Have you ever imagined chess and boxing in one sporting event? Safe to say, it’s weird but interesting combination as witnessed most recently in the 2013 World Championship Chessboxing in Moscow, Russia.

While this appears to be new hybrid sporting competition, dual athletes in this sport have been fighting both on the ring and board for a number of decades already.

According to worldchessboxing.com, the first know club was established in London in 1978 by an amateur pugilist and wood pusher James Robinson. Over 30 years later, independent chessboxing clubs were emerging left and right, and international tournaments were being held in big cities including London, Berlin, Krasnoyarsk and Los Angeles.

The latest big chessboxing event happened in Moscow where major chessboxing fights took place in the heavyweight, light heavyweight and middleweight divisions.

The smartest and toughest athletes from the home country Russia, Italy, Belarus and India. among other nations. were represented.

No results are available as of press time, but Russia’s Sazhin was scheduled to face Italy’s Sirci in a heavyweight bout and Belarus’ Chernobayev was set to take on India’s Shaliesh.

The demanding sport requires the competitors to play in an alternate format of round of chess and a round of boxing with three minute intervals.

The winner is decided when a comeptitor wins via a checkmate or time penalty in chess or knockout (KO) or technical knockout (TKO) in boxing. If a draw in chess happens at any point before the final round, the competitors are required to finish it in the ring to conclude the match.

At this point, some readers may be doubting the veracity of the story or even, if such a sport actually exists. Thanks to YouTube, we have some video evidences to back up both ((Video credit to respective YouTube clips uploaders) :

Here’s a primer for this year’s chessboxing event in Moscow:

Chess Boxing World Championship Moscow 2013 Teaser

Here’s a snippet of chessboxing documentary:

Squaring Up: Chessboxing [TRAILER]

And here’s chessboxing featured on ESPN:

Chessboxing on ESPN Sports Center

Dou you want to start chessboxing or even better, do you want to become the greatest chessboxer of all time?

Simple: float like a butterfly, sting like a bee then knockout the king.