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Documents for "Sports":
  • aerobics [Gr.,=with oxygen], system of endurance exercises that promote cardiovascular fitness by producing and sustaining an elevated heart rate for a prolonged period of time, thereby pumping an...
  • amateur in sports, one who engages in athletic competition without material recompense. Upper-class Englishmen in the 19th cent. used the concept to help define their social status, first applying the term...
  • archery sport of shooting with bow and arrow , an important military and hunting skill before the introduction of gunpowder. England's Charles II fostered archery as sport, establishing in 1673 the world's oldest continuous archery tournament,...
  • automobile racing sport in which specially designed or modified automobiles race on any of various courses. Automobile racing originated in France in 1894 and appeared in the United States the following year. It is...
  • badminton game played by volleying a shuttlecock (called a "bird" )—a small, cork hemisphere to which feathers are attached—over a net. Light, gut-strung rackets are used. Badminton, which is generally similar to tennis, is played by two or four persons. A...
  • baseball bat-and-ball sport known as the national pastime of the United States. It derives its name from the four bases that form a diamond (the infield) around the pitcher's mound.
  • basketball game played generally indoors by two opposing teams of five players each. Basketball was conceived in 1891 by Dr. James Naismith , a physical education instructor at the YMCA college in Springfield, Mass., as a way to condition outdoor athletes during the winter months. His original list of 13 rules has undergone a century of...
  • biathlon sport in which cross-country skiers race across hilly terrain, occasionally stopping to shoot with rifles at sets of fixed targets. The biathlon features the 10-km (6.2-mi) sprint, in which...
  • bicycle racing or cycling, an internationally popular sport conducted on closed courses or the open road. Track racing takes place at a velodrome, usually a banked 1,093.6 ft (.333 km) oval. Olympic medals are awarded in...
  • billiards any one of a number of games played with a tapered, leather-tipped stick called a cue and various numbers of balls on a rectangular, cloth-covered slate table with raised and cushioned edges. Games...
  • birling sport in which two competitors try to maintain balance on a floating log, each seeking to rotate the log and spill the other into the water. With origins in the spring log drives in New England,...
  • Black Sox scandal episode in which eight members of the Chicago White Sox, the American League champions, were banned from baseball in 1921 for having conspired with gamblers to throw the 1919 World Series to the...
  • boating see canoeing ; iceboating ; motorboating ; rowing ; and sailing.
  • bobsledding winter sport in which a bobsled—a partially enclosed vehicle with steerable sledlike runners, accommodating two or four persons—hurtles down a course of iced, steeply banked, twisting inclines. A...
  • bowling indoor sport, also called tenpins, played by rolling a ball down an alley at ten pins; for lawn bowling, see bowls. Bowling is one of the most popular participatory sports in the United States, where...
  • bowls ancient sport (the bocce of Caesar's Rome is still played by Italians), especially popular in Great Britain and Australia, known as lawn bowls or bowling on the green in the United States. It was...
  • boxing sport of fighting with fists, also called pugilism and prizefighting.
  • bullbaiting 17th-century amusement, particularly popular in England, in which trained dogs (bulldogs) attacked a tethered bull. Bullbaiting, along with bullrunning (in which the bull was run down and killed by...
  • bullfighting national sport and spectacle of Spain. Called the corrida de toros in Spanish, the bullfight takes place in a large outdoor arena known as the plaza de toros. The object is for one of the bullfighters...
  • canoeing sport of propelling a canoe through water. John MacGregor, an English barrister and founder of the Royal Canoe Club (est. 1865), is generally credited with being the initiator of modern sport canoeing. Between 1849 and 1869,...
  • catamaran watercraft made up of two connected hulls or a single hull with two parallel keels. Originally used by the natives of Polynesia, the catamaran design was adopted by Western boat builders in the...
  • cockfighting sport of pitting gamecocks against one other. Though popular in ancient Greece, Persia, and Rome, cockfighting has been long opposed by clergy and humane groups. Massachusetts passed (1836) the...
  • Commonwealth games series of amateur athletic meets held among citizens of countries in the Commonwealth of Nations. Originated (1930) as the British Empire games, the series is held every four years and is patterned after the Olympic games; women have participated since 1934. In their early stages the games...
  • court tennis indoor racket and net game of ancient origin. It is believed to have originated (about the 14th cent.) in medieval France and is the forerunner of most modern racket games. In its early days the...
