When you think of sports, you might think of baseball, football, and other popular sports, but there are some very unique and unusual sports. For example: Extreme Ironing, Ear pulling, etc. But have you ever heard of the sport of toe wrestling? Toe wrestling is a very unpopular sport, but is also very competitive for people who play it. The sport itself sounds somewhat strange, but it’s a real worldwide sport that people are dedicated to.
The rules are rather simple: With shoes off, the competitors face one another toe-to-toe across the “toedium”, where they interlock their big toes and try to force each other off the toedium (a lot like arm wrestling). The first person to knock the other opponent’s foot off the toedium wins the round. People usually feel very uncomfortable toe wrestling, (due to germs and the unusual thought of it) but we went around and asked students to participate. We went around 5 classrooms to see if anyone would want to compete. We pulled out 4 or 5 students and explained the game. Most of the people turned around and walked away disturbed, but we got 4 total people to compete in a “tournament.” Four people is not a lot, but due to the sport, it would have to work. We also talked to the teachers, who all said no. We asked the contestants if they would choose an opponent. We explained again that to play they must take off their shoes and socks as the game is played with bare feet. They then must link toes and win, 2 out of 3 rounds.
The students didn’t seem too pleased with the rules and refused to take off their socks. We couldn’t force them to take off their socks, so they continued to foot wrestle with their socks on. Them not participating defeated the purpose of the sport but we kept note of the rounds. Our contestants, Callen Clein, Kingston Hardiman, Boaz, and “to not be named,” all competed in this event. In the first round, Callen and Boaz competed, and Callen won two out of three, going on to the finals. In the second round, Kingston Hardiman, and “to not be named” competed and Kingston won three out of three sending him to the finals with Callen. Finally, Kingston and Callen competed in the final round and Callen Clein won the final round of toe wrestling.
A few weeks later we interviewed our contestants, asking them about their experience with the sport. First, we interviewed Boaz; we asked him how he felt about the sport, and if being with a friend made it more comfortable than with a stranger. He said, “ The sport was overall weird, but being with a friend made it less awkward.” Boaz seemed interested in the sport and though he lost he was a participant. Then we interviewed Callen, we asked him about the sport and how he felt about it, we also asked him if it was an easy win or if he struggled. Callen said, “ The sport was weird, but I won with no effort and I am the winner of toe wrestling.” Callen seemed to not be too interested in the sport, but mostly focused on the win… Next, we interviewed “to not be named,” they did not have a lot to say about what had happened, but we could tell that they were not happy with their loss. Kingston who got second place was not available that day but we assumed that he would think it was weird because that is how he felt the day of the match.
Overall the contestants were weirded out but got to have a very “fun” out-of-pocket experience. So toe wrestling might not be as popular as some other sports but it sure might be a once-in-a-lifetime kinda thing that you might want to try out (or maybe not).
