Who says football is easy

Triathlon Forum
1

I’m sure the SBR ad is a marketing gimmick trying to get attention, so no harm no foul…

…but the SBR ad is a little insulting to former football players (like me) – either American or “soccer” - claiming that if triathlon was easy it would be called football.

Did the writer of that ad ever go through a mid summer triple session practice where you spent 6+ hours practicing, running, tackling, hitting, jumping, in 90+ heat with a coach screaming at you, 280lbs+ guys running full speed at you, all with few if any water breaks (I played in the 80’s and we usually went 2+ hours without any breaks)?

Try to take a 300+ pound man (or blocking sled) and drive it ten yards with equal force being pushed against you and repeat that, say 50 times. How easy is that?

Run 50 x 20 yard full out sprints, then jump immediately into tackliing drills (wher you get the snot kicked out of you), followed by 1 hour of pass coverage drills running 30 - 40 yard per play at full throttle, then into a full contact, full speed scrimmage. How easy is that.

Play a full 60 minute game both ways and on special teams. How easy is that?

Football is one of the great sports of our time that requires significant speed, quickness, strength, endurance and the insticts to know what to do and where to go along with the ability to play in absolute unison with 10 other players…that is not easy…

And don’t ge’t me started about how easy soccer is either - those are some of the best athletes I know…

Sorry for the rant, but we just finsihed with the biggest day of the year for most football fans…

2

There are tons of those types of things. I taught some Sychro swimmers that had T-shirts that said “If sychro were easy they’d call it hockey”. I don’t think any of the hockey players were actually offended

3

Try to take a 300+ pound man (or blocking sled) and drive it ten yards with equal force being pushed against you and repeat that, say 50 times. How easy is that?

I’m going to ignore the whiny “I played football and it’s hard” aspect of your post and just highlight the statement above. If you pushed against an object and were met with equal force, regardless of how heavy the object might be you aren’t going to drive it backwards. So no, that would not be easy at all - in fact it would be impossible. :smiley:

4

Khai, not if my said guy blocking is say 310 pounds…

I’m not saying I played football and its tougher…I’m just saying to imply football is easy in comparison to triathlon is ludicrous. Both sports are very tough to do, even tougher to do well.

5

Khai, not if my said guy blocking is say 310 pounds…

I’m not saying I played football and its tougher…I’m just saying to imply football is easy in comparison to triathlon is ludicrous. Both sports are very tough to do, even tougher to do well.
Then you are making it an unequal force.

If two equal forces push opposite directions against something in the middle, the middle thing ain’t moving. If if moves, the forces are unequal in one direction or another.

:D~

John

6

Then you are making it an unequal force.

If two equal forces push opposite directions against something in the middle, the middle thing ain’t moving. If if moves, the forces are unequal in one direction or another.

C’mon, now. You can’t expect an ex-football player to understand physics!!!

Just kidding, lacverde. :slight_smile:

7

Lacverde as a football player was just trying to make the concept simpler for all by ignoring the changes of instantaneous force vector through time. It started out equal, but then lacverde with superior conditioning could maintain his force longer as the other player was vanquished to a lower instantaneous force vector and the sled moved. Only a lineman could understand all that … no one else could comprehend … the result of having a larger head and brain :wink:
Dave

8

Sorry but I have to say that 10-15 seconds of hard exertion with a 30-45 second rest is not hard! Swimmers go harder than that in practice with less rest. By comparison, Triathlon is harder, anyone can go out and play football, and most have, but how many have picked up the Triathlon gauntlet? And yes I played football and soccer and the training I do for triathlons is harder and I’m in better shape. And if you want to know I was 225 and I’m now 202, so I’m not some small guy who didn’t play in the trenches.

9

Apples to Oranges as they say. I would say that to participate at the most basic level, triathlon is harder. Otherwise, they both take dedication training, mental toughness, etc…

It’s like the zipp vs. hed argument, there is no clear answer. Now if you wanted to clarify that with comparing specific events, then maybe we could have some fun with it…

10

Credited. Crapping on other sports is never appropriate.

11

They’re an interesting article on espn.com that I couldn’t find again, however it ranked the “toughest” sports based on a variety of skills such as endurance, power, speed etc…football beat out triathlon by a lot.

http://ihatekaty.com/...6dzz5z54fsdq7ez78z8d

12

They’re an interesting article on espn.com that I couldn’t find again, however it ranked the “toughest” sports based on a variety of skills such as endurance, power, speed etc…football beat out triathlon by a lot.

http://ihatekaty.com/...6dzz5z54fsdq7ez78z8d
wtf is up with your link?

13

Not me. I say football is stupid and pointless, NOT easy.

14

They’re an interesting article on espn.com that I couldn’t find again, however it ranked the “toughest” sports based on a variety of skills such as endurance, power, speed etc…football beat out triathlon by a lot.

http://ihatekaty.com/...6dzz5z54fsdq7ez78z8d
wtf is up with your link?
Quasi porn thing.

John

15

I’m not sure, it doesn’t show up until after I make a post…

16

" Play a full 60 minute game "

When I was a high school teacher I coached the cross country team. We used to bust on the football players all the time about the actual number of seconds they played during a football game. Add it all up…an offense runs…what…50 plays? Each play lasts about 7 seconds? whats that total…350 seconds? Thats less then 6 minutes per game that they are actually “playing”. : ) This was all for fun…so don’t get all bent : ) They spent the rest of the time just standing around !!!

Now we have pro players playing a game that they actually are playing that totals about 6 minutes per week…AND they get paid millions of dollars for those 6 minutes each week!!

Remember - this was all in fun!!

17

Khai, not if my said guy blocking is say 310 pounds…

I’m not saying I played football and its tougher…I’m just saying to imply football is easy in comparison to triathlon is ludicrous. Both sports are very tough to do, even tougher to do well.
Then you are making it an unequal force.

If two equal forces push opposite directions against something in the middle, the middle thing ain’t moving. If if moves, the forces are unequal in one direction or another.

:D~

John
What if you put a 300lb force against a sled on a treadmill running in the opposite direction going at an equal 300lbs. Would the sled lift off or not?

18

At high levels, there are not really any “easy” sports. For instance, I can pretty much guarantee that none of the tough football players, or tough Ironmen, or tough hockey players, etc could have accomplished a tenth of a standard gymnastics practice. On the other hand, the normal gymnast would get crushed at a hockey practice.

19

apples to oranges here…endurance sport vs a power and agility based sport, hard in different ways.

http://ihatekaty.com/...6dzz5z54fsdq7ez78z8d

20

There is this amazing new concept, it’s called . . . I think I have this right . . . A JOKE!