  • cricket ball-and-bat game played chiefly in Great Britain and the Commonwealth countries.
  • croquet lawn game in which the players hit wooden balls with wooden mallets through a series of 9 or 10 wire arches, or wickets. The first player to hit the posts placed at each end of the field wins. The...
  • curling winter sport, similar in principle to bowls and quoits (see horseshoe pitching ), played on an ice court by teams of four. Each player hurls a squat, circular stone—weighing 38 lb (17.2 kg), dished on bottom and top and having a top handle for the player's grip—at the tees, or...
  • decathlon in modern Olympic games , a contest for men held over two days and composed of 10 track-and-field events. It consists of the long jump; the high jump; the discus throw; the shot putt; the javelin throw; the 100-, 400-, and...
  • Derby English horse race, instituted (1780) by the 12th earl of Derby and held annually at Epsom Downs, near London. The race is open only to three-year-old colts and fillies that must be entered when...
  • discus throwing gymnastic exercise of the ancient Greeks, revived in modern times, especially as part of the Olympic games (in which it is an event of the decathlon ) and as an event of most other track and field meets. The discus used to be thrown with either hand, the arm extended backward and the discus against the forearm. The discus for men is a circular...
  • diving, deep-sea act of descending into deep water, generally with some form of breathing apparatus, and remaining there for an extended period. It is used in fishing for sponges, coral, and pearls; in work on the...
  • diving, springboard and platform sport of entering the water from a raised position, often while executing tumbles, twists, and other acrobatic maneuvers. In most dives the upper part of the body enters the water first, and the...
  • dog racing trials of speed between dogs. Now contested on oval tracks, the sport developed from the ancient practice of coursing, in which specially trained dogs chase game animals in the open field. Whippets...
  • equestrianism art of riding and handling a horse. Horseback riding was practiced as far back as the Bronze Age and was thereafter adapted to commerce, industry, war, sport, and recreation. Diverse styles of...
  • falconry sport of hunting birds or small animals with falcons or other types of hawks; eagles are used in some parts of the world. It was known to the ancient Chinese, Persians, and Egyptians. Falconry...
  • fencing sport of dueling with foil, épée, and saber.
  • fishing act of catching fish for consumption or display. Fishing—usually by hand, club, spear, net, and possibly by hook—was known to prehistoric people. It was practiced by the ancient Persians,...
  • football any of a number of games in which two opposing teams attempt to score points by moving an inflated oval or round ball past a goal line or into a goal. Differing greatly in their rules, these include soccer (association football) and rugby , in addition to the games covered in this article: American football, Canadian football, Gaelic football, and Australian football. In the United States, the word football generally refers only to the American game; in other parts of the world it usually means soccer. Football, amateur and professional, is perhaps the most popular spectator sport in the United...
  • golf game of hitting a small hard ball with specially made clubs over an outdoor course sometimes (particularly if it is near the coast) called a links. The object is to deposit the ball in a specified...
  • Hambletonian 1849-76, American trotting horse, foaled at Chester, N.Y. Originally owned by Jonas Seely, Hambletonian was bought for little money by Bill Rysdyk and won few honors as a trotting horse. But...
  • handball, court indoor or outdoor game played by striking a ball against a wall or walls with the palm of the hand. Play may be for singles or doubles (four players) on a court with one, three, or four walls. The...
  • handball, team or field handball, team court game. Despite its status as an Olympic sport, the game is virtually unknown in the United States. Originated in central Europe in the early 1900s as an outdoor game, it combines elements...
  • hockey, field outdoor stick and ball game. Field hockey, like many sports, is of obscure origins, but traces in one form or another to the ancient Egyptians and Persians, making it one of the world's oldest...
  • hockey, ice team sport in which players use sticks to propel a hard, round disk into a net-backed goal.
  • horse racing trials of speed involving two or more horses. It includes races among harnessed horses with one of two particular gaits, among saddled Thoroughbreds (or, less frequently, quarterhorses) on a flat...
  • horseshoe pitching game played by two or more persons using horseshoes, the object being to throw the shoes so as to encircle a vertical iron peg that is 14 in. (35.6 cm) high. Regulation courts are at least 50 ft...
  • hunting act of seeking, following, and killing wild animals for consumption or display. It differs from fishing in that it involves only land animals. Hunting was a necessary activity of early humans. Through the Paleolithic period it was their chief means of obtaining food and clothing. In the Neolithic...
