Most of us start out playing a sport as a means of fun and recreation.

But somewhere along the way, in

the midst of all the fun, we realize that sports can often be a metaphor for achieving success in life,
because of the lessons it teaches us about life.

It teaches us about being a part of a team, the importance of working together to accomplish a common
goal. We learn to shoulder personal responsibility, and how to cope with defeat and failure. It teaches
how to remain focused on a task for the period of time required to achieve it. We learn about
consistency and concentration, how to overcome weaknesses, and go beyond our limits.

Today, the sports industry is worth multi million dollars. Sports men and women have to perform under
tremendous pressure, sacrifice the other important areas of their lives, and even play with injuries. In
such circumstances, it can be very comforting to read the sports motivational quotes from some of the
greatest sportspeople, who have experienced it all – the sweat, the toil, the despair, the triumph, the
joy!

So, here are some of the best sports motivational quotes for you to read and take inspiration from, not
only in sports but also in life itself:

"Just go out there and do what you've got to do." - Martina Navratilova

"The pain of discipline is far less than the pain of regret" - Sarah Bombell

"In order to excel, you must be completely dedicated to your chosen sport. You must also be prepared
to work hard and be willing to accept constructive criticism. Without a total 100 percent dedication, you
won't be able to do this." - Willie Mays

"The real glory is being knocked to your knees and then coming back. That's real glory." - Vince Lombardi

"Luck? Sure. But only after long practice and only with the ability to think under pressure." - Babe
Didrikson Zaharias

"The most important key to achieving great success is to decide upon your goal and launch, get started,
take action, move." - John Wooden

"Don't give up at half-time. Concentrate on winning the second half." - Paul Bryant

"The Truth is that Running Hurts. No one gets faster without meeting their personal pain barrier straight
on. No amount of junk miles, fun runs or affirmations are going to get you over the hill at the five mile
mark in a 10k. However, what will pull you through is solid prep with hard hill runs and interval work." -
Manciata

"Some people say I have attitude - maybe I do...but I think you have to. You have to believe in yourself
when no one else does - that makes you a winner right there." - Venus Williams

"Don't let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do." - John Wooden

"My mother taught me very early to believe I could achieve any accomplishment I wanted to. The first
was to walk without braces." - Wilma Rudolph

"The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a man's determination." - Tommy
Lasorda

"If you believe in yourself, have dedication and pride and never quit, you'll be a winner. The price of
victory is high, but so are the rewards." - Paul Bryant

"The ideal attitude is to be physically loose and mentally tight." - Arthur Ashe

"You can't get much done in life if you only work on the days when you feel good." - Jerry West

"The answer to three questions will determine your success or failure.

1 - Can people trust me to do my best?
2 - Am I committed to the task in hand?
3 - Do I care about other people and show it?
If the answers to all three questions are yes, there is no way you can fail." - Lou Holtz

"Never let your head hang down. Never give up and sit down and grieve. Find another way. And don't
pray when it rains if you don't pray when the sun shines." - Leroy Paige

"Being a winner is more than getting a first place trophy, it is acting like the effort was an honour and
the trophy is just a decoration." - Bryan Moseley

"I learned that the only way you are going to get anywhere in life is to work hard at it. Whether you're a
musician, a writer, an athlete or a businessman, there is no getting around it. If you do, you'll win--if you
don't, you won't." - Bruce Jenner, Olympic Gold Medalist, Decathlon

"You find that you have peace of mind and can enjoy yourself, get more sleep, rest when you know that
it was a one hundred percent effort that you gave - win or lose." - Gordie Howe

"I learned that if you want to make it bad enough, no matter how bad it is, you can make it." - Gale
Sawers

"The difference between a successful person and others is not a lack of strength, not a lack of
knowledge, but rather in a lack of will." - Vincent T. Lombardi

"Do you know what my favorite part of the game is? The opportunity to play." - Mike Singletary

"It's great to win, but it's also great fun just to be in the thick of any truly well and hard fought contest
against opponents you respect, whatever the outcome." - Jack Nicklaus

"The spirit, the will to win, and the will to excel are the things that endure. These qualities are so much
more important than the events that occur." - Vince Lombardi

