Did You Know...
Like Un Yong Kim (South Korea), Sheik Fahad Al-Sabah (Kuwait) and Joao Havelange (Brazil), José Gamarra Zorrilla was one of the best Olympic leaders in the Third World. He played a major role in promoting the values of sports in Bolivia and Latin America. José dedicated his life to fight against indifference to sports and the deplorable condition of the athletes in Bolivia. His country is one of the Third World`s poorest countries. Furthermore, Bolivia has had a record 194 attempted coups. However, under his leadership, several international congress and events were organized in La Paz, Cochabamba, Oruro and Santa Cruz de la Sierra. José was president of the Organizing Committee of the La Paz Bolivarian Games (1977) and for the South American Games in Bolivia (1978). As president of the Bolivian Olympic Committee (1970-1982), he led Bolivia to the best result ever in its history: 106 medals in the South American Games. He headed the Bolivian delegation at the Summer Olympics in Munich, West Germany. Many South Americans consider José Gamarra Zorrilla as the greatest South American Olympic leader of the 20th century.
This country had great sportspersons: Mario Martinez (tennis), Alan Saunders (nordic skiing), Milton Coimbra (football), Maria Ortuno (basketball), Giovanna Morejon Irusta (athletics), Ramiro Benavides (tennis), Anthony Iglesias (diving), Johnny Pérez (athletics), Scott Sanchez Saunders (nordic skiing), Oswaldo Morejon (track and field), William Arencibia (taekwondo), Erwin Sánchez (football), Ricardo Ramos (nordic skiing), Guadalupe Yañez (basketball), Betty Saavedra (basketball), Juan Rodrigo Camacho (athletics), Marco Etcheverry (football), Katherine Moreno (swimming), Roberto Nielsen Reyes (equestrian) and Billy Farwing Aranoa (nordic skiing).
Bolivia sent 7 sportspeople to the Winter Olympic Games in 1988. The South American skiers were Manuel Aramayo, Guillermo Avila Paz, Jaime Bascon, Jorge Bejarano, Enrique Montaño, Pedro Tichaver and Luis Vizcarra.
Julia Iriarte is the greatest Bolivian athlete of all time. Why? She won 5 gold and 3 silver medals at the 1947 Bolivarian Games in Lima, Peru. She became the star of the Games. Her gold medals were in the 80m hurdles, discus throw, shot put, long jump and high jump. Her homecoming was a huge success . After she was invited by president Enrrique Hertzog to the Government Palace (Palacio Quemado). She also won five gold medals in the South American Athletics Championships in La Paz in 1948. Under her coach, George Voeg , she broke several national records during the 1940s. Unfortunately, she did not compete at the 1948 Olympic Games in Helsinki (Finland). She was born in Cochabamba, Bolivia on December 20, 1919 to Placido Iriarte and Clara Velasco.
Bolivia participated at the 1979 Spartakiade of the Nations of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR).
From 1980 to 1984, the Bolivian government destroyed the sport. The South American athletes were not allowed to compete in the Olympics in 1980. Many sportspeople who had trained for years for the Games felt great frustration. Among these athletes were: Johnny Pérez (track and field), Luis Dario Vasquez (fencing), Mary Rojas (athletics), Walter Quiroga (shooting), Linda Spents (track and field), Isidro Guarachi (boxing), Walter Quispe (boxing), Edgar Cueto (cycling), Jean Young Kim Song (judo) and Antonieta Arizaga (swimming). Ironically, the USSR -host Olympic nation- subsidized Third World's Olympic teams (Tanzania -one of the Africa`s poorest countries- sent 41 sportspersons). For political reasons, Bolivia also did not participate in the 1983 Pan American Games in Caracas (Venezuela). For the first time since 1971, athletes from Bolivia did not took part in a Pan American. Unlike athletes from Haiti, Nicaragua, Chad and Sierra Leone ,Bolivian athletes had problems to go to Olympics Games in 1984.
Johnny Perez took part in the 1978 South American Games in La Paz, Bolivia, winning three gold medals in athletics, in 1,500m, 5,000m and 3,000m steeplechase.
