School and college sports

[Ticklishchap]

It's a windy and rainy afternoon here and I associate these conditions with school sports as throughout my teenaged years I had to turn out onto the Rugby field come rain or shine - and I even did it when it was no longer compulsory. However we didn't call it Rugby but 'Rugger' at my school. I can't say I enjoyed it all that much back then but have happy memories of it looking back and think it did me a lot of good in terms of discipline, team work, etc. What are your memories of school and college sport, compulsory or otherwise? Did you find it a waste of time or a necessary part of 'character building'?

 

[Stearmen]

I ended up taking Fencing of all things! Our University did not offer much in the way of activities for your Physical Education credits. I had the choices of fencing, weight training, swimming, golf or bowling. The latter three were off campus, so no time to fit those in, and lifting weights, I was not in prison, so fencing it was. It was actually fun, kind of regret giving it up.

 

[Ticklishchap]

Could you take it up again?

 

[Edward]

I fenced very briefly at university. I'd been at it about three weeks when I was rushed into surgery to remove an appendix that came extremely close to bursting, and ordered to give it up for the rest of the year. Tried again a year later, but it clashed with a drama group I was in, and fun as playing swords (which was all it ever was to me) was, the stage was much more fun.

School sport... eh.... I was in the badminton club, which I liked, and a swimmer; seven years of eight am swims every Friday morning. I used to love that. I did wim for the school on occasion but was never really successful, as I don't have much competitive spirit and so lacked the drive to be a winner. In terms of obligatory games lessons, I hated, loathed and despised them as an utter, utter waste of time. I am, in retrospect, quite aghast that the school wasted my time in that way for years (even beyond the legal requirement of 'up to sixteen'). It's ludicrous that evne in my a-level year they wasted an hour of my time every week on a games "lesson". What my teachers could have done with those lost hours... I'm a bit bitter about that in retrospect, though mostly at myself for not having the nous to simply opt out. A couple of friends just stopped turning up for those "lessons" in my final years (at an age when it was no longer legally compulsory), and they weren't chased. I do remember using any excuse I could to get out of those classes, though on the last one some of us simply just decided to stay in the study and get on with something productive (I think I did some homework)instead. Nobody seemed to notice. To be entirely fair I did at least learn that one thing: some things are a waste of time, and if there are no consequences of not bothering with them, then why do them. I know if I had been the type to have kids, I'd have written whatever notes they wanted to get out of wasting their time in the same way.

I do distinctly remember a shift from fearing games teachers to pitying them when I realised that the vast majority of those I encountered felt threatened intellectually by some of us, and had never really grown up themselves. I'm sure some of them out there aren't like that, but the ones I had certainly were. At least two of them were just sad bullies who clearly felt better about themselves by pushing kids around.

 

[Ticklishchap]

To be entirely fair I did at least learn that one thing: some things are a waste of time, and if there are no consequences of not bothering with them, then why do them.

I like that comment! At my boarding school from 13-18 years old I only had to do 'games lessons' (PE) in the first two years. The master who taught us was actually quite good - although games lessons and games in general had been pathetic and a complete waste of time at my junior (preparatory) school so I know exactly where you're coming from.

We had to do quite a lot of team sports right through to the sixth form and I am afraid I was a glutton for punishment in that I went on playing Rugger when it was no longer compulsory. In fact I was either playing or practicing four days a week at one stage with Corps on the other day. I think I believed it was good for me or that I 'ought' to do it although by instinct I would have preferred to be sitting around being lazy - or reading and studying. I can remember doing a lot of reading when I was off games for a few weeks because of a minor injury. Looking back I feel ambivalent about it: I can't say it was great fun but it probably did do me some lasting good.

 

[Harp]

Fenced briefly, more into off campus martial arts. Regret leaving the sport so soon.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Hated gym class with a flaming passion. Hated volleyball, flag football, floor hockey, running, rope-climbing, box-vaulting (which nearly gave me a concussion when I hit the wooden edge of the box instead of the pad), sit-ups, push-ups, and pull-ups. The only thing I didn't hate was fleece ball, which was indoor baseball played with a ball of fleece sewn into a softball skin, and that business we used to do with a surplus parachute -- stand around the edges of it, wave it in the air, and then everybody takes turns running to the opposite side. An absolutely pointless exercise, but it showed ingenuity in making do with a zero budget.

Our gym suits were rough, awful faded cotton with seams that ground you in places where you'd rather not be ground. Our gym teacher could have played the lead role in one of those women-in-prison exploitation films from the sixties. And probably did. Gym was compulsory thru the tenth grade, and I dropped it from then on.

By the time I was in high school my vision was so bad that any attempt to play softball -- the only sport I would have cared about -- would have been lethal.

 

[sheeplady]

I swam in middle school, which we called modified level. I made varsity before my freshman year, but I did not like the coach. He wanted us girls to do "extra practice" by joining the ymca swim team in a city an hour away.... and made it clear if you didn't, you would never get the best races. Which while not illegal in the technical way, polling your students who swam on their legal "day off" from practice and meets and then punishing those who didn't, as least violated the spirit.

