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What Is Sport ?

Sport is an activity that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often engaged in competitively. Sports commonly refer to activities where the physical capabilities of the competitor are the sole or primary determiner of the outcome (winning or losing), but the term is also used to include activities such as mind sports and motor sports where mental acuity or equipment quality are major factors.

There are artefacts and structures that suggest that the Chinese engaged in sporting activities as early as 4000 BC.Gymnastics appears to have been a popular sport in China's ancient past.

Monuments to the Pharaohs indicate that a number of sports, including swimming and fishing, were well-developed and regulated several thousands of years ago in ancient Egypt.Other Egyptian sports included javelin throwing, high jump, and wrestling. Ancient Persian sports such as the traditional Iranian martial art of Zourkhaneh had a close connection to the warfare skills. Among other sports that originate in Persia are polo and jousting.

A wide range of sports were already established by the time of Ancient Greece and the military culture and the development of sports in Greece influenced one another considerably. Sports became such a prominent part of their culture that the Greeks created the Olympic Games, which in ancient times were held every four years in a small village in the Peloponnesus called Olympia.

Industrialization has brought increased leisure time to the citizens of developed and developing countries, leading to more time for citizens to attend and follow spectator sports, greater participation in athletic activities, and increased accessibility. These trends continued with the advent of mass media and global communication. Professionalism became prevalent, further adding to the increase in sport's popularity, as sports fans began following the exploits of professional athletes through radio, television, and the internet--all while enjoying the exercise and competition associated with amateur participation in sports.

In the new millennium, new sports have been going further from the physical aspect to the mental or psychological aspect of competing. Cyber sports organizations are becoming more and more popular.

Activities where the outcome is determined by judgement over execution are considered performances, or competition.

Formula One

The results of each race are combined to determine two annual World Championships, one for drivers and one for constructors.

It is a massive television event, with millions of people watching each race in two hundred countries. The cars race at high speeds, often greater than 320 km/h (200 mph), and are capable of pulling up to 5g in some corners. The performance of the cars is highly dependent on electronics, aerodynamics, suspension and tyres. The formula has seen many evolutions and changes through the history of the sport.

Europe is Formula One's traditional centre and remains its leading market. However, Grands Prix are held all over the world and, with new races in Bahrain, China, Malaysia, Turkey and the United States since 1999, its scope continues to expand with Singapore scheduled to hold the first night race in 2008 and India being added to the schedule starting in 2010. Of the seventeen races in 2007, nine are outside Europe. As the world's most expensive sport, its economic effect is significant, and its financial and political battles are widely observed. Its high profile and popularity makes it an obvious merchandising environment, which leads to very high investments from sponsors, translating into extremely high budgets for the constructor teams. In recent years several teams have gone bankrupt or been bought out by other companies.

The sport is regulated by the FIA. Formula One's commercial rights are vested in the Formula One Group

Nascar

(National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing), organization that sanctions American stock-car races, est. 1948.

It held its first race in Daytona Beach, Fla., in 1948 and began its first and most important series of races (known as the Grand National Division from 1950, the Winston Cup Series from 1971, and the Nextel Cup Series since 2005) in Charlotte, N.C., in 1949. Other major NASCAR events include the Busch and Craftsman Truck series. Stock cars are standard production passenger vehicles modified in various ways to be faster–they often exceed 200 mph/320 kph–and more powerful than regulation assembly-line automobiles. Typical modifications include larger engines and specialized suspensions, chassis, brakes, and safety equipment. Today NASCAR sanctions more than 1,500 races throughout the country and several in Canada and Mexico. The majority are concentrated in the SE United States and held on paved oval tracks, and the most important are sponsored by major corporations. The largest and most presigious NASCAR race is the Daytona 500, a 500-mi/805-km Florida race that was first held in 1959 and 20 years later was the first to be nationally televised; it now attracts more than 200,000 fans and is widely covered by the media. As stock-car racing evolved to become one of the nation's most popular spectator sports, a number of drivers emerged as NASCAR heroes, among them Richard Petty, Cale Yarborough, Bobby Allison, Bill Elliott, Darrell Waltrip, and Dale Earnhardt.

Bibliography

See P. Golenbock, American Zoom: Stock Car Racing (1993) and The Last Lap: The Life and Times of NASCAR's Legendary Heroes (2001); M. D. Howell, From Moonshine to Madison Avenue: A Cultural History of the NASCAR Winston Cup Series (1997); R. G. Hagstrom, Jr. The NASCAR Way: The Business That Drives the Sport (2001); J. Menzer, The Wildest Ride: A History of NASCAR (2001); G. Fielden and P. Golenbock, The NASCAR Encyclopedia (2003); J. MacGregor, Sunday Money (2005).

Sport Watch

A stopwatch is a handheld timepiece designed to measure the amount of time elapsed from a particular time when activated to when the piece is deactivated. A large digital version of a stopwatch designed for viewing at a distance, as in a sports stadium, is called a stopclock.

The timing functions are traditionally controlled by two buttons on the case. Pressing the top button starts the timer running, and pressing the button a second time stops it, leaving the elapsed time displayed.

A press of the second button then resets the stopwatch to zero. The second button is also used to record split times or lap times. When the split time button is pressed while the watch is running, the display freezes, allowing the elapsed time to that point to be read, but the watch mechanism continues running to record total elapsed time. Pressing the split button a second time allows the watch to resume display of total time.

Mechanical stopwatches are powered by a mainspring, which must be periodically wound up by turning the knurled knob at the top of the watch.

Digital electronic stopwatches are available which, due to their crystal oscillator timing element, are much more accurate than mechanical timepieces. Because they contain a microchip, they often include date and time-of-day functions as well. Some may have a connector for external sensors, allowing the stopwatch to be triggered by external events, thus measuring elapsed time far more accurately than is possible by pressing the buttons with one's finger. The first digital timer used in organized sports was the Digitimer, developed by Cox Electronic Systems, Inc. of Salt Lake City Utah (1971). It utilized a Nixie-tube readout and provided a resolution of 1/1000 second. Its first use was in ski racing, but was later used by the World University Games in Moscow, Russia, the U.S. NCAA, and in the Olympic trials.

The device is used when time periods must be measured precisely and with a minimum of complications. Laboratory experiments and sporting events like sprints are good examples.

The stopwatch function is also present as an additional function of many digital wristwatches.