Which sport were you best at?
Just a question born out of an @LX1 temark on another thread. Which sport did you excel the most at in your life, and/or take the furthest? As a follow on, is there a sport you wish you had taken further in retrospect?
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Is beer a sport?
Cricket, don't want to boast ( but guess I am 🤦♂️) but played to a decent level (above village) had a highest score of 152
Tennis…won an intramural championship at University of Texas
To my shame I was pretty decent at rugby as a winger because I was fast and didn't mind getting smashed a bit. Made the school team but detest the sport and most of those involved.
Table Tennis - Semi-finalist in West of Scotland (under-16) Championships.
Golf - 11 handicap at the age of 11 (Got down to 5 handicap but gave it up after leaving Scotland at age 16) Took it up again decades later and was crap.
If ten-pin bowling counts as a sport, I helped my uni get to the national BUSA final. Though my greatest achievement was being the most improved player of the season in my U10s football team. Not until Clint Easton shoved the "most improved player" award back in the face of WWISC that I realise what a backhanded compliment that award was...
Running - The longer the better, add in some hurdles and a massive water feature and I was in my element.
Agreed. Played for Bucks U-18 at rugby. Hate everything it stands for. It really is an easy game to be good at if you are fast and strong and can catch and kick.
Football, rugby, cricket - average at best at all three but loved playing them all nonetheless.
That's the great thing about sport, you can always find a level to play at.
So true, I have loved playing competitive sports football, golf, tennis, table tennis and you can find a level and enjoy it.
I finished top 10 out of 200-odd in cross-country once, which is about as good as it got
I had a 32er in conkers when I was 10. Top that!!
Football till I was in my mid forties.
Various martial arts till I got too old.
And now I play a lot of enthusiastic but mediocre chess and walk the dog to a pretty decent standard.
Rugby, athletics, cricket and badminton for me.
I played for Bucks and SE England at Rugby as I was a pretty big teenager which seemed to qualify me to play at a reasonable level.
I played 5 a side football and occasional full games, but an ACL / PCL rupture put paid to my sporting career in my early forties.
A brisk walk with the dog, or a few gentle overs of spin is about all I can manage on my knees these days.
I wasn’t necessarily good at it but I completed an Ironman once. I can highly recommended triathlons as a sport for anyone going through a mid-life crisis
A robust but talentless full back in the days when you could get away with kicking wingers and still playing at the age of 74, albeit mainly the walking variety nowadays. Ran the London Marathon and a few half marathons.
I’m sure I saw you play in a fixture at AP once @glasshalffull or am I dreaming it?
I’ve a mental image of John Robertson playing in the same match too. It must have been early 90s.
Football - represented Berkshire under 15s and spotted by a scout who wanted me to go for a trial with West Ham. Parents had no car and no interest/support so it never happened sadly. School colours.
Cricket - colours at school, single wicket Champion Windsor 1971. Scored a good few centuries as an opening bat.
Rugby - hooker, school colours, played club rugby for Redingensians.
Tennis - school Champion 1969 and colours
Cross Country - colours and Outward Bound Course winner 1970. ( 90 competitors.)
Snooker - Pontins runner up 1988. Part of the prize was a frame against the visiting Doug Mountjoy who walloped me.
Needless to say my studies were swerved at school leading to miserable results, particularly as our pupils went on a sit down strike as we wanted a room set aside for smoking and socialising (never happened.) The 60’s what an era to be alive and young in!!
Rugby - As posted in other threads, I captained the school team, and was selected for Middlesex Schools U18s, then played for Wasps and later High Wycombe. Then got into coaching, and have all the RFU badges.
Athletics - Won the Middlesex Schools 440 yards final (equivalent to 400m) in 1964
Chess - Captained the Bucks team in the Chiltern League in the 1980s
Scrabble - Came 38th in the British Championships in 2005
As for football, I once worked for a company which organised indoor 5 a side matches at the local sports centre, But they weren't too keen on my interpretation of the shoulder barge tactic ...
Poohsticks
Cricket is my true love! I was lucky enough to win the Madrid Cricket Club International T20 Tournament a few years ago in La Manga. How we won I'll never know, as I think we consumed more units of alcohol on that tour than we scored runs in the whole tournament!
We were broken going into the final though, so 3 hours in Mulligans before the final helped to loosen the joints. Luckily I won the toss and elected to bowl, otherwise we probably would have been all out rather quickly.
Other than that I love all other sports and have played golf, football, rugby etc. Completed the London Marathon last month!
@MBS Doug Mountjoy - that's a blast from the past.
Watching other people playing sport has always been my forte. I am very good at it.
Rugby I was good at at school (basically I was tall and well coached) and carried it into club Rugby where I was okay (I could tackle pretty well) but it was mainly about drinking beer. Had to give it up when I started working shifts and getting up on a Sunday morning to open up a signal box was not exactly easy after a beer tour of Suffolk or Norfolk the previous afternoon/evening.
Cycling - TA Eastern Region Best All Rounder (50 miles, 100 miles & 12 hours) Champion 1981
Local Saturday league football until mid forties (shit Curtis Thompson)
Still manage to play low level league cricket into my late fifties (shit Jimmy Anderson)
Play golf every 3 or 4 weeks very badly
i find getting old and gradually having to give up difficult to deal with. Which means playing on too long and now getting increasingly stiff.
I got quite good at darts for a bit
Ah my spiritual brother. I’m dyspraxic, can’t catch, can’t throw and can’t control a football. School sport was purgatory. I can walk quite well though and have a probable pipe dream of doing a 50 miler in 24 hours. But we’ll see how well the Wembley to Wycombe pans out first.
I'm bang average at everything I play due to being completely useless with my left foot/leg/hand/arm and above average with my right.
I played for my university's first team at football many moons ago as a winger, by virtue of the fact I was fast and could whip in the odd decent cross from time to time. As soon as the defender worked out to put me onto my left foot that was my game over. I had to stop young though due to a dodgy knee.
Saying that, I also used to do the odd kick about behind the Stacey West Stand at Sincil Bank and would far too often hit the stand rather than the intended target, leading to my mates nicknaming Stacey when playing.
I saw someone mention ten pin bowling. If we're counting that, I'll take it. Table tennis too.
Slightly off topic but if anyone gets a chance to play pickleball that is well worth a go. Very easy to pick up and play and as long as you’ve got a little bit of mobility you’re able to participate in a respectable game.
Played Rugby for the school first XV (winger/full back), ran occassional cross country for the school, was a reasonable sprinter & long jumper, kept wicket at cricket but not a good enough bat to play for the school.
At uni I gave up rugby, as at the time in Wales it had become a glorified excuse for a 30 man brawl & took up hockey which I ended up playing to a fair standard for Chelmsford Hockey Club (mostly 2nd/3rd XI) but did get a few national league games for the Firsts, also took my coaching & umpiring badges (now lapsed) & umpired a lot of U18s & club games.
Now at 63 I don't do much other than walk a lot & cycle a bit even though in my head I am still capable of so much more, though I do run a company that delivers skateboard coaching & is expanding into other areas (cycling, tennis/padel, football, netball).