The La Paz Olympic Stadium is one of the most modern in Latin America and the Caribbean. Among the athletes who have competed in the Olympic Stadium are Romario de Souza Faria (soccer/ Brazil), Joao Carlos de Oliveira (athletics /Brazil), José Luis Chilavert (soccer /Paraguay), Tito Stenier (athletics /Argentina), Edith Noeding (track and field/ Peru) and Carlos Caetano Bledron Verri (soccer/ Brazil).
Giovanna Morejon Irusta finished 16th in the 20-kilometer walk at the 2003 World Athletics Championships in Paris, France.
Katherine Moreno was one of the youngest swimmers at the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul.
The Bolivian team won the silver medal at the South American Basketball Championship and qualified for the World Women's Basketball Championship in 1978 in Seoul (South Korea). Bolivia qualified for a world tournament for the first time.The heroines were: Janeth Blanco Saavedra, Betty Saavedra Zaconeta, Daysy Chucatini Torrico, Liceo Rojas Arteaga, Norma Zambrano Siles, Elizabeth Navia Ledesma, Guadalupe Yañez Heredia, Tania Claros Vargas, Antonieta Gudmanson Torres, Judith Quiñones Miranda and Vania Claros de Justinino.
Bolivia sent only one athlete (Fernando Inchauste Montalvo/ kayak) to the Summer Olympics in 1960.
From 1971 to 1979, 500 Bolivian athletes participated in international tournaments and competitions.
Like Hortencia Maria de Fatima Marcari (Brazil) and Carol Turney (Canada), Guadalupe Yañez was one of the best basketball players in the 1979 Pan American Games in San Juan de Puerto Rico.
Erwin Sanchez was one of the most important football players in Bolivia in the 1990s.
From 1975 to 1977, more than 25 foreign coaches helped to train Bolivian sportspeople in preparation for the international competitions (Olympic Games, Bolivarian Games, Pan American Games and South American Games). The coaches were: Bornj Wangemann (athletics/ West Germany), Mike Lucero (basketball/ USA), Paul Gonzalez (basketball/ USA), Stanislav Golubkov (boxing/ USSR), Heriberto Diaz (cycling/ Mexico), Pedro Escobar (equestrian / Chile), Stanislav Spyra (fencing/ Poland), Walter Madel (fencing/ West Germany), Eduardo Virba (football/ West Germany), Dale Cutler (gymnastics/ USA), Donald Howorth (gymnastics/ USA), Pedro Ortega (gymnastics/ Mexico), Jasuhido Takasuka (judo/ Japan), Benigno Marquez (wrestling/ Venezuela), Karol Czarkoswki (weightlifting/ Poland), Wu Yu Yung (swimming/ Taiwan), Yadwiga Czarkoswka (swimming/ Poland), Adolfo Coronado (swimming/ Ecuador), Francis Conway (shooting/ USA), Nicolay Durnev (shooting/ USSR), Cselaw Gajdamovicz (volleyball/ Poland), Tien Heing Hisch (volleyball/ China), Chiu Chiao Chi (volleyball/ Taiwan) and Lin Chou Nou (volleyball/ China).
In recent years sports fans have been revamped from what they were many years ago. It's not just a question about their eating more modern fast foods, but it has more to do with the way in which they flaunt themselves. Their means of expressing themselves are to dress up for the particular sport event.
Those were the days when just painting your faces with the colors of the respective teams was in rage, but the fanatical sports and games fans of today express themselves with sophisticated sports-fan-gear replete with armor and helmet.
Some of the more restrained methods that you can see are sporting team checks that have the team logo or team image on them. This is deemed one of the most efficient ways to show your allegiance to a specific team. You will find that there are team logo checks for almost any sports league or team.
Into this fray has entered the women sports fans who love to choose form the myriads of colors of female fan gear. Their fan-gear is fast gaining importance. You will find figure hugging jerseys, T-shirts, shirts, hats, backpacks and pocketbooks in all sorts of pastel colors manufactured with just the woman in mind. Many of the sports shops stock up their shelves with these gear for women sport fans.
You will find a variety of sports gears like jerseys, T-shirts, shirts, hats, caps and other accessories in sport shops, your local malls and for that matter even in online sports stores. The reason for this sudden increase in sports-fan-gear is that the interest in sports in itself is growing in leaps and bounds and manufacturers are finding that creating fan gifts is an extremely lucrative business.
