Showing results for "The Race" in Sports History

In the tradition of Seabiscuit, critically acclaimed author Neal Bascomb reaches back to the golden age of sport and crafts an utterly captivating narrative of what may be the most remarkable athletic feat of all time.

The 1988 Seoul Olympics played host to what has been described by some as the dirtiest race of all time, by others as the greatest. The final of the men's 100 metres at those Olympics is certainly the most infamous in the history of athletics, and more indelibly etched into the consciousness of the sport, the Olympics, and a global audience of millions, than any other athletics event before or since.

The 1989 Ironman World Championship was the greatest race ever in endurance sports. In a spectacular duel that became known as the Iron War, the world's two strongest athletes raced side by side at world-record pace for a grueling 139 miles. Driven by one of the fiercest rivalries in triathlon, Dave Scott and Mark Allen raced shoulder to shoulder through Ironman’s 2.4-mile swim, 112-mile bike race, and 26.2-mile marathon. After 8 punishing hours, both men would demolish the previous record - and cross the finish line a mere 58 seconds apart.

Frankel was born on 11th February 2008, with four white socks and a blaze, from impressive equine lines on both his parents’ sides. Simon Cooper revisits the whole of the horse’s life, giving listeners an inside tour of the calm oasis that is life on a stud farm, where a foal will live with his mother for the first year of his life. Next, the atmosphere of heady possibility that marks the early days of training. Roadwork. Gallops. Trials. Turning raw potential into something more. Frankel begins to set himself apart.

As 1909 dawned, the greatest jewels of exploration - set at the world's frozen extremes - lay unclaimed: the North and South Poles and the so-called "Third Pole", the pole of altitude, located in unexplored heights of the Himalaya. Before the calendar turned, three expeditions had faced death, mutiny, and the harshest conditions on the planet to plant flags at the furthest edges of the Earth.

The Tour de France may provide the most obvious fame and glory, but it is cycling’s one-day tests that the professional riders really prize. Toughest, longest and dirtiest of all are the so-called ‘Monuments’, the five legendary races that are the sport’s equivalent of golf’s majors or the grand slams in tennis. Milan–Sanremo, the Tour of Flanders, Paris­–Roubaix, Liège–Bastogne–Liège and the Tour of Lombardy date back more than a century, and each of them is an anomaly in modern-day sport. Peter Cossins tells the history of these extraordinary races and the riders they have immortalised.

Every year the Grand National produces very different stories from jockeys and horses alike; uplifting scenes from a victor and heartbreak when a mere inch divides the loser from the winner at the end of nearly four-and-a-half miles and 30 challenging fences. The race has evolved over the years, but there is one constant: luck, or the lack of it. How fitting, then, that in 1839 the first winner was named Lottery.

The iconic Sydney to Hobart Race, a 723-mile deepwater challenge - often called the “Everest” of offshore ocean racing - is considered one of the toughest in the world. Unpredictable weather and seas make each race demanding, but in 1998, an unexpected “weather bomb” hit the fleet, creating 80-foot waves and 100-mile-per-hour winds. Many bigger, better-equipped boats tried to maneuver around the storm, but the crew of the AFR Midnight Rambler chose to head directly into its path.

Cristiano and Leo is the fascinating account of the lives and rivalry between two of the best footballers to ever play the game, Ronaldo and Messi. The rivalry between Ronaldo and Messi has defined football to a generation of fans - everyone has an opinion on who is the greatest. Do you prefer Ronaldo, whose work ethic and physique have been honed for one purpose - scoring goals? Or Messi, whose superhuman natural talent means he can do the seemingly impossible with a football?

The Circuit des Champs de Bataille (the Tour of the Battlefields) was held in 1919, less than six months after the end of the First World War. It covered 2,000 kilometres and was raced in appalling conditions across the battlefields of the Western Front, otherwise known as the Zone Rouge. The race was so tough that only 21 riders finished, and it was never staged again. With one of the most demanding routes ever to feature in a bicycle race, and plagued by appalling weather conditions, the Circuit des Champs de Bataille was beyond gruelling, but today its story is largely forgotten.

It started with a cash drop by an English spy in occupied Paris in 1944. Reserved for Resistance groups during the war, the money reached Émilien Amaury, an advertising executive, who was tasked to help France return to a free press once liberated. He soon launched a newspaper empire that—unbeknown to him—would own the rights to run what would become one of the greatest sporting events in history.

Even today, it’s considered one of the most thrilling races in Olympic history. The hundred-meter sprint final at the 1924 Paris Games, featuring three of the world’s fastest swimmers—American legends Duke Kahanamoku and Johnny Weissmuller, and Japanese upstart Katsuo Takaishi—had the cultural impact of other milestone moments in Olympic history: Jesse Owens’s podiums in Berlin and John Carlos’s raised, black-gloved fist in Mexico City. Never before had an Olympic swimming final prominently featured athletes of different races, and never had it been broadcast live.

More than its many adventures, the Peking-to-Paris Motor Challenge took place on the precipice of a new world. As the twentieth century dawned, imperial regimes in China and Russia were crumbling, paving the way for the rise of communist ones. The electric telegraph was rapidly transforming modern communication, and with it, the news media, commerce, and politics. Suspended between the old and the new, the Peking-to-Paris, as bestselling historian Kassia St. Clair writes, became a critical tipping point.

The inspiring true story of the first female pilots taking their rightful place in the exciting world of aviation. In 1929, 19 gutsy women blazed out of the darkness by setting out from California in propeller-driven planes, each competing to be the winner of the first female cross-country air race. The hazards were many, from disastrous weather to possible sabotage, but by facing the dangers with skill and determination, the racers thrilled the nation and pioneered a new future for female pilots and women's rights.

Albert, Colonel Weatherford's assistant, had to guard the stables and the valuable colt Le Grand Chien at the Old Bergen Country Racetrack the night before the North Jersey Stakes Race. Rumor had it that Jake Katz, a notorious bookie, had been trying to fix the race. In addition, the colonel agreed to a bet with Katz at 10-1 odds that Le Grand Chien would win. Of course, that night even with Albert on guard, Katz would make every effort to make sure the horse would lose. The race was held the next day. Would Le Grand Chien even be able to race, let alone win?