Three Strikes Each, Five Minutes on the Clock, and Three Tangles Gets You Thrown Out
The World Conker Championships are expected at Southwick on 11 October, though the organisers have not confirmed it.
The World Conker Championships are expected at the Shuckburgh Arms in Southwick, Northamptonshire, on Sunday 11 October.
The format is stricter than the playground version. Horse chestnuts go on 20-centimetre bootlaces. Conkers are drawn blind from a bag and each player may reject up to three. A coin toss decides who strikes first. Players then alternate three strikes each at the opponent's nut, and deliberate miss-hits are not allowed. The match ends when a conker is smashed.
If nothing has broken after five minutes, each player gets up to nine further alternating strikes, and after that it goes to sudden death, one strike at a time. Three tangled laces, called snags, and you are disqualified.
Around 400 competitors enter and up to 5,000 spectators come, with entries from Australia, Canada, France, Japan, Russia and the United States.
Peter Midlane has three men's titles, Jasmine Tetley three women's and Oliver Simons three youth titles. John Riley won it at 85 in 2017. Fee Aylmore won in 2022 after thirty years of trying.
Anglers started the championships in 1965 at the Chequered Skipper in Ashton, when bad weather stopped a fishing trip. It stayed there for 45 years and moved to Southwick in 2009.
The 11 October date comes from listings sites, one of which hedges it with the word should. The organisers' own site was not reachable to confirm it.