Another set of sports fan gear is for the kids. You will be amazed to find shops sporting baby cheer leader garments or jerseys with proud parents vainly showing them off.
You know, fan gear is also gaining plenty of popularity as Christmas gifts. If you are in a quandary about what to buy your man for Christmas; if he is a sports lover, then you can bet your high horses that he will be thrilled to receive fan-gear as a Christmas present. These gifts can be anything ranging from team jerseys, hats, caps, blankets, credit cards, team sunglasses; just about anything that will make him feel that he belongs.
No matter where you are, you are sure to find sports fan gear of local as well as national and international sports. And the beauty of it all is that the gear is beginning to get really exciting and original with manufacturers thinking up novel ways to attract sports fans. Irrespective of your taste, you will quite definitely find sports gears in the market.
Flash is a runtime client software and its eighth version is in use today. Previously known as Macromedia Flash, it is now known as Adobe Flash. Computer and mobile golf games based on Adobe Flash platform are called flash golf games. Short animation films, mobile games, and other applications are developed using the Flash platform.
Flash based golf games use very little disk space, and most of them occupy only about 100 KB of disk space. These games have good quality graphic images and user-friendly game controls.
Players have different options to choose from, such as selecting a golfer, course, club and holes. They can also select from different game modes available in the game software. Some of the most common game modes have desert courses, snow covered courses and mountain courses. Players have the option of playing individual games, or take part in tournaments with two or more opponents. These games can be played by people of all ages. The only drawback is the small sized screen of a mobile phone handset. It is not possible to provide a huge number of varied courses and holes in such a small space.
Gamers who have knowledge of Flash can design and develop their own customized golf game. Flash games can also be downloaded free from Internet websites. However, some of these games have bad graphics, poor resolution and fussy controls. Courses in these games are fairly similar and become boring after some time.
Flash games cannot compete with the quality, resolution and imagery of high-end computer based golf games. These are best suited for smaller devices like cell phones. However, mobile technology is changing at a rapid pace. The processing power and memory of mobile phones has increased significantly paving way for development of improved Flash golf games.
The World Equestrian Games consist of eight equestrian sports. The games are held every four years just two years before the Olympic Games. The World Equestrian Games are governed by the Federation Equestre Internationale (FEI). Due to this, the games are often referred to as the FEI games.
The Federation Equestre Internationale is the international governing body of equestrian sports around the world. The Federation was established in 1921 and the headquarters are located in Lausanne, Switzerland. When the FEI formed, it joined the national equestrian organizations in the US, Sweden, Norway, Japan, Italy, France, Denmark and Belgium. Later, 126 additional nations joined. There are a total of 134 nations in the FEI today.
The World Equestrian Games are the world championships for eight equestrian disciplines. These include:
Dressage: Dressage means "training" in French. The goal of this discipline is to develop the horse in to an athlete that is happy and moves in harmony with the rider. The horse should be calm, supple, loose and flexible. It should also be confident, attentive to the rider and keen. In competition, each horse and rider perform a test that consists of a combination of movements and gates that must take place at predetermined areas in the arena.
Combined Driving: Combined driving consists of three competitions which include driven dressage, marathon and obstacle cones driving. The event is competed by four in-hand drivers with a team of four horses.
Eventing: Eventing consists of three competitions as well. These include dressage, cross country and show jumping. Each event is held on a separate day and the entire competition is referred to as "Three Day Event."
Endurance: An endurance ride tests the speed and endurance of the horse. The competition is a race against the clock over a 100 mile distance.
Jumping: Show jumping consists of a horse and rider team competing over various obstacles on a course.
Reining: Reining is the only western event at the World Equestrian Games. Competitors run one of several approved patterns.
Para Dressage: The para dressage discipline allows riders with physical disabilities to compete at a professional level.
Vaulting: Vaulting combines gymnastics and dance elements that are performed to music on a cantering horse. Competitors can compete on an individual, pair or team basis.
The 2010 Alltech World Equestrian Games will take place over 16 days at the end of September and the first ten days of October. Each event is staggered on various days throughout the 16 days. The World Equestrian Games is one of the most exciting two and a half weeks in the world of equestrian sports.
