Knights in the ring as chess boxers slug it out

AFP, July, 2008

BERLIN (AFP) — Rarely do brains and brawn come together in this way. A Russian was crowned world champion Sunday in the novelty sport of chess boxing that requires equal skill at moving pawns and throwing punches.

Mathematics student Nikolai Sazhin, 19, competing under the name "The President" knocked out a 37-year-old German policeman, Frank Stoldt, who served as a peacekeeper in Kosovo until recently.

The loser said he was simply too punch drunk to fend off checkmate.

"I took a lot of body-blows in the fourth round and that affected my concentration. That's why I made a big mistake in the fifth round: I did not see him coming for my king," he said.

Berlin is home to the world's biggest chess boxing club with some 40 members and it is in an old freight station here that the two men settled the matter in ...