Gymnastics.
Also circus arts, such as aerial straps get overlooked as they aren’t mainstream (was that a condition for chosing?), there is no fightig/competing involved and the performers make it look “easy”. But those are extremely extremely challenging, athletic. And painful.
Just watch this
i would say golf since one round takes the longest.
there are many facets to athleticism (10 in total i believe although i can’t name them all) - strength, speed, power, stamina, endurance, agility, hand/eye coordination. i’m not sure which sport requires the greatest combination of all of these, or how you’d even weight them in terms of importance.
i’ve always heard that hitting a baseball thrown at major league level speed requires the greatest amount of coordination. hitting a baseball well also requires strength/power.
The world championship Spartan Beast claims that its winner is the world’s most athletic person. In terms of the facets of athleticism, there might be some truth to that as you need to be good at all facets.
links?
^ Badwater Ultramarathon.
Stories include tips like learning to run on the white lines so your shoes don’t melt as fast.
^ Badwater Ultramarathon goes through Death Valley in July.
Well, neither one of us better mess up again. It’s on.
While I’m not trying to dimish the athleticism of the marathon runners or power lifters, I think that to be a true “athlete”, you can’t be a one-trick pony. To me, hockey and basketball take the most all-encompassing “athleticism” as described by Turd.
“Real” athletes can play more than one sport. LeBron James is an athlete. Randy Moss is an athlete. Bo Jackson is an athlete.
Lance Armstrong is a specialist. Lance Armstrong might be able to ride a bike, but can he hit a ball out of the infield? Can he sink a free throw? Can he run the ball in from the two-yard line?
I know 300 lb fat asses that can hit a free throw, hit a ball out of an infield. I’d love to see Kobe run a ball in from the 2 yard line without snapping in half. The things you described are primarily all cordination feats that require little acual athleticism. Hell Shaq can’t even do any of the things described. You’re cherry picking because Lance can run marathons well and win Tours de France and I’d imagine even rock climb well with his build. Just cherry picking one section of physical feats that share common traits can make anyone look multifaceted.
Most athletes including Lance Armstrong and Michael Phelps can probably do things like baseball well I’d imagine. You’re limiting them by what you choose to define as a sport.
I’ve changed my mind. The answer is…American Ninja Warriors.
thats nuts cuz
Russell Wilson then
UFC
American Ninja Warrior(s)
while i agree that many fighting sports and extreme sports involve the most athleticism, few things are more exhausting than being a professional hockey goalie. the average goalies loses 5 to 8 pounds a game. plus the guy faces 100mph rubber discs all day and has the dexterity of a cat.
one more thing about hockey that many non-hockey fans don’t know is that hockey players basically get on a bike at 5pm until 7pm, play a period, get back on the bike, play another period, get back on the bike, then play another period. the fact that hockey players basically operate at a high level for straight 4 hours and then snipe a 6 square inch hole from 50 ft while going 20-25mph is quite a feat. oh and they hit eachother and 20mph x 2.
ESPN summed it up pretty well here:
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/sportSkills
Edit: I hate it when people don’t put the results in the post, my bad.
Boxing
Hockey
^ Clearly the ability to pilot a boat after drinking in the sun all day was not given much weight.
Based on the 1990s cartoon Pro Stars, I would conclude that the order is 1) Basketball, 2) Hockey, 3) Baseball, as is reflected in the relative abilities of the three main characters, Michael Jordan, Wayne Gretzky and Bo Derek.
Glad someone said it!