The word “gymnasium” comes from the Greek word gymnos, which means naked. In ancient times athletes practiced in the nude to the accompaniment of music. They also performed naked at the Olympic Games. Women were not allowed to participate or even to attend as spectators. The first Olympic games were held in 776BC – and [...]
Category: sports
A sport similar to football (called soccer in the United States and elsewhere) was played 3000 years ago in Japan. Chinese text from 50 BC mentions football-type games between teams from Japan and China. A text dating from 611 AD confirms that football was played in Kyoto, the ancient capital of Japan. Ancient Greeks and [...]
On Tuesday 13 February 1923, in a strong man contest held before a packed house in City Hall in Augusta, Maine, John B Gagnon beat Warren L Travis of Brooklyn, NY – holder of the official title of World’s Strongest Man. In 10 lifts, taking only 25 minutes, Gagnon lifted a total of 7,552 kg [...]
The love of – nay, addiction to – competitive and solitary sports cuts across all social-economic strata and throughout all the demographics. Whether as a passive consumer (spectator), a fan, or as a participant and practitioner, everyone enjoys one form of sport or another. Wherefrom this universal propensity? Sports cater to multiple psychological and physiological [...]
In 1891, James Naismith, a physical education instructor, was thinking about new ways of providing exercise for the young men. He nailed peach baskets onto the balconies at either end of a gymnasium and challenged his student to throw a soccer ball into them from below. Thus modern basketball was born. Springfield, Massachusetts a 30-year-old [...]
A form of badminton was played in ancient Greece and Egypt. But it wasn’t called badminton then. In India, the game was called poona. Elsewhere it was called either battledore or shuttlecock. British Army officers stationed in India in the 1860s took the game back to England. In 1873, it was played at a party [...]
Korfball was founded in 1903 in Holland by Amsterdam teacher Nico Broekhuijsen. It is one of few team sports that up to its highest level is played with mixed teams: a team consists of 4 men and 4 women! In defense, men guard men and women guard women. High speed, super agility and enormous endurance [...]
Far-fetched it may seem but when Benoit Lecomte swam across the Atlantic in 1998 he introduced a new global sports challenge: the first to swim around the world. In a remarkable feat of endurance, 31-year Benoit Lecomte became the first man to swim across the Atlantic ocean, 1998. The long history of swimming is depicted [...]