Growing up on a farm where I had 2 to 3 hours of work upon arriving home, a long bus commute home (nearly an hour), and homework from a full load of courses, I couldn't have physically managed practicing more than the 2.5 hours of daily practice we already had during the week, as days that we had meets we could lose 4 to 5 hours at the meet with travel time. So I quit.

I also didn't like how "touchy feely" the coach was with the girls, but honestly, I was lazy and didn't need more work. To his credit, that coach trained a number of top swimmers in my state and quite a few swimmers had full sports scholarships for college.

My senior year in high school I ran into my middle school gym teacher, who said something like, "I heard you quit swimming. We would have loved to have you on the field hockey team, you had such a natural talent for it." Well, a little too late for that one.

 

[Stearmen]

I loved rope climbing in Junior High! Two reasons, one, I was really good at it, and the gym teacher always singled out the boys that were bad at it, so I had no problems! Two, and most important, the gym was divided by a curtain, boys on one side, girls on the other. The top was, however a see through mesh, so at the top of the rope you could look over at the girls! Oh, Gabriela, I can still see you in your yellow leotards!

 

[Ticklishchap]

The last post is entirely outside my experience as fortunately (IMHO) I never went to a co-ed school!

 

[LizzieMaine]

We had that same curtain, and breaching it brought immediate condemnation. The crowning achievement of my phys-ed career came in a 9th grade fleece-ball game, when I hit a home run over that curtain. I never admitted to anyone that it was purely a lucky hit, and that I couldn't actually see the ball at all.

 

[Ticklishchap]

This whole idea of co-ed games lessons sounds bizarre and I'm glad I didn't experience that in any form. But this could be a cultural difference.

 

[Stearmen]

This whole idea of co-ed games lessons sounds bizarre and I'm glad I didn't experience that in any form. But this could be a cultural difference.

Don't know, since I never was involved in co-ed sports. In my day, we only had cheerleaders. Although, now that you mention it, I would have thoroughly enjoyed Touch Football back in middle and high school!

 

[Ticklishchap]

Don't know, since I never was involved in co-ed sports. In my day, we only had cheerleaders. Although, now that you mention it, I would have thoroughly enjoyed Touch Football back in middle and high school!

That's interesting because I interpreted your description of gym classes as coed, even though there was a 'curtain'! But that's because I went to a single-sex school, which I know is less frequent in the US. It's interesting that there are so many differences as well as similarities between our two countries.

 

[HudsonHawk]

...and that business we used to do with a surplus parachute -- stand around the edges of it, wave it in the air, and then everybody takes turns running to the opposite side. An absolutely pointless exercise, but it showed ingenuity in making do with a zero budget.

We had those too. To this day I have no idea why old parachutes were so popular in gym classes of the 1970s, but there you go.

As for formal organized sports, I played the "big three", football, basketball and baseball as a kid, but baseball was by far my best and favorite, so that's all I played after about the 9th grade. Played all the way to college, and still play today. Today it's more about going out for a slice of pie after the game with the fellas than it is about actually playing, though every once in a while our competitive side rears its ugly head, such as the other day when the umpire doesn't know the difference between a force out and an appeal out. I mean, we're paying the guy $65, the least he can do is know the rules...

 

[Fading Fast]

To the thread's early question, I found sports in school, at their best - with a good, engaged gym teacher or coach - could help one learn some lessons about life - competition, sportsmanship, teamwork, strategy, etc. - but those experiences were the exception and, in general, it was drudgery with a good mix of stupid activities with some average to petty coaches and gym teachers that I was glad I could opt out of when I was a senior in high school.

One of the worst experiences I had as a kid was watching a mean-spirited gym teacher embarrass the heck out of kid in grammar school who couldn't skip. I have no idea why skipping was something we had to do in gym class, but we lined up and everyone had to skip the width of the basketball court and this one kid - who was a bit awkward in general - couldn't do it and the gym teacher kept forcing him to "try again" and taunting him as he failed. I'd like to say I stood up for him, but I didn't, but even as a kid, my heart was breaking. Some - not too many - kids were laughing, most were like me silent and probably horrified. I told my mom that night and she told me to tell the head gym teacher (my parents almost never got directly involved in anything to do with my schooling), but that went nowhere. I still get a sick feeling in my stomach (as I have right now), just thinking about that forty plus years later.

 

[LizzieMaine]

We had those too. To this day I have no idea why old parachutes were so popular in gym classes of the 1970s, but there you go.

We also had a surplus weather balloon that we'd bounce back and forth across the gym. It was like being in an episode of "The Prisoner."

 

[Smithy]

Played rugby at school (wing) for a time as well as tennis (until it got in the way of cricket) and swimming. Cricket was what I was best at and played briefly for school but was invited to play for my local club and played 9 years club cricket - fast bowler and 3rd or 4th drop batsman until I completely buggered my rotator cuff (being a fast bowler that put paid to that). I was devastated at the time as I was nearly at the point for provincial selection. C'est la vie!

 

[Stearmen]

While it is true, there is no I in TEAM, there is ME! Probably why, once I discoverer motorcycle racing, I never looked back at team sports.

 

[Stearmen]

Looking back, our style of gym class was geared towards the military draft! We lined up every day, arms length, divided into squads, squad leaders, team activities, through a hand-grenade, I mean softball, even had to pass the Marine Corp physical fitness test, adjusted for age of course!