Speed Stacks are specially designed high-tech Sport Stacking cups endorsed by the World Sport Stacking Association (WSSA) for competition.
Available in 13 colors, each set comes with its own nifty nylon and mesh bag along with our cool Stacker Training DVD, loaded with instructions, World Championship highlights, Sport Stacking techniques and competitions to help you truly "Stack Fast!".
Speed Stacks are the only cups permitted for use in WSSA sanctioned events and each Speed Stacks cup carries the official WSSA approval mark.
This is an introduction to a world of incredibly fun games played with dice. No, I am not going to teach you how to gamble. Rather, I am going to show you how just 2 to 8 dice can allow you to play a number of sports. In this first installment I am going to teach you about playing the college version of "Dice Football". This is probably the simplest of all my dice sports games that I'll reveal in later articles. Anyway, in all dice football games you will need two dice, notebook paper and a pen or pencil.
The first thing you'll need to do is draw a two inch horizontal rectangle on the paper encompassing three lines. I prefer college ruled notebook paper because the lines already create a smaller natural Visitor/Home team's divider for the rectangle you draw. Next break your rectangle into quarters--just like in the box scores you see in the newspaper. You can write in any two college teams that you want to see play or just stick with the home/visitor set-up.
Once you've got your box score set up you can begin the game. The top team always goes first. Both teams will get five rolls of the two dice. You always allow the two teams to make their rolls (5) in the quarter all at once. In simpler terms, the visitor team rolls two dice five times. Then the home team does the same. You do this for each quarter of the game.
Scoring occurs when the two dice hit "doubles". That is a touchdown and it's worth six points. For the extra point you would roll just one dice. If the dice is anything other than a "one", the extra point is good. Should you roll a one then the extra point was missed and you'll have to settle on just six points for that one particular roll. Remember, you get five rolls of two dice per quarter per team.
Field goals can be attempted whenever one roll of dice results in a total of either a ten (4 & 6) or eleven (5&6). At that point you roll one dice to see if the field goal is good. When you attempt a field goal and you roll a one, two or three, the field goal is good. Roll a four, five or six and that means you missed...bummer.
This is an example of how the game can break down. The visitor team rolls the dice three times before a pair of twos result...Touchdown! The visitor rolls one dice and it results in a four...extra point is good--seven points total. The visitor makes their fifth roll and nails an eleven. A field goal attempt! He rolls a two which means that the field goal is good. The total score for the visitor in the first quarter is ten points. They got seven for the TD and the extra point plus the three points for the field goal.
The home team rolls twice before rolling a ten. He rolls a five on his field goal attempt which means he missed. Then he rolls doubles on both of his last two rolls, making the extra point both times. His final score in the first quarter is a fourteen. Thus the home team leads the game after the first quarter 14 to 10.
Keep rolling until the end of four quarters. If the score ends in a tie just alternate one roll of two dice between the two teams until someone scores. In the next article I'll teach you about dice pro football which is a little more complicated. Till then, keep on rolling.
Basketball Party Games are nothing but pure fun in the Basketball Party. If you are planning for a Basketball Party, then you must sit down with your friends to think of the innovative basketball games so as to make sure that everyone in the party has fun and feel that this is the best party ever that they have been a part of.
Who Can Make A Basket
This Basketball Party Game is for all of your guests to participate. To put it in simple words, we can say that there is no escape in here and everyone is a part of it. The rules are simple, everyone is going to have a chance to stand as a line in your backyard and try to score by throwing the basketball to make a basket. There will be two tries for warm up and then the game starts after that, every individual is going to get two chances at first and then through the process of elimination, the last man standing is going to win the game and will get the prize.
Make A Song
This can be a very unique Basketball Party Game. In this game, you can ask the guests as to who would love to make a basketball song in the given time and sing. For this you must have an individual who can give the beats on the song so it sounds really exciting. After the given time, you can ask the different guests to come up on the stage one by one and sing their song, and with the show of hands of all the guests, you will have the winner of the game. This game is going to provide fun and laughter throughout.
You can think of different Basketball Party Games other than these and having creative games at your party is going to provide a lot of fun for all.
