) the wearer had borrowed it from.

Conkers is about the least upper class game i can think of. We played it on council estates.