Thomas Oehler is coming on in leaps and bounds
© mirja geh
Exploration

Top 10 Ridiculous Extreme Sports

You might not see any of these sports at the next Olympics, but they sure look fun.
Written by Louie Gatas
4 min readPublished on
Our athletes pull off some pretty gnarly stunts from Robbie Madison's Tower Bridge jump to Bruce Irons flaring surfboard but can they match the bare knuckle suspense that some of the more off-beat extreme sports offer? Check out our guide to the sublime and the ridiculous world of extreme sports as we take you on a white knuckle ride starting with the world of extreme ironing....
Extreme Ironing
Whether it’s standing on a mountain or in a cave, hanging off a cliff, driving on a motorway, flying through the air, jetting on the water, skiing down a hill or simply standing on a sidewalk in Times Square – Extreme Ironing is the new extreme sport that takes the mundane task of ironing clothes to another level.
Unicycle Hockey
When someone first proposed playing hockey on ice, people probably thought “You’re insane, combining ice skating with hockey?!” Nowadays ice hockey is the most common variant of hockey, though possibly not for long… Unicycle hockey is a newcomer to the “hit it in the goal with a stick” genre of sports, but hopefully will prove just as popular.
Chess Boxing
Requiring a combination of brains and brawn, chessboxing is among the most demanding of sports. All participants must be expert level in chess and physically fit enough to box for the required number of rounds. Amusingly, the worse a participant fares in the ring, the less likely they are to be able to win on the board.
Sepak Takraw
Sepak Takraw is serious business in South East Asia and is a frankly awesome sport. To the layman it looks like hackeysack on steroids but the game requires a huge amount of agility and dexterity to pull off some of the more daring maneuvers, such as overhead or bicycle kicks.
Wife Carrying
Whilst we know this sport developed in Finland, its exact history is unclear. The sport itself is pretty self-explanatory; you have to carry your wife (of at least 7.7 stone) over an obstacle course as fast as possible. What’s bound to cause problems is that you can either carry your wife or your neighbour’s wife. If you don’t pick your own, you better make sure you win – the prize is the woman’s weight in beer and after that, who cares about an angry wife!
Zorbing
Gravity is a cruel mistress, why not show her who’s boss by ensconcing yourself in an inflatable ball and shout “do your worst” to the laws of physics as you throw yourself down something steep. Zorbing is quickly becoming available as a day activity all over the world so this is one you might want to give a go!
Human Castle Building
Human castle building or ‘castell’ is an age-old Catalan tradition where rival teams try to assemble the tallest tower from their own bodies. The level of engineering on show is astounding and the towers often have a few nimble youngsters at their summit to add a few extra feet. The tallest towers are 10 levels high, which means it’s a choice between a long drop from the top or a lot of people potentially landing on top of you!
Horse Boarding
If you like to water-ski but you live in the countryside, you no longer have to mope around the fields. Stunt rider Daniel Fowler-Prime, who worked in films such as Kingdom Of Heaven and The Da Vinci Code, found a solution: horse-boarding. All you need is a skateboard, a rope, and… a horse.
Cheese Rolling
The tradition of competitively chasing dairy products down an incline dates back around 200 years and originated in the small English town of Brockworth. Every year a wheel of Double Gloucester is let loose, followed by the competitors who scramble/tumble down Cooper's Hill to win both the cheese and the respect of their peers.
Under Water Hockey
As silly as this sport might sound, Under Water Hockey has been around for almost 60 years. Players only use diving masks and snorkels, so controlling breathing and oxygen levels is an important game factor! The rules are similar to hockey – two teams, two goals, one puck – but the stick is only 12 inches long and players actually AIM to stay close to the ground.