Forbes: Most Disliked Athletes 2012

[Seal (SmittyIsOurSavior)]

Auto racing is undoubtedly a sport. I'm not a huge Nascar fan, but I used to be a hardcore follower of Formula One. These dudes are racing 20+ other guys around a track, NOT an oval by the way, at speeds that you couldn't even imagine going.

Do that for the hours straight that they do, and tell me it's not a sport. Have you ever seen a fat Formula One driver? I dunno about Nascar, but these guys are fit as hell.

Even just racing go carts as a kid, I can tell you that after a long race, you're physically drained. It's not like driving your little Prius 10 minutes up the road to your nearest Bojangles.

[Keith Moons Liver]

Auto racing is undoubtedly a sport. I'm not a huge Nascar fan, but I used to be a hardcore follower of Formula One. These dudes are racing 20+ other guys around a track, NOT an oval by the way, at speeds that you couldn't even imagine going.

Do that for the hours straight that they do, and tell me it's not a sport. Have you ever seen a fat Formula One driver? I dunno about Nascar, but these guys are fit as hell.

Even just racing go carts as a kid, I can tell you that after a long race, you're physically drained. It's not like driving your little Prius 10 minutes up the road to your nearest Bojangles.

Something being a sport or not does not depend on the fitness required. Being an astronaut takes extraordinary fitness, is space flight a sport?

[Seal (SmittyIsOurSavior)]

Something being a sport or not does not depend on the fitness required. Being an astronaut takes extraordinary fitness, is space flight a sport?

If they were doing it as an organized competition, it could be considered a sport.

What makes football a sport? I play intramural football, but I guess it isn't a sport, right? Wrong, it's considered a sport even if it takes me very little physical exertion. It's not about the fitness, it's the fact that it requires fitness, skill, endurance, etc and it's an organized competition.

Even if you're shooting baskets by yourself, basketball is a sport. If you're playing catch with a friend, baseball is a sport. Etc etc. Gotta look deeper than you are, my friend.

[Seal (SmittyIsOurSavior)]

Also, I wanna throw Luis Suarez' name into this conversation. For the intentional handball that cost Ghana the win vs Uruguay in the World Cup, and now because he's still a little f*cking rat in the Premier League.

[frash.exe]

Auto racing is undoubtedly a sport. I'm not a huge Nascar fan, but I used to be a hardcore follower of Formula One. These dudes are racing 20+ other guys around a track, NOT an oval by the way, at speeds that you couldn't even imagine going.

well as far as NASCAR is concerned, it doesn't matter how fast you can go controlling a fuging machine, it's not a mark of physical fitness at all.

Do that for the hours straight that they do, and tell me it's not a sport.

oh great this thread has basically devolved into freshman philosophy featuring Gin and Juice and Smittyisoursavior, and that's what they might as well change the title to at this point. There's nothing that isn't remarkable about going as fast as they do, but it's not athletic. This "prolonged activity" argument has been made for literally everything to try to convince people that the people who do it are athletes, even drumming. Basically all you guys are rebutting with is "well you've never done it so you lose the argument", which isn't a winning argument in any level of debate.

Have you ever seen a fat Formula One driver? I dunno about Nascar, but these guys are fit as hell.

well here's an example of a nascar driver

wow stewart really looks like he's hitting the weights and cardio hard for this whole physically intense racing workout that only the fittest humans in the world do for a living.

Even just racing go carts as a kid, I can tell you that after a long race, you're physically drained.

you can get that same "physically drained" feeling doing anything for extended periods of time. Doesn't require athleticism to do something that leaves you "physically drained" with minimal physical exertion after a prolonged session.

It's not like driving your little Prius 10 minutes up the road to your nearest Bojangles.

how many "driving your x to y" references can you and Gin and Juice come up with

If they were doing it as an organized competition, it could be considered a sport.

it's honestly much more physically draining and hazardous to be an astronaut than a NASCAR driver, and it takes months of preparation and training before an astronaut does a week long shuttle ride. from dealing with G-Forces not even racers can imagine (much less Gin and Juice, whose extent of racing probably starts and ends with doing donuts at a tuner show), to muscle atrophy and bone loss experienced in space, an astronaut has to be in pretty damn good shape to go into space. That doesn't make space exploration a sport, (HEY THOUGH, UNLESS YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT THE SPACE RACE BETWEEN THE US AND SOVIETS IN THE LAST CENTURY! THEN BY YOUR DEFINITION IT'S A SPORT!)

What makes football a sport? I play intramural football, but I guess it isn't a sport, right? Wrong, it's considered a sport even if it takes me very little physical exertion. It's not about the fitness, it's the fact that it requires fitness, skill, endurance, etc and it's an organized competition.

intramural football doesn't showcase professional athletes.

Even if you're shooting baskets by yourself, basketball is a sport.

lol so EVERYTHING GETS TO BE A SPORT, NO MATTER HOW MINIMAL THE EXERTION REQUIRED IS, AS LONG AS YOU'RE MOVING MUSCLES LOL! Why not just say ball in a cup is a fuging sport then. Just as long as we're moving, and we have a scoring goal

If you're playing catch with a friend, baseball is a sport. Etc etc. Gotta look deeper than you are, my friend.

there's a difference between playing a sport, and being an athlete at the highest level of said sport.

[Gin and Juice]

When are you going to get that I don't think of drivers as "athletes"? But I am certainly not going to undermine what they do like you attempted to do. You called golfers athletes? Really?

[Gin and Juice]

This guy says hello!

And Tony is just pure tough! Kind of like a lineman

[frash.exe]

When are you going to get that I don't think of drivers as "athletes"? But I am certainly not going to undermine what they do like you attempted to do. You called golfers athletes? Really?

in between taking sips out of your juicebox, i suggest you do some research about the conditioning and training regiment the pros go through to prepare for cup tournaments. but i guess your dumb redneck self didn't think about that while you were too busy posting this picture

This guy says hello!

oh wow, nascar drivers really go hard

[frash.exe]

And Tony is just pure tough! Kind of like a lineman

lol please

Jerome Brown was never as good a driver as Tony Stewart but if he were alive today he could probably beat Stewart to death with Dale Sr's corpse

[Gin and Juice]

Lol.....you started the picture posting. Figured that's how you like to communicate!

Hell Yeah, this golfing thing looks hard!

This what you define as "athlete"?

[Gin and Juice]

Here is another one of your athletic golfers!

[frash.exe]

whoops never said golfers were athletes otis

[Gin and Juice]

Well Lawrence, this argument is over being that neither of us have a point!

[davos]

Its all relative

You have this thing called competitive racing. Sometimes people use their feet, sometimes a bike, sometimes they spend oodles of money into cars in which they put pretty sponsors on to drive at these major tracks throughout the US. Competitive racing is exactly what it is and many people enjoy it.

The different levels depend on layers of integration...the most raw (running) being the purest and most humanly definable then...the most coated (Nascar) being the more layered and multi-factored type.

RB you first talked about the argument of a "sport" but then referred to this idea of its competitors having to be an athlete in order for it to translate into a sport. Then, you said reflexes and awareness don't have to do with athleticism. So in this regard, take away all but these definable "athletic" abilities of guys in any sport and they become much worse at whatever they do. Being an athlete doesn't directly relate to being a sports participant or vice versa.

I think you proved if anything that you simply hate that damn hillbilly Nascar thing.