Not Curling but Hurling- Haggis Flinging World Championship
Not Curling but Hurling-
Haggis Flinging World Championship
The prize is a year’s supply of haggis and the challenge is to throw the “great chieftain o the puddin'-race” more than 217 feet which is the current world record for haggis hurling. The world championship of this noble sport was held at the home of the Scottish Bard Robert Burns. This year the contestants huffed and puffed, but none could break the record set at the Milngavie Highland Games on 11 June, 2011. The 217 feet was hugely more than the previous record of 180 feet which stood for two decades before it was cast to the wind.
20 Haggises Sacrificed for the Throwing
Now there are complications with haggis throwing, in that the haggis must not split on landing and must be fit to eat after the throw. I’m not sure how you can throw something the length of a 70 metre long garden and still eat it, but rules is rules. The 83 contestants were a divergent bunch, the youngest 4 and the oldest a venerable 75 years old. A local Dumfries butcher supplied 20 haggises for the event, but there is no record of what happened to these ‘great chieftains’ afterwards.
Normally the contest is held in the South Ayrshire hometown of the bard, Alloway, but for 2017 it was moved Ellisland Farm, in Dumfries and Galloway where Burns married and two his children were born. It is the place where he penned Auld Lang Syne.
On a Plate
Now we don’t sell venerable haggises, but we do have some lovely Spode plates to serve some haggis on, now I wouldn’t call them chieftains of the porcelain race, but I would call them a mite special so get the while they are in stock. They sell quickly.
