Author Topic: Which sport has the fittest participants?  (Read 10838 times)

supsurf-tw

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Re: Which sport has the fittest participants?
« Reply #15 on: July 16, 2016, 05:28:52 PM »
When I think of fit I think of guys like Chuck Patterson. Strength, athleticism and endurance. Put a water polo guy, runner, etc. out at Jaws on a pair of water ski's and see how he does........ 
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hbsteve

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Re: Which sport has the fittest participants?
« Reply #16 on: July 16, 2016, 06:46:22 PM »
The problem with playing water polo in a surf town, is that after practice we went surfing.  I wasn't fast in the pool.  But, I had lots of endurance. 

Zooport

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Re: Which sport has the fittest participants?
« Reply #17 on: July 16, 2016, 07:35:48 PM »
HB, I would think that water polo has to be one of the most strenuous sports, and then going surfing after that?  You must have been ripped. 
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Area 10

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Re: Which sport has the fittest participants?
« Reply #18 on: July 16, 2016, 09:39:24 PM »
Balance_fit is right, it's an interesting but not very reasonable question. The concept of fitness relates to adaptation to particular demands, so by the very nature of it, fitness means specialisation. Most of us who have competed at sports will have been struck by how we can be highly fit for one sport but really pretty average for another. Put an all-rounder like a Decathlete up against a specialist in either one of their disciplines or another altogether (like swimming) and their stats would look pretty average.

I'd prefer to think of fitness in the biological sense of the word. So you'd have to ask which sport has the participants who have the most children, live the longest, and are the happiest. Now that would be interesting to know!
« Last Edit: July 16, 2016, 10:01:18 PM by Area 10 »

zachhandler

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Re: Which sport has the fittest participants?
« Reply #19 on: July 16, 2016, 09:51:56 PM »
I agree it is all in how you define fitness. If you define it most broadly as the ability to cope with whatever physical challenge the real world throws at you, then I know the answer: your average 3rd world subsistence farmer or hunter/gatherer. They have more grit and resilience than any of us any will, can adapt to just about anything, and do it all on about 1200 calories a day.

yugi

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Re: Which sport has the fittest participants?
« Reply #20 on: July 17, 2016, 12:53:22 AM »
You'd first have to define  "fittest"......

Typically that would be cardiovascular fitness. A simple measure of strength to weight ratio is the weight of the heart to body weight. By that measure cyclists are fittest followed by swimmers and cross country skiers (almost equal).

An 8 year old is even fitter!

natas585

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Re: Which sport has the fittest participants?
« Reply #21 on: July 17, 2016, 06:03:15 AM »
I'm just pleased to see these kinds of discussions and the level of comments on something like fitness. I've been a physical educator for over 30 years and the level of information on this subject is extremely diverse. But with the internet we can now get answers more readily than when we had to write letters to some university asking a professor, that may have published a paper 10 years ago, what they meant with their results. As far as what activities have the most positive crossover health/fitness markers I would argue for stand up paddling. It's a muscular endurance activity, meaning it uses a high degree of total body muscle tissue to accomplish. It's an easy skill to acquire so you are apt to do it. The top athletes in the sport could with minimal skill training in a separate sport would only need to practice that new skill to perform at a higher than average level in the new sport. They not only have good power output but their cardiovascular fitness is such they can keep it up for long periods. They have fewer specialized muscle imbalances than other sport specialized athletes. This is only my opinion from observation, participation, and spending lots of time with athletes of various other sports. On another note, the crossfit games are starting this week and you can have the opportunity to watch humans push the level of what a person can do with little recovery, destroying their bodies trying to push the limits all for our viewing pleasure. Every time I think something is too much for an athlete, these individuals go out and prove me wrong. Pretty fantastic from a strength and condition position.
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Re: Which sport has the fittest participants?
« Reply #22 on: July 17, 2016, 06:15:57 AM »
The term aint golfer's bod.  Minute for minute swimming is the one. 

