George Duke wrote on Mon, Jun 9, 2008 05:38 PM UTC:
Why do clocks run clockwise anyway? Chess Variants suggest modifications of
other Sports: Thoroughbred racing Variants. ''Big Brown's''
embarrassing last-place finish at Belmont Stakes, NY USA, June 2008: no
hysterical ''Triple Crown'' winner. (1) Variant One. High-Stakes Race
contenders run the tracks clockwise (European-style). Half the races actually should go clockwise for health reasons. Running CCW around ovals all the time distorts anatomies, because unsymmetrically left flanks always toe in for changes of direction, whilst right overdevelops striding. Such different stresses mean eventual genetic maladaptation by selection. (2) Change winning conditions. Why the Horse crossing finish line first always declared winner? a) Cross finish line at greatest angle from 90 degrees, up to 45 degrees. b) Stepping backwards. c) Over and back fifty metres and over again. d) Thrice such. (3) Horse racing occasionally features locals as jockey-riders and monkeys. The first to produce full on-board robotic computer-mount control winning North American race gets free entrance fees for entire barn. This will also encourage not just one but many androids fitted for saddling entire stables. No more jockeys, think
of savings. (Will some world-class jockey, robotically beaten, claim human intervention from a distance, like Gary Kasparov?) (4) Four is variation of (1). Half the field runs CW, and
half CCW. Head-on collision at Finish is Draw, Deadheat, called ''Draw by Header.'' [Next we look at ''Basketball,'' invented by Naismith 1891, to redesign toward full potential and outlast the Classical Arena.]