Sports Facts for Kids
Fun facts from the world of sports
Ski jumpers can soar over 100 metres (328 feet) through the air after launching from a ramp. They lean forward as far as possible to make their body act like a wing, and their skis are held in a wide V-shape to generate extra lift.
Surfing made its Olympic debut at the Tokyo 2020 Games, where waves at Tsurigasaki Beach in Japan were judged. Athletes score points based on the difficulty and style of manoeuvres they perform on each wave. The sport has been practised in Polynesia for over a thousand years.
Darts began as a military training exercise in the Middle Ages, when soldiers would throw short arrows at the bottom of a wine barrel. The round dartboard with numbered sections was introduced in the early 1900s. A standard dartboard has 62 sections.
Brazilian football legend Pelé scored more than 1,000 career goals, a feat no other footballer has officially matched. He scored his 1,000th goal in 1969 from a penalty and dedicated it to the poor children of Brazil.
The first Olympic Village was built for the 1924 Paris Games to give athletes from all countries a place to eat, sleep, and socialise together. It had wooden huts and no heating! Today's Olympic Villages are like small cities, housing over 10,000 athletes.
Running backwards, also called retro running, is a real competitive sport with its own world records and championships. Researchers have found that running backwards uses different muscles and can be better for your knees than running forwards.
A rugby union scrum involves eight forwards from each team binding together and pushing against the opposing pack with all their strength. The combined force generated in a professional scrum can be over 1.5 tonnes — roughly the weight of a small car!
A badminton shuttlecock can travel at over 400 km/h (250 mph) when smashed by a top player, making it the fastest-moving object in racket sports. Despite this incredible speed, the shuttlecock slows down rapidly because of its unique feathered shape.
Basketball legend Michael Jordan was cut from his high school varsity team as a 15-year-old because his coach thought he wasn't tall enough. He went on to win six NBA Championships and is widely considered the greatest basketball player of all time.
In 2008 and 2009, almost every swimming world record was broken because of full-body polyurethane 'supersuits' that made swimmers more buoyant and streamlined. FINA banned these suits in 2010 because they gave too much artificial advantage, and many of those records took years to beat in normal suits.