hefwiezen16

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Re: Which sport has the fittest participants?
« Reply #23 on: July 17, 2016, 06:57:21 AM »
I'm just pleased to see these kinds of discussions and the level of comments on something like fitness. I've been a physical educator for over 30 years and the level of information on this subject is extremely diverse. But with the internet we can now get answers more readily than when we had to write letters to some university asking a professor, that may have published a paper 10 years ago, what they meant with their results. As far as what activities have the most positive crossover health/fitness markers I would argue for stand up paddling. It's a muscular endurance activity, meaning it uses a high degree of total body muscle tissue to accomplish. It's an easy skill to acquire so you are apt to do it. The top athletes in the sport could with minimal skill training in a separate sport would only need to practice that new skill to perform at a higher than average level in the new sport. They not only have good power output but their cardiovascular fitness is such they can keep it up for long periods. They have fewer specialized muscle imbalances than other sport specialized athletes. This is only my opinion from observation, participation, and spending lots of time with athletes of various other sports. On another note, the crossfit games are starting this week and you can have the opportunity to watch humans push the level of what a person can do with little recovery, destroying their bodies trying to push the limits all for our viewing pleasure. Every time I think something is too much for an athlete, these individuals go out and prove me wrong. Pretty fantastic from a strength and condition position.


I like to watch the crossfitters try to swim!  I wouldn't consider them the fittest athletes as generally they are to musclebound to move properly.     An interesting anecdote on the crossfit games that I recently learned.  The ones performing at the national level don't train with crossfit.  They specialize in what will be expected of them at the games. 
     A strong case has been made for the gymnast: they have it all, speed strength-weight, endurance, flexability, range of motion.   Their  total body fitness would suit just about any sport or activity, except mabey sumo wrestling.   Those water polo guys are no joke either.     

zachhandler

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Re: Which sport has the fittest participants?
« Reply #24 on: July 17, 2016, 08:12:25 AM »
You'd first have to define  "fittest"......

Typically that would be cardiovascular fitness. A simple measure of strength to weight ratio is the weight of the heart to body weight. By that measure cyclists are fittest followed by swimmers and cross country skiers (almost equal).

An 8 year old is even fitter!

If heart to body weight is the measure i would think these twiggy marathon runners would take the cake. But yes, you have to leave out children, victems of starvation, those with enlarged hearts from heart failure, double amputees, etc...

pdxmike

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Re: Which sport has the fittest participants?
« Reply #25 on: July 17, 2016, 10:56:51 AM »
The term aint golfer's bod.  Minute for minute swimming is the one.
Swimmers more fit that golfers? Obviously.  Bowlers? No doubt.  The athletes swimmers fear being compared to are relief pitchers.

pdxmike

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Re: Which sport has the fittest participants?
« Reply #26 on: July 17, 2016, 11:37:01 AM »
I like all the answers.

It's easy to forget that water polo and hockey players have to do a whole secondary sport just to move around to do their primary sport. 

The broader the definition of "fitness", the more impressive people like Chuck Patterson or Laird Hamilton or Dave Kalama become.  Same with gymnasts and wrestlers as groups.

If you gave high priority to athleticism as being part of fitness, I'd rank basketball players high.  And if I had to name one person as fittest, my first thought would be Bruce Lee.

natas585 has good arguments for standup paddling.  There's no weak link in its requirements.  With my other sports, distance running is skewed entirely towards cardiovascular, and requires (and actually penalizes) strength.  Swimming is awfully close, but all good swimmers do "dryland" resistance training because swimming has limits on how much it taxes your muscles due to you being suspended in water.  Standup requires everything, and as natas said, also doesn't overdevelop anything. 

Actually, if you just judged fitness by looking at bodies, and had a broad definition of fitness (more than cardiovascular) that would be pretty accurate.  All the sports people have been mentioning would come out high.  Ones that require high fitness in some areas but not all, like distance running, would come out lower.
« Last Edit: July 17, 2016, 11:45:54 AM by pdxmike »

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Re: Which sport has the fittest participants?
« Reply #27 on: July 17, 2016, 06:16:42 PM »
You can argue that all "sports" or athletic competition is directly (boxing, track and field events etc.) or by proxy (team sports), related to combative warfare. If that is the case then the "fittest" athletes are the ones who can "kick" everyone else's arse. If that's the case then I'm voting for MMA fighters.
Bunch of old shit

Subber

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Re: Which sport has the fittest participants?
« Reply #28 on: July 17, 2016, 07:47:43 PM »
OK, but who has the most fun getting the fittest?

I say SUP surfing!
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Re: Which sport has the fittest participants?
« Reply #29 on: July 17, 2016, 09:27:34 PM »



I like to watch the crossfitters try to swim!  I wouldn't consider them the fittest athletes as generally they are to musclebound to move properly. 

I will let my daughter know that you said she can't swim.  She's heavy into cross fit.  Guess she'll have to change jobs.  She is a US Navy Aviation Rescue Swimmer. 

 


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