According to a recent, completely unscientific poll which may or may not have been conducted by this writer purely for the purposes of this sentence, almost half of the internet is comprised of cutesy clips of animals doing stupid things like this:

However even before the internet ramped it up to the next level, mankind’s obsession with animals took it to some pretty weird places… not least onto the turf of the sports field.

Across the globe there are a whole load of slightly insane people running crazy competitions where our four (or more) legged friends can battle it out. Sometimes for little more than the honour of being tomorrow’s lunch.

These are the world’s most mental animal sports.

Yabby Racing

Humanity’s involvement with crustaceans largely revolves around boiling them alive to serve up at swanky restaurants.

Knowing this, the humble yabby is probably taking the quirky tradition of racing its kind very seriously.

The yabby is an Australian freshwater crayfish who’s latin name, cherax destructor, pretty much translates as ‘the destroyer’.

But this means nothing for a yabby racer who is more likely to be slapped with some ridiculous moniker like ‘This Scampi Happening’ or ‘Stop Being Shellfish’.

The Yabby’s Latin name pretty much translates as ‘the destroyer’…

Not content with disrespecting the little fella’s badass name, Aussies have taken to racing them at festivals throughout the country.

Races are simple, dump a bucket of yabbies in the middle of a painted circle and the first one to crawl out wins.

This is a good laugh for spectators but for the yabby it’s more like a re-run of Gladiator, crammed with his mates into a plastic prison and suddenly released, blinking into an arena surrounded by a yelling crowd of his mortal enemies.

The worst bit is that running for your life or sitting put out of abject terror makes no difference because sometimes the contestants are served up as dinner after the race. Guess Australia had better hope that old destructor got his name by mistake…

Dog Surfing

Yup, you read that right. Sadly dog surfing doesn’t just exist on Youtube, it’s an actual thing, with actual competitions. No, we’re not kidding.

Dog surfing is just what it sounds like. Dogs surfing, complete with all the ridiculous clothing their owners can throw at them. And yes, of course it’s an American thing.

The sport has actually existed as far back as the 1920s in both Hawaii and California and continues to have a strong following along the west coast of the US.

The canine competitors don’t shred tubes, instead they get marks for how long they can stay on the board for and the size of the wave. Some contests even give bonus points to dogs who don’t look like they’re bricking it, but that doesn’t stop hilarious wipeout pics like this:

Frog Jumping

As a sport, making a frog jump would seem to be on a par with making an ice-cream melt or a premiership footballer dive in the box – if you give it long enough it will eventually happen on its own.

But nobody has told this to the good people of the US of A who will happily spend hours chasing frogs around trying to make them jump further than their rivals.

Thousands of people across America attend frog jumps each year including the world famous Calaveras event which has been running since 1928 and offers hundreds of dollars in prize money.

Frogs start on a pad at the edge of the jumping area and their total distance is measured from the end of their third jump back to the pad.

The results are quite frankly hilarious, as competitors use everything they can think of to spur on the amphibious athletes.

Competitors use everything they can think of to spur on the amphibious athletes…

From slapping phone books together and yelling at their frogs to stamping on the ground close enough to crush the squishy green guys, contestants will go to any length to prove that they are the champion of getting a frog to do what it would quite happily do even if they weren’t there.

Some contestants even perform their best frog impression, leaping around to show the little critters how it’s done. Which makes you wonder if what you’re actually watching is the annual human jump, organised by frogs….

Camel Wrestling

Sports often seem like a testosterone fuelled fight to the death and nowhere is this more true than Selcuk, Turkey where each year hulking male combatants slap each other around in front of thousands of screaming spectators.

In this instance however, the scrappers are camels; salivating, horny camels. During mating season the randy ungulates have just one thing on their mind and it’s not sitting down for a nice tea party.

The randy ungulates have just one thing on their mind…

They get so aroused that almost anything moving becomes a target and if they can’t hump it they’re gonna’ try to take it out. At the top of the hit list are other male camels who represent competition for all the, ahem, ‘fine’ camel ladies like Miss July here:

Just to make sure they’re at truly Wolverine like levels of rage, the locals dress their camel champs up in like desert drag queens in the gaudiest saddles money can buy and then slap them in ring to watch them wrestle.

The hairy heavyweights scrap away until one camel retreats, screams or falls over and bouts can be quite technical with camels favouring different angles of attack, shoving and even tripping each other to get an advantage.

The crowds have a great time cheering on their dromedary heroes and then to add insult to injury head off to enjoy a popular delicacy: smoked, spicy sausages made from – you guessed it – camel.

Canine freestyle dancing

A dog might be man’s best friend but now it can also be your dance partner!

Canine freestyle dancing lets your pooch show off its fancy footwork in a series of choreographed manoeuvres usually set to some cheesy ballad from the 80s.

It’s a bit like watching your mum shaking her stuff round the lounge, trying not to fall over the dog after one too many sherries at Christmas.

Dogs perform obedience training and tricks in time to the music spurred on by their owner’s body language and temptingly closed hands probably crammed full of Scooby snacks.

To be fair the fido fandangoers are pretty talented and owners are often forced to dress up in ridiculous outfits just so they aren’t upstaged by their canine counterparts.

After all, dancing is hard enough without getting shown up by Rover:

Goose pulling

This has nothing to do with your ability to sweet talk ganders. But even if that was a thing, this ‘sport’ would still be a more disturbing way to spend your time.

Back in the 17th century, the ignoble art of goose pulling involved strapping a live goose to a wooden frame, charging at it on a horse and trying to rip its head off.

It was a popular event, apparently attracting thousands of competitors who would bet cash and alcohol on the event.

To give the goose a fighting chance they would often slather it in oil and have someone standing by, ready to whip the horse just as the rider grabbed for the feathered prize.

To give the goose a fighting chance they would slather it in oil and have someone whip the horse…

Perhaps unsurprisingly, given the amount of animal cruelty involved the sport has largely died out – although shockingly it is still practised in Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands.

However, because we’ve realised that tearing live animals apart is absolutely mental and probably an early warning sign of becoming a serial killer, riders now use a dead goose instead.

But that still doesn’t stop the sport attracting some of the craziest people you’re ever going to see on a horse.

Buzkashi

Afghanistan is home to some of the toughest people in the world but even in a country that’s been at war for the last century or so, people still need to blow off steam and that’s where Buzkashi comes in.

Literally translated as ‘goat dragging’ this bonkers sport does exactly what it says on the tin as hordes of skilled horsemen battle it out to grab hold of a dead goat carcass.

To win, riders either try to grab the goat and escape all the other players or try to sling it into a goal in the ground.

Whips to the face are par for the course

Grabbing, pushing and whips to the face are all par for the course, resulting in some frankly terrifying bails as the competitors tumble off their horses surrounded by dozens of thundering hooves.

The humble game of football began in similar style to goat dragging, with a couple of mates kicking an inflated sheep’s bladder around the street.

The sport has since evolved into the overpaid acting class it’s become today. But Buzkashi serves as a tantalising reminder of how differently things could have gone if someone had the guts to throw a can of man-the-fuck-up into the mix.

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