Paintball gun barrels vary in size, color and design. In general, paintball gun barrels are twelve, fourteen, sixteen, eighteen, and twenty inches. Some people also make use of custom made barrels of about 48 inches. There are also barrels that are less than 8 inches but the accuracy rate of such barrels are very poor. The ideal gun barrel should be between 8 and 14 inches.
As the length of the barrel increases, the gas used also increases. A considerable amount of gas is used by barrels which are more than 14 inches. During warm seasons, short barrel guns are better. A longer barrel is ideal during cold seasons. The advantages of longer paintball gun barrels over shorter barrels are that they make less noise. This is mainly because of the porting that long barrels have. The term port refers to the holes that long paintball gun barrels have on the sides. Some people choose barrels which are ported to avoid sound. As the number of port increases the sound made by the paintball gun reduces considerably. But it is found that ported barrels use more gas to reach the desired velocity.
A vast majority of paintball markers use threaded barrels. Angel, Shocker, Tippman, and Spyder are among the common threads to be found. The inner diameter of the barrel is called bore. Nowadays, paintball gun barrels made of aluminum, stainless steel, ceramic, and brass are available for purchase.
One piece, two piece, and three piece barrels are some of the popular types of barrel. One piece barrels are made from a single material. The material used in this type of barrel is aluminum. Two piece barrels are machined from two different materials. Usually, it contains a front and back. Instead of multiple backs, three piece barrel features only a single back. The other types of barrel commonly found are flatline barrel and apex barrel.
Paintball gun barrels made of aluminum are lightweight and not expensive. Stainless steel barrel are long lasting and are scratch free. Barrels made of ceramic features low friction. Due to many disadvantages, brass barrels are not common nowadays.
Word Relay
This game is good to help review vocabulary and spelling.
1) Split the class into two teams and have a player from each team come to the board.
2) Divide the board in two and write a word on each side.
3) The players begin the game by writing a word with the last letter of the previous word (i.e. snake ->elephant -> toys).
4) The players pass the marker to the next students and the word relay begins.
I usually assign more points for longer words or will not accept smaller words.
Do This Do That
This game is a variation of the popular game Simon Says. Instead of saying "Simon Says" the leader says "Do this" or "Do that". When the leader says "Do this" the students should follow the action, however, when the leader says "Do that" students should not follow the action. The amount of actions is limitless and if the students need a workout the leader can perform more physical movements like jumping jacks or push ups. The game can be elimination format or team format.
Teacher Basketball
With March Madness basketball taking place in Canada and the U.S. this month, I thought this would be an appropriate game to share.
1) Find a small soft ball for the basketball and use your arms or an empty garbage can to create the basket.
2) Draw two lines on the floor with an erasable marker. Make one line closer to the hoop than the other.
3) Divide the class into two groups and begin play by choosing a player from each team and asking them each a question from the lesson.
4) After the players answer their questions have them play Rock, Paper, Scissor to see who will shoot from the closer line.
5) Give a point for each basket and the team with the most points at the end of the game wins.
To make the game more difficult move the basket back and forth as the player is shooting (I close my eyes to keep it fair).
To make the game more competitive give one question to the players and have the player that answers first shoot from the closer line.
If a team begins to pull away, increase the value of the points to give the other team a chance to comeback.
Whether you want to believe it or not, we like to watch sports for very different reasons than you may think. In fact, the real things that cause us to like sports are in every person, whether we like sports or not. What things can we learn about human nature by simply looking at our fascination with competition? The answers may surprise you. Not only are the answers interesting in themselves, but they may just help you in other ways too.
There are some fairly straightforward and obvious explanations for why we like sports to be sure. Sports teach us about loyalty, perseverance and honor. It gives us a way to bond, it's cathartic, and we identify with teams and players. We live vicariously through the players we watch. We have our favorite players, and there are teams we've grown up rooting for because our brother or dad used to love them, and now we still root for them today. Or we may follow a sport now that we used to play as a child.
But there are some deeper, more powerful and fascinating reasons too.
We're All Just Big Children
Whether you want to believe it or not, all adults are just big children. We're all just big kids. We just hide our true feelings and thoughts with highly developed skills (or at least most of us do). We still want to belong or be accepted by our peers, we all still want to be loved, we still feel emotional pain, and we still find ourselves giving in to immediate gratification when we know better. And yes, some of us still lie and cheat in our normal day to day lives.
