Sport or not?

[IKE]

Wikipedia:
"Sport is an activity that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often engaged in competitively. Sports commonly refer to activities where the physical capabilities of the competitor are the sole or primary determiner of the outcome (winning or losing), but the term is also used to include activities such as mind sports (a common name for some card games and board games with little to no element of chance) and motor sports where mental acuity or equipment quality are major factors."

I have always considered FIRST Competitions a subset of Motorsports. I have always defined Motorsports as a competition where machines are doing most of the "work", but are not able to perform well without human interaction.
These would include, any motor vehicle racing (from faster lap to endurance like solarcar), motor driven freestyle competition (Drifting to Monstertruck Freestyle). All of these are competitions with powered machinery. It also fits into this model as most teams are highly involved in the preparation for an event, but the driver does most of the actual competing.


I have played many sports in High School, and have participated in many motorsports. Many motorsports can be as physically demanding as almost any traditional sport, but usually they are not. That being said I have seen some really out of shape people play many sports (even at the professional level).

So to conclude, if you put Motorsports as a subset of Sports, then yes the FIRST Competitions are Sports. If you give Motorsports it own category on the same level as "Sports" then no it is not a sport.

I make sure to site the words "FIRST Competitions" to both include FRC, FTC, and FLL as well as seperate it from the rest of FIRST (learning, GP, and all the awards for things you have done).

On a side note: Please be careful devaluing "Sports" as having no positive impact. If more people participated in more physical activity, there would be a huge benefit to national Health. While the sport is merely there for "Entertainment" these entertainers are indirectly responsible for many jobs including engineers and construction crews building stadiums, and broadcasters presenting this entertainment. All of these things have significant value to the global economy and the quality of life. This entertainment has also given many students that are economically challenged a way to get a college education.