The file is on the desk and the folder in which it belongs is behind the back in the office. It doesn't take a necessarily lazy employee in this situation to see that he doesn't get up to get the folder. After all, a well-timed push off the desk with both legs is much more fun than hurtling backwards towards the shelf. Sporty people take the same route back - after all, the child in the man or woman wants to be cared for a little even in the driest working day. Like everything that is fun, this principle has become a sport: a fun discipline.
- About the global triumph of the Gaudi sport “office chair racing”
- Different variants and an internationally surprisingly similar set of rules
- Desk chair tuning is expressly permitted
- Office chair racing, extreme ironing and bog snorkeling
About the global triumph of the Gaudi sport “office chair racing”
It is known about André Franquin, the great Franco-Belgian comic artist and creator of such brilliant series as “Spirou and Fantasio”, “Marsupilami” and “Gaston”, that he had an anarchist sense of humor. In this respect, the anti-hero Gaston was his most important work: Franquin immortalized a bit of himself in the experiences of the terribly unproductive and useless office boy by conventional standards, but all the more creative. While Gaston is rather unaffected by the conventional use of office furniture, he develops almost sporting zeal when it comes to misusing it. He installs a pedal drive in them, invents seat shells with which he can lower railings, invents a hammock chair transport system for branched office buildings - and during his working hours he likes to compete against the stopwatch in an office sport: office chair rolling.
What arose decades ago from the genius of a unique artist is now a reality: office chair racing exists as a fun sport that is practiced worldwide. But from the beginning. While Gaston kneels with one leg on the seat of the chair and pushes off with the other foot and races through the office corridors, the "actual sport" is limited to two principles: the use of gravity and the minimization of resistance, similar to the principle of a soapbox race or sprint pushing on the flat - or a mixture of both. At least this is the result of extensive research in the depths of the search engines, sometimes with the help of a Chinese keyboard. Because who’s really surprised? Office chair racing is a big thing in China. However, according to unreliable sources, the Japanese are named as the inventors. Until a few years ago, a team in Bad König in the beautiful Odenwald organized a German championship that made it into the international media. In San Clemente, California, people are relaxed and allow longboards and tire couches to race. As in all other aspects of life, the British are not averse to this curiosity and there are also tournaments in Australia, France, Sweden and Spain in which the focus is on rapid progress on a piece of work furniture.
Different variants and an internationally surprisingly similar set of rules
Whether on a sloping slope or on the flat: the daring men and women compete against each other on their rolling furniture and try to get over the finish line as quickly as possible. Unlike most other sports, tuning is expressly permitted in office chair racing and it is left to the imagination and craftsmanship of the participants as to how they convert their chair into a rolling racing car.
Now there is one Office chair As is well known, it consists of a backrest, possibly armrests, a rotating seat, a height-adjustable main column and a turnstile to which, depending on the model, four or five casters are attached. According to most regulations, the rollers must not have a diameter larger than 20 centimeters, must be freely movable and of course must not have a drive. There is a rumor that a particularly ambitious office chair pilot has equipped his vehicle with rockets and is now flying a course around satellites in Earth orbit. There is also a rumor going around that at least the second part of the rumor is actually a rumor.
Desk chair tuning is expressly permitted
The office chair is actually controlled by simply shifting your weight and this is where the fun begins. Anyone who has ever rolled around the room on an office chair and tried to make a controlled turn knows that this is actually impossible. The contortions of the racing pilots are correspondingly spectacular, as are most of the attempts to influence the direction of roll with their feet. It doesn't matter whether you sit on the chair, lie on your stomach or on your back: the bizarre postures in the elimination fights, which mostly follow the knockout principle, are correspondingly diverse. Speaking of “KO”: Actively influencing opponents is also prohibited, according to most rules. In plain English: Anyone who steps out of the way of their competitor, causes them to lose track of them as they drive past or actively influences the direction of travel of the opposing vehicle will be disqualified.
A popular tuning measure is increasing the weight, although a sense of proportion is required here: if too many trading disks are attached to the turnstile, the vehicle will pick up speed too slowly - if there are too few, precious seconds will be wasted. Particularly popular with office chair pilots: particularly wide “orthopedic” office chairs that run significantly more smoothly than the entry-level model. Another effective measure is replacing office chair castors, upgrading the bearings or simply using lots and lots of good lubricant.
A car tuned like this can reach 35 to 40 kilometers per hour Office chair create; Accordingly, protective equipment is seriously required or at least strongly recommended. Helmet, elbow, knee and wrist pads are common, as are gloves. If you assume that a normal office chair with an average seat height of 50 to 70 centimeters allows for a significant fall, a full-face helmet is even recommended. Because if one thing is certain: falls are a given in rolling competitions and are often a sophisticated part of a kind of choreography doomed to failure - which serves the sole purpose of amusing the audience.
Office chair racing, extreme ironing and bog snorkeling
If you believe a book about fundraising ideas, there are even office chair racing world championships - and also global tournaments in worm digging, extreme ironing, shin kicking (!), cheese rolling, bog snorkeling, nettle eating - although the latter discipline is hopefully just about spelling the name of the sport correctly. As with all fun tournaments, the office chair race is, above all, about fun. Accordingly, local organizers can set their own rules and, for example, allow push staff, build a course with water machines, copiers, potted plants and wastebaskets in the way or, in the spirit of Gaston, hold a pedal chair race - whatever pleases, makes you happy and focuses on the misuse of rolling swivel chairs is allowed.