T. Boone Pickens and other wealthy, elderly Oklahoma State alums decided to participate in a scheme named "Call of a Lifetime", where they would allow the university to take out $10 million life insurance policies on them. What could go wrong?
posted by reenum on Oct 7, 2012 - 66 comments

Clearing the Bar Is the Easy Part: [NYTimes] "Mark Hollis is a pole-vaulter, and while he and his competitors here feel significant pressure as they compete for a place on the Olympic team, the anxiety they experience just trying to get their equipment to meets is sometimes even more excruciating."
posted by Fizz on Jun 23, 2012 - 35 comments

Adaptive sports are generally limited to people with disabilities. What if everyone participated in adaptive sports?
posted by chickenmagazine on Jun 22, 2012 - 34 comments

Not content with displacing the poor, menacing photographers and blocking ambulances the london olympics now wants ground-to-air missiles, presumably to shoot down rogue skywriters who might misuse it's brand.
posted by Artw on Apr 28, 2012 - 68 comments

Dick Pfander's obsession with basketball box scores means that every NBA box score in the league's history is now accessible.
posted by reenum on Feb 1, 2012 - 13 comments

Are Big Time Sports a Threat to Student Achievement? A study by 3 University of Oregon economists suggests that male University of Oregon students’ grades drop during successful seasons for the UO football team, as students study less and drink and party more to celebrate Duck victories. [more inside]
posted by Danf on Dec 21, 2011 - 28 comments

Serum hemoglobin is related to endurance running performance. Smoking is known to enhance serum hemoglobin levels ... alcohol may further enhance this beneficial adaptation.

A recent paper by Kenneth Myers in the Canadian Medical Association Journal reviews the potential benefits of smoking for endurance atheletes. [more inside]
posted by nangar on Nov 26, 2011 - 35 comments

Here's the deal: If you don't play for, or you are not an employee of, the team in question, "we" is not the pronoun you're looking for. "They" is the word you want.

Why "We" is the most overused term in sports.
posted by The Gooch on Oct 20, 2011 - 154 comments

The unlevel playing field - "Contrary to popular perception, poverty and broken homes are underrepresented in the NBA, not overrepresented. ... We believe that skills always trump circumstances. But that's a myth."
posted by mrgrimm on Aug 1, 2011 - 16 comments

An oldie but a goodie: Don Reese, then of the San Diego Chargers, talks about his own problems with cocaine and the widespread drug use in the NFL at the time. [more inside]
posted by reenum on May 24, 2011 - 9 comments

In 2006, Joss Naylor ran 50 miles up and down seventy Lake District fells, ascending more than 25,000 feet in 21 hours. Not his best performance, but to be fair, he was 70 at the time. Cumbrian shepherd Joss Naylor (warning: Youtube link; Cumbrian accent, impossibly adorable sheepdog) is one of the greatest British athletes most people have never heard of, and perhaps the greatest competitor ever in a sport most people have never heard of either: fell-running. [more inside]
posted by reynir on Nov 20, 2010 - 25 comments

Bulgaria is not what you'd call a wealthy country. It has a smaller population than New York City. But Bulgaria utterly dominates the sport of Olympic Weightlifting. A full explanation of this prowess is beyond the scope of a simple blog post, but I will share with you this six-minute video about a man who built a nationally-ranked team training his athletes with barbells made of pipes and cogs and assorted industrial junk. I hope this goes at least a little way towards explaining their remarkable accomplishments.
posted by jason's_planet on May 5, 2010 - 17 comments

Peak Performance is a website featuring dozens of articles on just about every aspect of sports science, including large sections devoted to cycling, swimming and sports psychology. Some of my own favorites deal with the beneficial effects of Omega-3 fatty acids, the Chinese government’s plan to dominate the Olympics, Veronique Billat’s 30-30 running workouts and how to increase growth hormone levels naturally.
posted by jason's_planet on Apr 30, 2007 - 13 comments

On sunday, Rush Limbaugh commented that Donovan McNabb, quarterback of the Philadelphia Eagles, was overrated and was only seen favourably by the media because they want to see a black quarterback do well. McNabb responded, and earlier tonight Limbaugh resigned from his post on ESPN's pre-game show. N.D. Kalu, one of the Eagle's defensive ends, offered this choice quote: "He speaks well, he's well-read, but he's an idiot."
posted by The God Complex on Oct 2, 2003 - 100 comments

Great feat, but not a great athlete. Let the Cyclist bashing continue.
As a follow up to the pointless Bicycles and cars don't mix column, Ron Borges over at MSNBC wonders if Lance Armstrong is even an athlete.
He says Athletes must do more with their bodies than pump their legs up and down. For his money, being the greatest athlete in the world involves strength, speed, agility, hand-eye coordination, mental toughness and the ability to make your body do things that defy description. Anyone who has ever been in a bike race (Road or MTN) knows it does indeed take all that and more. Anyone who writes about sports, rather than participating, would of course have no clue it takes more than moving your feet up and down.
posted by Blake on Jul 26, 2002 - 48 comments

Run faster, jump higher. What happens when you cross stilts and pogo sticks? The next 'extreme sport' on the verge of the big time, or a new and fun way to really injure yourself?
posted by KnitWit on Mar 29, 2002 - 12 comments

ESPN hosting show on the world's sexiest athletes. 32 men and 32 women vie for the big crown(s), to be announced Jan. 27. The website has profiles on all 64 and will have a place for you to vote for your favorites. Don't all chime in with who you're going to vote for (that's what espn.com is for, not MeFi), but who'd they leave out? I say race-car driver Dario Franchitti and track star Suzy Favor Hamilton.
posted by msacheson on Jan 7, 2002 - 43 comments

PETA is at it again, but this time they know not with whom they trifle. PETA's Kristie Phelps sent a letter to Dr. John Palms, president of the University of South Carolina, requesting that USC "bench" their athletic teams' moniker "The Fighting Gamecocks," because, well, it's funnier to read the press release and letter for yourself. The letter elicited this response and this news story in The State, our local paper. (Note the further link from there to the readers' forum, which is pretty damn hilarious in its own right.)
posted by alumshubby on Oct 18, 2001 - 74 comments