Losing its main sponsor amid the economic crisis has done little to dampen the sport’s expansion plans, it seems. A European championship fight in England next month will be followed by the world championship in Russia’s Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk.
“Grass-roots level development is what we are doing right now and we can do that easily,” Rubingh said. “We do not need to organize a congress for 100 people like other federations.”
“We just need a group on Facebook,” Rubingh said during a tour of the visiting athletes’ Berlin accommodation, where the rooms were covered with wallpaper showing chess boxing scenes and sprinkled with quotes from famous boxers and chess players.
“Russia is the chess boxing nation and it is now waking up,” Rubingh said.
Eastern Europe, and Russia in particular, have proved to be fertile ground for the sport, with both boxing and chess widely played.
One of Rubingh’s plans is to stage an unofficial demonstration of chess boxing during the 2012 London Olympics.
“We are planning some guerrilla shows in London during the Games,” said Rubingh, who as an artist has blocked off roads in Tokyo and Berlin, causing traffic chaos.
“Our vision is to one day make it to the Olympics. I think there it would become the top discipline for the ultimate athlete,” he said.
RSS