A Temporary Historical past of Fictional ‘Star Trek’ Sports activities

Star Trek has a protracted historical past of athletic exercise—from shipboard gymnastics to Sisko’s love of baseball conserving the game alive within the twenty third century, the franchise has cherished exploring real-world sports activities as leisure pastimes, nevertheless it additionally loves inventing a number of of its personal. Such was the case in this week’s Starfleet Academy, which gave us Calica, so let’s induct it into the Star Trek sporting halls of fame alongside the franchise’s different fictitious athletic achievements.

Calica

Let’s get the beginner out of the best way first. A mascot-defense shootout designed to encourage our younger academy heroes to discover ways to deal with a phaser, Calica is at the least not a Starfleet-specific sport, as a number of cadets point out having beforehand performed in leagues on their homeworlds. Performed with modified phasers that may transport a focused opponent to the sidelines to eradicate them, Calica’s round-based matches see opposing groups try and breach one another’s defensive traces to attain factors by capturing a goal defended by a costume-wearing mascot.

Geskana

Briefly performed by Archer and Tucker within the Enterprise episode “Desert Crossing,” Geskana was a sport performed by members of Zobral’s clan, an unidentified species that mainly invented lacrosse with smaller objectives and extra alternatives for our heroes to take their shirts off.

Vajhaq

Star Trek has a bunch of one-off sports activities which might be talked about in passing as soon as after which by no means once more—a well-known little bit of worldbuilding shorthand. The brusquely named Vajhaq is considered one of a number of famous in Deep House 9, a ball-based recreation performed on the planet Meridian. Sisko declined the chance to play a match. Shocking, contemplating his adoration of baseball.

Tsunkatse

Star Trek has a number of iterations of martial arts, resembling Klingon mok’bara or the traditional Vulcan artwork of Suus Mahna (and another newly created Earth iteration we’ll get to later), however few translated to broadcast sports activities the best way Tsunkatse did. Virtually fairly actually simply skilled wrestling however Star Trek—proper all the way down to the looks of Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson within the most interesting of his acting endeavors—Tsunkatse was a fight sport the place fighters wore stun disruptors on their arms and toes and performed in an area surrounded by equally charged panels. Tsunkatse matches might be performed to a number of levels of violence, from knockout matches to loss of life battles.

Pan Zan

One other offhand sports activities point out from Enterprise, Pan Zan was an Enolian sport that was apparently very near water polo.

Springball

An immensely well-liked Bajoran sport much like Jai Alai, springball noticed two opponents try to attain factors by hitting a goal aim on a walled courtroom and might be surprisingly violent—whereas gamers couldn’t punch or kick one another, they might steal photographs with physique checks. Whereas primarily performed with simply the arms (one gloved, one ungloved, with solely photographs from the gloved hand able to scoring factors), Main Kira was talked about as proudly owning a springball racquet a number of occasions on DS9, so there might have been a variant of the game that used one… or the writers confused Kira’s sport of selection with Miles and Bashir’s fondness for racquetball. A confusion that led to Decrease Decks accidentally having Bajoran safety officer Shax invite Boimler to a recreation of springball, solely to play what regarded rather a lot like racquetball because it appeared on DS9!

Pala

A subject sport performed by the Brunali, Pala briefly comes up on Voyager when the younger ex-Borg Icheb, a Brunali himself, is invited to play it once more when given the prospect to return to his homeworld, nevertheless it goes unseen.

Velocity

One other phaser-based sport like Calica, Velocity noticed two gamers commerce photographs to maintain a Frisbee-esque disc bouncing between them, with factors scored when a participant didn’t cease the disc from hitting their physique. It’s solely ever proven being performed on holodecks, so it’s unknown if it’s a purely holographical sport or might be performed with an actual disc and phasers.

Karo-Internet

We all know completely nothing about Karo-Internet aside from that it exists—it’s talked about as soon as offhandedly by Odo whereas he bemoans to Quark the compromises made in relationships. Presumably, given Odo’s upbringing, Karo-Internet is probably both a Bajoran sport or one thing popularized by the Cardassians throughout their occupation of Bajor.

Anbo-jyutsu

Whereas we by no means see Anbo-jyutsu in knowledgeable aggressive setting, we’d be remiss to not point out the Japanese-influenced martial artwork that was apparently considered one of Earth’s premiere fight sports activities by the twenty fourth century. A one-on-one duel performed in a small round area, Anbo gamers wore mild armor that included a full visor to obscure their imaginative and prescient, battling with a employees that included a proximity sensor in considered one of its ends to assist present an auditory clue of the place their opponent was.

The Octran Fertility Contest

One other offhanded point out from Enterprise, this contest was performed in an identical method to basketball, based on Phlox. Presumably the “fertility” side concerned the truth that it was additionally performed with minimal, if any, clothes.

Hoverball

Whereas we don’t get to see Hoverball being correctly performed, we briefly get to see the titular ball in TNG‘s “Captain’s Vacation,” when Picard’s studying break on Risa is interrupted by the floating anti-grav system. Hoverball was apparently extremely well-liked although, particularly on Voyager, with an excellent chunk of the senior employees taking part in it amongst themselves on the holodeck of their downtime.

Hydrosailing

A maritime sport that’s once more talked about offhandedly, with Kes taking holographic classes in it on Voyager. Tuvok bluntly declines the provide to be taught himself, citing that Vulcans don’t hydrosail, nevertheless it’s unknown if this can be a cultural distinction or all the way down to Tuvok being a grump.

Parrises Squares

Star Trek loves a preferred sport that it then by no means ever really reveals being performed, however Parrises Squares may be the game that’s gone the longest between us being launched to it and seeing it get performed. First talked about within the TNG season one episode “11001001” in 1988, it might take 36 years for it to be proven on-screen in Prodigy‘s sophomore season. An apparently harmful (and sometimes violent) sport, Parrises Squares noticed groups of 4 use ion mallets to bat a ball into an opposing aim. The squares within the identify presumably come from the grid-based courtroom it was performed on, with every sq. within the grid able to altering top mid-game. No marvel individuals obtained injured a bunch!

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