Once and for all, YES, it’s a sport. Golf? Yes. Cycling? Yes. Freestyle rock climbing? Yes. Skateboarding? Yes. Bowling? Yes.
You can argue that some sports don’t lend themselves to competition, usually for lack of an objective way to score the event. One example is figure skating, scored by corrupt machine politicians with one hand out and one eye closed, yet nobody who knows skating would argue that it doesn’t require highly developed skills and athletic talent. Anything with a panel of judges is difficult-to-score-prone-to-bullshit-results sport.
Arguing that cycling is not a sport is just stupid. Racing (conveyance) is one of the oldest sports, from our ancestors running away from Smilodons on the backs of Harlan’s ground sloths (a classic tortoise-hare matchup) to Formula 1.
Okay then, can we add other sportswriters to the list? I fucking HATE Drew Sharp of the Detroit Free Press. Or is it the Detroit News? Either way, he’s a fool.
One great example came during this Ed Martin crap. When the ugly stories about U-M’s basketball fuckups first came to light, U-M came up with its own sanctions, one of which was barring itself from post-season play this year.
Early in the season, Drew Sharp bitched to high heaven in his column that this particular self-punishment was “meaningless” because U-M’s team pretty much sucked ass and would never make it to the tournament.
Then, when the team played its heart out all year and started looking good, he said that all the punishments weren’t severe enough because U-M wasn’t sucking.
You can’t win with this guy, playing well or playing sucky, he’ll find something wrong. Asshole.
That’s why I would argue that figure skating is not a sport. Ballet requires highly developed skills and athletic talent too, but it isn’t a sport. To me, if there is not a completely objective way to measure performance, then that particular athletic endeavor is a performance art and not a sport. After all, there is not anything fundamentally different from a judge’s score and the evaluation of a performance art critic writing for the local newspaper.
I hate to admit it but I lean towards Monkey’s point. A sport, to me, is a contest of physical skill with objective criteria for determining a winner. How HARD it is is not the point; moving furniture is hard, but it’s not a sport. Figure skating is partially a contest of physical skill, but it’s also partially a subjective preference for artistic expression.
There’s nothing particularly wrong with having JUDGES. I mean, a basketball ref is sort of a judge. But judging based on costume and music is clearly an element that detracts from the sport element. Figure skating is certainly an athletic thing, but its status as a sport is sullied by the “Artistic expression” malarkey.
Cycling is obviously a sport. I’ve never heard anyone seriously suggest otherwise.
Of course cycling’s a sport, anyone who doesn’t think so has zero understanding and appreciation of it. Especially when it comes to the grand Tours, such as this one. Individual talent, physical stamina, and ability of course means alot, but those who insist cycling isn’t a sport don’t understand how important a role a team plays. It’s little different than basketball, football (either version ) or baseball…it’s just that it happens over a longer time period.
Witness Tyler Hamilton’s stage win the other day…sure, he won it by a great individual performance, but anyone who paid attention knew (as he himself mentioned) that he wouldn’t have had that opportunity without the fact that his team helped pull him even at the beginning when he was dropped from the peloton.
Mainly it’s just ignorance that claims it’s not a sport. Pure and simple.
) or baseball…it’s just that it happens over a longer time period.