The Fittest Sportsman

[davestar_delux]

This was an interesting debate on another forum I am on. The front-runners last I read there were Muay Thai practitioners, rugby league players, cross-country skiers, tour cyclists, decathletes and F1 drivers. So who do you think is the fittest?

 

[davestar_delux]

See I'm not sure if this would count as fitness but I reckon there should be a mental element - like a sport that if you slip up in or don't maintain perfect concentration you could die or get seriously injured - which is why I put F1 so high and combat sports like boxing, muay thai, MMA... of course all of these guys have excellent physical conditioning in addition to this.

 

[davestar_delux]

I find sprinters fascinating, so much training put into an event that lasts no more than 10 seconds but it's difficult to see where they would stand and they are so rarely mentioned in something like this but I reckon they could compete with a good amount of strong-men and long-distance runners although it would just destroy their sprinting game to do that. Or do people not like that because your average Joe can't go out and work his backside off and and get into it, at that level it's about genetics and all the conditioning in the world still wont get you into it.

Also, what about sailing? Or these people trek to the North Pole? Are these endurance athletes? That British lassie had to stay awake about 4 days solid moving masts about (or whatever they do) and battling the ocean.

I might be shifting the goalposts a bit to the heights of human endeavour but I'm mainly interested in the ultimate in human conditioning so keep the ideas flowing.