Eau Claire is the capital of Kubb, a lawn sport that's as much a party as a competition

Kathy Flanigan | Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

EAU CLAIRE - It's one thing to grab a beer while watching a tournament. It's another to see players drink beer (Shandys, mostly) while competing in a tournament and trying to edge their way to the top among 128 teams. That's one of the quirky features of Kubb — a lawn game of mental skill and strategy dating back to the Vikings.

Each year Eau Claire hosts the U.S. National Kubb Championship — pronounced with the long "u" sound, rhyming with tube. This year, teams of three to six players hailing from Wisconsin, a handful of other states and Germany chucked wooden Kubb pieces for two blisteringly humid days on treeless repurposed soccer fields.

Here's what we learned while watching: The rules are beyond difficult to explain but easy to follow in action, and Kubb has a devoted, cult-like following.

U.S. National Kubb champions describe the game Scott Forster, Grant Scott, and Gregg Jochimsen of the winning team 2, 4, 6 Mafia describe kubb after their U.S. National Kubb Championship win.

So how do you play Kubb?

Here are the basics:

The game is played on a rectangular field known a pitch.

In the center sits the "king," a 12-inch rectangular wooden block.

Ten smaller wooden blocks, about 6 inches tall, called kubbs are placed in lines on either side of the king.

Players use round sticks called batons, throwing them underhand to try to knock down the other team's kubbs, which are lined up at the baseline on the other side. Opponents try to knock over the kubbs but must throw the batons underhanded and spin them end over end. Kubbs that are successfully knocked down are then thrown onto the other team's half of the pitch and stood on end.

Play then switches to the opposing team, which throws the batons but must first knock down any standing field kubbs. That's called "drilling." Any kubbs that are knocked down are thrown onto the other opposite half of the field and stood up. If either team leaves field kubbs standing, the kubb closest to the king now represents that side's baseline, and throwers may step up to that line to throw at their opponent's kubbs.

The goal is to take out opponents' kubbs, and eventually capture the king.

At the national championship, members of a team with the "Game of Thrones"-inspired moniker Kubbaleesi — team names are important, just ask Tasteful Side Kubb — compared it to a game of pool, because to take out the king before the field is cleared is a loss akin to hitting the eight ball in the pocket before the table is cleared. You lose.

Another compared Kubb to chess, because it involves taking opponents' game pieces with the end goal of capturing the king. Kubbs that are successfully knocked over are thrown onto the other team's side and stood on end. Play switches back and forth with each team trying to vanquish the opponent's kubbs, then knock down the king, which is in the center of the pitch, to win.

A team of three can play a team of six or two can play against four, most combinations work. There's no age requirement. Players don't have to be particularly good to be in the championship.

Where does Kubb come from?

Kyle Hicks, a Kubb player from Arkansas who drove 13 hours straight to play two days' worth of the game, traced the game's roots to the Vikings who would use the skulls and femurs of their enemies as game pieces. Maybe he was exaggerating, but the origin story is definitely part of Kubb lore.

Kubb dates back 1,000 years and is thought to be a game invented to pass the time during the long days of summer in Nordic climes.

Eric and Erin Anderson learned the game while enrolled in a graduate program in Sweden and Eric's father game them a Kubb set as a gift. Impressed by the versatility of the game — it can be played on grass, sand or snow and by nearly any age group — the Andersons taught some friends and neighbors the game when they moved to Eau Claire in 2007. The popularity of the easygoing yard game grew from there. In 2011, the City Council declared Eau Claire the Kubb Capital of North America.

Is Kubb a game of strategy?

The most common strategy in the game is to cluster the kubbs while throwing them on opponent's side. Clustering the kubbs makes it easier to take down more than one at a time. The opponent is allowed to stand the kubbs up on its side of the field. Because the kubbs are square, they look for positions that will give more distance between the clustered wooden blocks.

Players roll the baton in hand to prepare. Others bounce on one foot, sometimes to the eclectic music playing through loudspeakers.

But Kubb is also a social game. Cordial, even.

"It's a game best played with a beer in hand," said a member of Team Kubbaleesi, to general agreement.

No one actually keeps score. Teams just know when they've won the match (a match is three games played).

Players can smoke cigars, drink beer and go barefoot during regulation play if they desire. Spectators are free to walk among the games. In the championship, they strolled with strollers, walked and meandered among four neat rows of simultaneous games that stretched the length of a football field.

How much does Eau Claire love Kubb?

Eau Claire loves the game so much it teaches Kubb in its schools.

Eric Anderson, a 45-year-old regional planner, set up the city's first Kubb tournament in 2007. Fifteen teams, 35 players, signed up. As the game grew in popularity, friends told Anderson he needed to call the tournament the Midwest Championship.

He took it a step further.

He created the U.S. National Kubb Championship, with a board of directors and prizes.

The annual tournament draws hundreds of players and assorted spectators. It's staffed with dozens of volunteers, some of whom run the merchandise table. There's a concession stand selling snacks and candy. They also sell — because Wisconsin — grilled bratwurst. But since it's a Swedish game, the brats get a Swedish touch and are wrapped in lefse and topped with honey mustard, dill and the crunchy fried onions usually reserved for a green bean casserole. The concession stand benefits Chippewa Valley Girls on the Run.

Reporting live from the U.S. National Kubb Championship

For the championship games, teams arrived early on a Saturday morning to set up tents and canopies, spraying legs and arms with insect repellent until a mist hung in the air. Several contestants speared cupholders into the ground for beverages during play. A majority of teams, like Kubb Life from Milwaukee, wear matching shirts.

Steve Beyer of Pewaukee, Jeff Merryfield of Germantown and Alan Gardebrecht of Germantown are Kubb Life, a Milwaukee-based club. Merryfield's brother-in-law introduced him to the game. No one has played bags since, Gardebrecht said.

This is the third year Kubb Life has entered this tournament. The fledgling club has fall and spring leagues, which have drawn as many as 22 members.

They're trying to grow interest in the sport but have trouble explaining Kubb to prospective competitors.

"The most difficult thing is trying to tell people how to play," Gardebrecht said.

Kubb Life made it into Sunday's semifinals but didn't play in what's called "the cage," a smaller pitch area set up for the final four. As Merryfield explains the team standings, the conversation is interrupted by a compliment from a member of the Gorilly Goods, part of the Kettle Moraine Kubb club.

It's not unusual for competitors to congratulate each other, even during play. Toward the end of the tournament. Scott Graham heads up Team Kubboom Jr., the lone adult among teammates Sam Klages, 15, and Max Klages, 13. They play against an all-adult team Kubb United. The boys' mother, Gina, is on the tournament board, and the boys are part of a neighborhood that fielded seven Kubb teams this year, Anderson said.

A barefoot Max Klages finishes a throw, spots his mother and runs over to give her a hug before he grabs a fresh water bottle from her — both moves also legal in Kubb.

As Team Kubboom and Kubb United played nearby, Jason Larson, a member of one of three Team Chaskas (defined by the different colors they wear) started the wave around the cage in support of all four teams playing at one time.

"I love backyard games," said Larson, who had just finished his ninth U.S. National Kubb tournament. He rings a cowbell on a long handle when he feels the spirit.

Larson, from St. Louis Park, Minnesota, crafted the official Kubb equipment used in the tournament — 64 sets in all. Next to Anderson, he's one of the game's biggest cheerleaders. He led the wave and handed out miniature cowbells to everyone.

Kubb needed more cowbell.