A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game, or ability.
22-576: The FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championships is the double-gender world championship for the sport of beach volleyball organized by the Fédération Internationale de Volleyball ( FIVB ) the sport's global governing body. The first official edition of the event was held in Los Angeles , United States in 1997 and tournaments had been awarded every two years since then. Before 1997, ten unofficial championships not organized by
44-496: A 48-team main draw per gender and consists of two stages: the group stage followed by the knockout stage. The prize pool for each gender is US$ 500,000. First Beach Volleyball World Championships were held from 10 to 13 September 1997 in Los Angeles , California ( United States ). It was the first official edition of this event, after 10 unofficial championships between 1987 and 1996. As of 2023 Beach Volleyball World Championships . World championship The title
66-536: A series of four Grand Slam events recognised as the pinnacle of the game, in addition to key team events, world tour finals and the Olympic Games, though each year ITF (International Tennis Federation) designates a World Champion based on performances throughout the year). There are some sports that already had a 'world championship' in the 18th or 19th century, although it was variable how 'world-wide' these competitions really were. The French player Clergé
88-544: A total of two group-stage games. Teams will then advance to the second round, and from there to the placement and medal games. Because American football is far more dominant in the United States than anywhere else in the world, the United States did not field a team in the tournament for its first two editions. The United States has fielded a squad for the last three iterations, but with extremely restrictive criteria that make most American football players ineligible for
110-434: A true world championship but may designate the winners of a domestic competition to be "world champions". This is especially true of the "Big Four" major professional sports leagues in the United States and Canada ; world cups and championships exist in all four of the major sports, but the domestic U.S. and Canadian leagues are generally known as the world professional championships (due to the best players worldwide being in
132-511: A world championship or a world cup as such, but may have one or several world champions. Professional boxing , for example, has several world champions at different weights , but each one of them is decided by a "title match", not a tournament. In a title match system, the championship can only be won by directly defeating the incumbent, who in turn must continue to compete to retain their title or risk forfeiture . Still other competitions, most commonly in professional sports , may or may not have
154-560: Is considered to be the first international champion in real tennis , since 1740. In chess , international matches have been held for centuries, often resulting in certain players considered the best of all, with the first multiplayer tournament held in London in 1851 , but Wilhelm Steinitz in 1886 was the first chess player generally recognized as the world chess champion . Other sports with early 'world championships' were English draughts (1840) and speed skating . The following lists for
176-548: Is usually awarded through a combination of specific contests or, less commonly, ranking systems (e.g. the ICC Test Championship ), or a combination of the two (e.g. World Triathlon Championships in Triathlon ). This determines a 'world champion', who or which is commonly considered the best nation, team, individual (or other entity) in the world in a particular field, although the vagaries of sport ensure that
198-731: The 1999 and 2003 championships . The championship was held in Italy in 1999, in Germany in 2003, in Kawasaki , Japan in 2007, and in Austria in 2011. The 2015 IFAF World Championship was originally going to be held in Stockholm , Sweden , however local organizers had to cancel the event due to lack of sponsorship. The 2015 tournament was played in Canton , Ohio , United States . At
220-608: The FIFA Club World Cup . The first edition in 2000 ran concurrently with the 2000 Intercontinental Cup , and in 2004 the Intercontinental Cup was merged with the CCW, which has been ongoing since 2005 with yearly editions. Finally, certain competitions do not have a world championship or world cup, but rather hold a series of events recognised as the elite level in their field (e.g. tennis and golf have
242-643: The Pan American Federation of American Football received berths, as did one member each from the Asian Federation of American Football and from the Oceania Federation of American Football . For the 2019 championship (postponed to 2023, then 2025), the tournament will expand to 12 teams. Teams will be divided into four groups, each consisting of three teams. Teams will play the other two teams in their group once each, for
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#1732787651260264-424: The 2011 championship, the championship tournament consisted of eight teams divided into two groups of four (there were six teams in 1999 and 2007, four in 2003, and seven in 2015). The opening round featured a round-robin tournament within the groups, with each team playing each other once. However, as opposed to a tournament bracket after the games were completed, the teams with the best record from each group met in
286-632: The Big Four leagues, winners of the Women's National Basketball Association , much like its men's counterpart , commonly call themselves world champions, as with the winners of the National Lacrosse League and Drum Corps International . On the other hand, association football (soccer) has more parity between national leagues and even continental tournaments has seen the birth of one true "world championship". The first such tournament
308-803: The FIVB were all held in Rio de Janeiro , Brazil between 1987 and 1996. The most recent World Championships took place in Mexico in 2023. Winning the World Championships is considered to be one of the highest honours in international beach volleyball, surpassing the FIVB Beach Volleyball World Tour and being surpassed only by the beach volleyball tournament at the Summer Olympic Games . The tournament has
330-479: The competitor recognised at the best in an event is not always the 'world champion' (see Underdog ). This may also be known as a world cup competition , for example cycling ( UCI World Championships and UCI World Cups ). Often, the use of the term cup or championship in this sense is just a choice of words. Some sports have multiple champions because of multiple organizations, such as boxing, mixed martial arts and wrestling. Certain competitive exercises do not have
352-497: The cup was endorsed by both UEFA and CONMEBOL but had no involvement from FIFA , the governing body for world football. As such, FIFA wanted to expand the tournament to include the champion from other continents - from the AFC Champions League ( Asia and Australia ), CAF Champions League ( Africa ), CONCACAF Champions League ( North America and Caribbean ) and OFC Champions League ( Oceania ) and created
374-500: The gold medal game, with the second-place teams in each group playing for the bronze medal, the third-place teams playing in the 5th-place game, and the fourth-place teams playing in the 7th-place game, thus guaranteeing each team four games. Automatic berths included the host nation and the defending champions. Both finalists from the European Championship of American football tournament received berths. Two teams from
396-540: The league itself) (as with the Stanley Cup , ostensibly an independent championship for ice hockey but under the de facto control of the National Hockey League through two trustees who since no later than 1947 have been NHL loyalists) or the equivalent of a world club championship. In American football , although an IFAF World Championship exists, the United States is so far above and beyond
418-636: The other nations it faces that the winner of the U.S.-based Super Bowl , a competition limited to the 32 teams in the National Football League , is commonly nicknamed as the world champion by the players, the press and fans alike; the NFL itself explicitly marketed the contest as a world championship in its first iterations. Winners of the Major League Baseball 's World Series are also commonly called world champions. Outside of
440-577: The sport. Seventy-one nations have a national American football team. The most recent tournament, in 2015, featured seven teams. The defending champions are the United States , who won the 2015 championship after winning both the 2007 and 2011 editions. The U.S. team did not compete in the World Cup until 2007 and have won every tournament since. Prior to the American entrance, Japan won
462-560: The various sports with a world championship include: IFAF World Championship The IFAF World Championship of American Football (also known as the IFAF World Cup ) is an international gridiron competition held every four years and contested by teams representing member nations. The competition is run by the International Federation of American Football (IFAF), the international governing body for
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#1732787651260484-733: Was the Football World Championship disputed from 1876 to 1904 between the winners of the FA Cup and Scottish Cup . After that, there have been many tournaments between teams from around the world, but it wasn't until 1960 when the Intercontinental Cup was established, competed between the winners two greatest and most important continental championships: the UEFA Champions League from Europe and CONMEBOL Copa Libertadores from South America,
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