The Olympic Games
The interlocking rings on the Olympic flag are symbolic in showing that the Olympic Games are intended for all nations to be able to come and compete against one another in unity. The Olympic rings colors are not of any important significance; however, the five colors of the Olympic rings and the white background have at least one color of every nation’s flag in them. The motto of the Olympic games is Citius, Altius, Fortius, which is Latin for “Faster, Higher, Stronger”. Previously, both the winter and summer Olympic Games took place every four years in February and August of the same year. Currently, the winter and summer games alternate every two years. As of 2012, the Summer Olympics will include 26 sports with 36 disciplines and approximately 300 events, and the Winter Olympics include 7 sports with 15 disciplines and approximately 80 events. The number and kinds of events can change from one Olympiad to the next based on consideration by the IOC. The 2010 winter games took place in Vancouver, the 2012 Summer Games will take place in London, the 2014 winter games in Sochi (Russia), and the 2016 summer games in Rio de Janeiro. The location of the Games in 2018 and beyond has yet to be determined. Olympic athletes compete in regional, national, and international competitions between the Olympic Games, which ultimately result in the most successful athletes being named to each participating country’s Olympic team.
The Paralympic Games (or Paralympics) are the second largest sporting event in the world today, and are held immediately after the Winter and Summer Olympic Games. Starting with the Wheelchair Games in 1948, the first Paralympic Games were held in Rome in 1960 and involved 400 athletes from 23 countries. Since that time, the Paralympic Games have grown dramatically. The present day Paralympic Games include six major classifications of athletes from around the world who have physical challenges.
The X Games
The X Games is a fast-growing competition involving a variety of “extreme action” sporting events. It is owned by sports broadcaster ESPN. The inaugural X Games was held in the summer of 1995 in Rhode Island. The Winter X Games are held in January, and the Summer X Games are held in August, both in the United States.
Participants compete to win bronze, silver, and gold medals, and prize money. Each competition has often featured new, more challenging tricks, such as Tony Hawk’s 900 in skateboarding, Anthony Napolitan’s first double front flip on a bicycle, Travis Pastrana’s double back flip in Freestyle Motocross, and Levi Lavallee’s double back flip in Freestyle Snocross. Concurrent with the competition is the “X Fest” sports and music festival, which offers live music, athlete autograph sessions, and interactive activities. The location of the Winter X Games is in Aspen, Colorado through 2012, while the location for the Summer X Games is in Los Angeles, though other cities have expressed interest in hosting future Summer X Games. The Winter X Games events include a variety of men’s and women’s skiing and snowboarding competitions. The Summer X Games events include a variety of men’s and women’s Moto X, BMX, skateboarding, and rally car racing competitions.
The Triple Crown of Thoroughbred Racing
The Triple Crown of Thoroughbred Racing (sometimes shortened to “Triple Crown” to avoid possible confusion with other sports) consists of three races for three-year-old Thoroughbred horses. Winning all three of these Thoroughbred horse races is considered the greatest accomplishment of a Thoroughbred racehorse.
In recent years, winning a Triple Crown has become a very rare achievement with most horses specializing in a limited range of distances. No horse has won the U.S. Triple Crown since Affirmed in 1978. The three races that compose the Triple Crown are: Kentucky Derby, run over a 1-1/4 mile track at Churchill Downs in Louisville, Kentucky; Preakness Stakes, run over a 1-3/16 mile track at Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore, Maryland; and Belmont Stakes, run over 1-1/2 mile track, the longest track in thoroughbred racing, at Belmont Park in Elmont, New York. Owners of Thoroughbreds enter their horses in selected races year-round throughout the country leading up to the Triple Crown events.
FIFA World Cup
The FIFA World Cup (also called the World Cup, Football World Cup, and Soccer World Cup) is an international association football (also denoted as “futbol”) competition contested by selected players from participating countries that comprise the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA), the sport’s global governing body.
The World Cup championship started in 1930 and is held every four years. The current champions are Spain, who won the 2010 tournament, and will defend their title, subject to qualification, at the next tournament to be held in Brazil in 2014. The bidding process for 2018 and 2022 is currently underway. The current format of the tournament involves 32 teams competing for the title at venues within the host nation over a period of approximately one month – this phase is often called the World Cup Finals. A qualification phase, which currently takes place over the preceding three years, is used to determine which teams qualify for the tournament, together with the host nation whose team automatically qualifies. Since the beginning of the World Cup in 1930, Brazil has won the World Cup a record five times, and they are the only team to have played in every tournament. The World Cup is the world’s most widely viewed sporting event; an estimated 1.5 billion people watched the 2010 World Cup held in South Africa.
The FIFA Women’s World Cup is recognized as the most important International competition in women’s football (also denoted as “futbol”) and is played among women’s national football teams of the member states of FIFA, the sport’s global governing body. Contested every four years, the first Women’s World Cup tournament, then named the Women’s World Championship, was held in 1991, sixty-one years after the men’s first FIFA World Cup tournament in 1930. The current format has sixteen teams competing every four years for the winner’s trophy. The participants qualify through the regional football confederations of Oceania (OFC), Europe (UEFA), North America, Central America, and the Caribbean (CONCACAF), South America (CONMEBOL), Asia (AFC), and Africa (CAF). The 2011 Women’s World Cup will be held in cities across Germany. The competition takes place over the course of three weeks. In the group stage, 16 teams seeded into four groups (A, B, C, and D) compete against each other in a round-robin tournament. The competition will expand to 24 teams for 2015.
Le Tour de France