• Sports Miracle on Ice A roster of college kids with a combined average age of 21 faced the most dominant hockey dynasty on Earth, and… 3 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Rumble in the Jungle A 32-year-old ex-champion given a 4-1 chance against an unbeaten puncher who had never lost a round he wasn't winning… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Marathon The world's most famous race is 42.195 km long because of a British royal family's driveway — and named for a… 3 min read · 10 facts
• Sports FIFA World Cup It started with 13 teams and a long boat ride to Uruguay. Today, five billion people follow it, making a single month… 3 min read · 8 facts
• Sports Olympic Games A footrace held for a Greek sanctuary grew into the planet's biggest gathering, surviving wars, boycotts, and a… 3 min read · 8 facts
• Sports Basketball It was invented by a gym teacher to survive a rainy winter, the first game ended 1-0, and someone had to climb up and… 3 min read · 8 facts
• Sports Tour de France It was invented to sell newspapers during a circulation war, its famous yellow jersey is yellow because of cheap… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Formula One The cars generate so much downforce they could in principle drive upside down — and for twenty years after one… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Sumo A bout usually lasts a few seconds. Reaching the top rank means you can never be demoted — and the diet that gets you… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Curling It is called the roaring game because of the sound a granite stone makes crossing bumpy ice — and the ice is bumpy on… 3 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Association Football 250 million players in over 200 countries, and the rules have barely changed since 1863. The final of one club… 3 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Cricket A single match can last five days and still end in a draw. The rules are kept by one private club in London, and the… 3 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Chess It began in 7th-century India, took its modern shape in 15th-century Europe, and in 1997 a machine beat the world… 3 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Esports South Korea licensed professional players in 2000. By 2020 the audience was heading for 454 million — and the Olympics… 3 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Boxing The oldest evidence may date to the 6th millennium BC. It entered the Olympics in 688 BC — and its modern rulebook was… 3 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Volleyball It was invented in 1895 as an easier alternative to basketball, and its inventor called it something else entirely… 3 min read · 9 facts
• Sports The Ancient Olympic Games: Naked Sprints and a Sacred Truce For the first thirteen games there was only one event — a single sprint. Athletes competed nude, an emperor 'won' a… 3 min read · 8 facts
• Sports Fosbury flop Every elite high jumper on Earth now goes over the bar backwards. That only became physically survivable once someone… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Tennis A French king who built the first indoor courts became the first tennis player in history known by name, largely… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Golf A Scottish king banned golf in 1457 because it was distracting his subjects from archery practice. The ban lasted… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Swimming You float because your body is very slightly less dense than water. Men find it harder than women, and that is anatomy… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Usain Bolt In the 2008 Olympic final he slowed down to celebrate before the line, with a shoelace untied, and still set a world… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Michael Jordan As a high school sophomore, Michael Jordan was judged too short for his school's top team. He went on to win six NBA… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Pelé Pelé learned to play with a sock stuffed with newspaper because his family could not afford a ball. At 17 he became… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Table tennis It began as an after dinner game for Victorian households, played over a row of books with a golf ball. The name… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Surfing People were riding waves in Peru, Polynesia and West Africa long before anyone wrote the word surfing. Standing up on… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Paralympic Games They started in 1948 as a wheelchair sports competition for spinal injury patients at a British hospital, held on the… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Baseball It is the one major sport that refuses to end on schedule, because it has no clock at all. A tied game simply keeps… 3 min read · 8 facts
• Sports Cristiano Ronaldo His father named him after an American president. The boy from a small Atlantic island went on to score more official… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Muhammad Ali A stolen bicycle sent a 12-year-old into a boxing gym. He grew up to shock the world, lose his title for refusing to… 3 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Wimbledon Championships The oldest tennis tournament in the world still plays on grass, still makes everyone wear white, and still serves… 3 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Rugby union One of the world's big team sports began with rules written by schoolboys. Then an argument over paying players split… 5 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Ice hockey On 3 March 1875, Montreal hosted the first indoor game of a sport that now draws crowds of more than 100,000. Here is… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Tug of war The simple rope game from school sports day was once an Olympic event. It stayed in the Games from 1900 to 1920. 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Skateboarding Skateboarding began because California surfers got bored when the waves went flat. Here is how that idea rolled all… 5 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Parkour The name only exists because someone thought a k looked stronger than a c. The sport itself began with a boy training… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Parachuting The first famous jump came from a balloon over Paris in 1797, and today people leap from the edge of space at over… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Rock climbing Some of the hardest climbs on Earth are just 4 metres tall, yet climbers spend years on them. Inside the sport that… 5 min read · 10 facts
• Sports 2026 Asian Games Four thousand athletes are sleeping on a cruise ship, the budget quadrupled, and a typhoon-season downpour flooded the… 3 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Snowboarding Snowboarding began as a dad's homemade toy for his daughters, and early riders had to pass a test just to ride the… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Fencing Before electric scoring, fencers coated their sword tips in dye, soot or chalk so the referee could see where each hit… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Bobsleigh Bobsleigh began when bored rich tourists at a Swiss resort raced homemade sleds through the streets and kept crashing… 5 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Badminton A badminton smash has been clocked at 426 km/h, far beyond the fastest tennis serve, yet the feathered shuttle slows… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Archery In 18th-century Britain, archery contests were grand shows, with flags, music and even 21-gun salutes. 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Rowing (sport) Rowers race facing backwards, and a coxswain who is too light may have to carry sandbags in the boat. 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Speed skating Over a thousand years ago, people in northern Europe raced across frozen rivers with bones attached to their shoes… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Water polo Water polo players often wear several swimsuits at once, because grabbing an opponent's suit is that common. And they… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Squash (sport) The Titanic had its own squash court. The game itself was born when English schoolboys found that a punctured ball… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Handball In handball, players can leap into a zone they are banned from touching, catch the ball mid-air and score before their… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Triathlon The first modern triathlon finished in the dark, lit by car headlights, with a 13-year-old on a surfboard as the only… 4 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Gymnastics Gymnastics once crowned Olympic champions in club swinging, and since 2006 the famous perfect 10 is no longer the top… 5 min read · 10 facts
• Sports Polo Polo is played on the biggest field in modern sport, and its so-called ponies are really full-sized horses that can… 4 min read · 10 facts