  • hurling outdoor ball and stick game similar to field hockey (see hockey, field ). The national pastime of Ireland, it was played for many centuries before the Gaelic Athletic Association standardized the rules in 1884. In the United States, hurling was played by early Irish...
  • ice dancing ice-skating competition in which couples are required to perform dance routines to music. The sport gained popularity in the 1930s and the first world championships were held in 1950. Ice dancing...
  • ice skating gliding along an ice surface on keellike runners known as ice skates.
  • iceboating sport of sailing a specially prepared boat equipped with runners over ice. The first iceboats were probably sailed by the Dutch during the 18th cent., although the Finns and Lapps may have built...
  • Iditarod abandoned town in SW Alaska, site of a 1908 gold rush, on the Iditarod River. The town site and river lie on the Iditarod National Historic Trail, 2,350 mi (3,781 km) long, a gold-seekers' route from Seward to Nome (see National Parks and Monuments , table), and on the route of the Iditarod Race, an annual dogsled competition that runs 1,160 mi (1,868 km) from Anchorage to Nome. The race commemorates a medical mission undertaken by dog sled during a 1925 diphtheria epidemic. First held in...
  • Isthmian games athletic events organized c.581 BC They were held at Corinth in the spring of the first and third years of the Olympiad , and they honored Palaemon as well as Poseidon. The contests were generally like the Olympic games , but they were conducted on a smaller scale; the many added amusements and the convenient journey from Athens made the Isthmian games popular. The victor's prize was a crown of wild celery, but...
  • jai alai handball-like game of Spanish Basque origin. It is also called pelota. Jai alai is played on a three-walled court with a hard rubber ball that must be hurled against the front wall with the cesta, a wicker basket attached to the player's arm. The court is about 175 ft (53 m) long, 40 ft (12.2 m) wide, and 40 ft (12.2 m) high. Spectators sit behind a wire fence or plexiglass wall on the...
  • Johnson, Randy (Randall David Johnson), 1963-, American baseball player, b. Walnut Creek, Calif. After pitching for the Univ. of Southern California, Johnson signed with the Montreal Expos in 1985, playing in the...
  • judo sport of Japanese origin that makes use of the principles of jujitsu, a weaponless system of self-defense. Buddhist monks in China, Japan, and Tibet developed jujitsu over a period of 2,000 years...
  • jujitsu or jujutsu: see judo ; martial arts.
  • Justin Morgan 1792-1821, American horse, the foundation sire of the Justin Morgan breed of horses. Originally called "Figure," the stallion was renamed for his first owner, Justin Morgan (1747-97), after both owner and horse were dead. The horse—small, weighing about 800 lb (363 kg), of tremendous endurance, and with a...
  • lacrosse ball and goal game usually played outdoors by two teams of 10 players each on a field 60 to 70 yd (54.86 to 64.01 m) wide by 110 yd (100.58 m) long. Two goals face each other 80 yd (73.15 m)...
  • luge a type of small sled on which one or two persons, lying face up, slide feet first down snowy hillsides or down steeply banked, curving, iced chutes similar to those used in bobsledding. Steering is accomplished by shifting weight, pulling straps attached to the runners, or using the feet. Popular in the Alps and in other parts of Europe since the early 20th cent., luge has been...
  • Man o' War 1917-47, American racehorse, by Fair Play out of Mahubah, bred by August Belmont near Lexington, Ky., and owned by Samuel D. Riddle after 1918. A large reddish-colored colt capable of tremendously...
  • marathon race long-distance foot race deriving its name from Marathon, Greece. According to legend, in 490 BC, Pheidippides, a runner from Marathon, carried news of victory over the Persians to Athens. In the...
  • martial arts various forms of self-defense, usually weaponless, based on techniques developed in ancient China, India, and Tibet. In modern times they have come into wide use for self-protection, as competitive...
  • motorboating sport of navigating a motor-powered vessel on the water. It is done on either fresh- or saltwater and may be competitive or recreational. The first successful motorboat traveled (1887) a few yards...
  • mountain climbing the practice of climbing to elevated points for sport, pleasure, or research. Also called mountaineering, it is practiced throughout the world.
  • Olympic games premier athletic meeting of ancient Greece, and, in modern times, series of international sports contests.