We certainly hide things better and often successfully 'act' as if we don't care about belonging, or love, or pain, or whatever. Deep down inside we are a little more mature and wise, but basically still just children. We may not say it out loud anymore, but we still think to ourselves sometimes, "That's not fair!" We would rather play than work. Some may argue, depending on whether they pee standing up or sitting down, that this is especially true for men. Maybe that's why there are more men sports fans than women.
You see, watching sports gives us a perfect, safe and secure, black and white, little microcosm of life. Following a player, team or game allows us to experience ups and downs and a whole array of emotions, just like in real life, but we aren't actually affected.
And unlike life, sports and games are generally fair! There are rules and a crystal clear framework, or paradigm that all the participants and spectators know about. There are never any monkey wrenches thrown into a sports game, like the rules changing mid-game for instance. If rules are broken, the offender is penalized. They don't frustratingly get away sometimes like in real life.
At the end, there is an unambiguous winner and loser. We get to pretend that the game we're watching is life, where everything is perfectly fair, everyone plays by the rules and everything makes sense.
Children tend to think of things in much more black and white terms. It is only through living and maturing that we realize that all of life is a series of grays. But we all still long for a simpler and easier life. When things are only seen in black or white, things indeed seem simpler and easier, but life isn't so clear-cut.
This helps explain why politicians who break their platform down into simple sound bites and into terms devoid of complexity often do better than politicians who talk about life like it really is, a complex, interrelated world of nuances.
Watching sports allows us a temporarily safe and socially acceptable way to be more like our true nature, and our true nature is frighteningly childlike. So the next time you deal with a difficult person, remember that they are just a large child, like you and everyone else, and maybe that knowledge will help you deal with them a little more easily.
What do watching a horror movie and sports have in common?
Ever wonder why so many people, including maybe you, enjoy watching horror movies so much? They provide a safe way for people to experience high levels of suspension without actually being in any real danger. Sports can be the same way. Again, watching sports allows us to enter a perfect world where the suspenseful outcome has no bearing on our real lives (unless you have a nasty sports gambling problem of course).
People love drama, suspension, and resolution, which are all elements inherent in sports. In fact, the closer the game, the more suspension there is. If we identify with a player and he wins, we are vicariously happy for the success. However, if the player's team loses, we feel the defeat a little as well. But our lives are unaffected. And sports announcers usually only add to the drama and suspension.
A sports game is a sort of story. There is a beginning and an end. There is a protagonist (your team) and an antagonist (the other team). There is a scene and setting, the stadium at noon, and there is a plot, which is the action. Only after the games ends, and depending on if your team won or not, is it decided to be called a fairy tale ending or a tragedy.
Reptilian Brain and War
Whether you want to believe it or not, humans are a lot closer to nature and the animal world than most people like to think. We're not just close to nature; we're a part of it! Evolutionarily speaking, we are much closer in time to our unintelligent animal ancestors than we are to a transcended sentient species apart from nature. Our behavior is guided much more by our 'primitive brain' than our more recently developed neocortex, which is the seat of our intelligence. The primitive brain, or lower brain function, deals with fight or flight behavior, hunger, fear, and sex, among other things.
A common, yet erroneous concept is that the human brain is the result of billions of years of evolution. Our primitive or reptilian part of the brain is that old, but our brain's extra large neocortex, the thing that separates us from other mammals, came about only a couple million years ago, a mere drop in the evolutionary bucket. The neocortex has not had much time to develop, and so our primitive brain plays a significant role in our lives.
Our basic flight or fight mentality is manifested in sports. We can relate, on some deeper and unconscious level, with the guy running with the football towards the end zone and being chased by a pack of angry men. We can understand what it feels like to check another player in hockey and slam him into the boards. Or we can sympathize with the NASCAR driver who gets passed by a competitor, but throws it into a higher gear and chases after him.
Our primitive desire for dominance is represented in sports. When our team wins, we experience a sort of dominance over the opposing team and their fans.
