>It seems like a bad move to have a participant responsible for drilling the holes and attaching the strings.

It is probably the kind of event where the only people who would be willing to do the timely prep work are the contestants.

The guy the article is about won the men's. At the end, the men's champ plays the women's champ for overall champion.

This American mentioned was the women's champ, who apparently went on to beat him. Which either means he wasn't cheating, or was and then played fairly on the last match?

I assume he wouldn't cheat everytime and instead would only do it to reduce the overall wear on the chestnut over many matches?

Apparently they pick a new one each round.

>It seems like a bad move to have a participant responsible for drilling the holes and attaching the strings.

Part of the "point" of conkers is that conker-prep is just as much as a skill as the technique during the hitting phase.

I think this was just poor scrutineering (or corruption) on the organizers side.

That would make sense to me, but it seems like maybe it isn’t how they did it?

> Jakins was responsible for drilling and inserting strings into other competitors’ chestnuts as the competition’s top judge, known as the “King Conker”.

Ridiculous. A perversion of the true spirit of conkers.