Our predatory nature is lit up when we see a linebacker following a running back through a mass of football players, waiting for the perfect moment to strike his prey with a tackle. Watching someone chase the man with the ball in basketball, soccer, or baseball affects us in similar ways.
Our tribal instincts are fulfilled by sports. We all want to belong to something; it's a basic human need since we are such social animals. We identify with a team like our ancestors would identify with their tribe. This is especially true for the Western world's modern man, where community has taken a back seat to independence.
Our primitive warring nature is satisfied by sports. There seems to be an innate desire for war, even in so-called 'modern' man. Indeed, look at the world today and how many current wars are going on, and you'll see how far we are to real peace. Pathetically, that last statement holds true for almost any time in history, regardless of when you're reading this. Again, this goes back to the fact that we are ruled more by our 'primitive', survival-driven, fight or flight brain than our reasonable and intelligent 'modern' brain.
Every sports game is like a tiny war between tribes, with an end and a declared victor. But there's one important distinction; unlike war, no one has to die in sports.
One of the reasons going to a game is more exciting than watching it on TV is that there is a kind of energy created when so many people get together and root for one cause. You might even liken it to a mob mentality. We don't have to look farther than our own stadiums where pandemonium has broken out in protest to a call or in celebration of a win. Sports strongly appeals to the gaming and struggle instincts of humans.
And since our modern lives no longer contain any real physical danger and all our basic needs are immediately taken care of, we now have a void that needs to be filled somehow, our primitive brain expects it. Sports fit the bill. It gives us the illusion of reality where there are no consequences. It gives us the illusion of battle, war, victory and defeat, without the consequences. And it gives us the illusion of being a child again, even if it's all temporary.
You may not like sports at all, but we are all a quite childlike inside. We all yearn for some level of drama in our lives. And we are all constantly affected by our primitive brain. Watching sports is one excellent way for people to reconcile these inescapable facts.
A lower cost alternative to our full-size Tournament Display, the StackPod features an LCD display that's visible up to 20 feet away. Like its full size brother, StackPod plugs into the StackMat Timer and displays the stacker's time as it happens. Great for video taping your best runs and posting them on You Tube. And check this out - when un-plugged from the Timer, StackPod functions as an unconventional clock, displaying every second with StackMat accuracy. Requires (2) AAA batteries (included).
Please note that StackPod is only compatible with StackMat Timers that have a data port. Timers purchased in retail stores do not have a data port and will not work with StackPods.
Horse racing is a very competitive sport. Race horses are athletes at the peak of their physical perfection. It takes a lot of training to get them ready for race day. One of the most enjoyable aspects of horse racing is watching these beautiful animals doing what they do best. Horses have such beautiful gaits. The way they carry themselves when their strides are fully extended is one of the most beautiful sights I've ever seen.
Imagine horses racing at speeds of 40 miles an hour with 130 pounds on their back while competing with other horses to win the horse race. What makes this sport so beautiful compared to other sports (football, baseball, basketball, hockey or golf) is that in no other sport is the athlete required to exert so much energy and effort for such a period of time. Horse racing requires these magnificent animals to carry weights, including the jockey, and in some cases above 130 pounds at speeds of approximately 40 miles per hour.
I have watched many so-called professional gamblers or individuals who love to bet on horses and follow the racing circuit everywhere. These individuals, so-called professional handicappers, try to make a living on betting, wagering and picking winners. Events like the Kentucky Derby that takes place the first Saturday in May at Churchill Downs are places where you will see hoards of people gathering to see the best of horses compete with each other.
Thoroughbred race horses are the fastest breed of horses. They say you can determine a champion race horse by looking in his eyes. These race horses will show expressions of strength and dominance. You'll find free racing videos on horses competing in the Preakness Stakes, the second leg of the Triple Crown taking place at Pimlico Racetrack each year two weeks after the Kentucky Derby on the internet.
Such a competitive game can also be played online through online horse racing games readily available on the internet. You can download free racing games and sit back and enjoy watching the best horses like Zenyatta and Sir Barton run for the finish line in the best of Breeders' Cup and Kentucky Derby. You can breed thoroughbred horses and train them the way you want virtually. 3d horse racing games will keep you hooked onto your seats. These virtual horses will teach you a lot of things about the real world of racing.