"It's not whether you get knocked down; it's whether you get back up." - Vince Lombardi

"Never let the fear of striking out get in your way." - George Herman "Babe" Ruth
"The principle is competing against yourself. It's about self improvement, about being better than you
were the day before." - Steve Young

"If you don't invest very much, then defeat doesn't hurt very much and winning is not very exciting." -
Dick Vermeil

"The man who has no imagination has no wings." - Muhammad Ali

"I've never known a man worth his salt who in the long run, deep down in his heart, didn't appreciate
the grind, the discipline... I firmly believe that any man's finest hour - this greatest fulfillment to all he
holds dear is that moment when he has worked his heart out in a good cause and lies exhausted on the
field of battle, victorious." - Vince Lombardi

"When I go our on the ice, I just think about my skating. I forget it is a competition." - Katarina Witt

"Positive thinking is the key to success in business, education, pro football, anything that you can
mention. I go out there thinking that I'm going to complete every pass." - Ron Jaworski

"Just do what you do best." - Red Auerbach

"I didn't just jump back on the bike and win. There were a lot of ups and downs, good results and bad
results, but this time I didn't let the lows get to me." - Lance Armstrong

"Golf is a game whose aim is to hit a very small ball into an even smaller hole, with weapons singularly
ill-designed for the purpose." - Winston Churchill

"Experience tells you what to do; confidence allows you to do it." - Stan Smith

"The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a man's determination." - Tommy
Lasorda 

The Importance of Sports in the Life of a Student

Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point Wrestling Coach
Assistant Wrestling Coach West Carteret High School

The importance of sports in the life of a young student is invaluable and goes much further than
the basic answer that "it keeps kids off the streets." It does in fact keep kids off the streets, but it
also instills lessons that are essential in the life of a student athlete. Sports play a pivotal role in
the makeup of a young athlete, especially in the middle school to high school years where
student athletes are much more mature and mentally developed. Where else can a young,
impressionable youth learn values like discipline, responsibility, self confidence, sacrifice, and
accountability? Television, which may be the most influential tool in the lives of young adults,
does not show enough of these qualities, nor is it on the Internet, or radio. Rather it is up to the
parents, teachers, sports teams, clubs, and after school programs to help mold, develop, and
instill these qualities into the lives of student athletes. I believe in order for this to happen, school
sports programs must have a few components in place. The first thing they need is a good core of
coaches that understand the great responsibility that is placed upon their shoulders to help shape
and prepare these student athletes not only in sports, but in their everyday lives. Yes, I did say
coaches, because it is a responsibility that lies on the shoulders of more than one person and it is
going to take more than one person to help lead these student athletes to success.

The second component also involves the coaches: It is the ability to capture the admiration and
the trust of the athletes. This is crucial because if you can capture a person's admiration and trust
you can motivate them to perform at a higher level not only in sports, but also in their own lives.
If you can get the athletes to believe in you and your philosophies you can begin to see
significant changes in grades and behavior. It all starts with coaches that have a plan and
methodology behind the principles they are teaching. As I said earlier, there is a great
responsibility on the coaches to help young student athletes make a smooth transition into
society.

The third and I believe the most crucial of all is the support that comes from the community, and
administration. This is very important because student athletes need to know they are appreciated
and there is no greater way than for the community, booster club, and commissioners/treasurers
to show that appreciation than to get involved in youth athletics. In order to accomplish this it's
going to take investment and the most valuable investments are money and time. The more
invested, the better the results. I can attest that there is no greater investment than the future of
our young student athletes. When these things are in place, I believe student athletes will benefit
and the results will be evident not only on the field, but long after they step off of it.

SPORTS AND ITS IMPORTANCE

Sports can be a positive experience for your

child's body and mind. Outdoors Unstructure
Activities and games are essential for every child.
Let a child explore, go trekking with his friends,
encourage him to play, run around, jump, etc.
These activities are an essential way of venting
out physical energy.

Physical activities can be divided into two :

a.  Outdoor unstructured activities
b.  Structured physical activities
Structured physical activities instil disipline, camaraderie's values like sporting
spirit and trust. It also helps a child to take his own decision and sharpens his
thinking process. Structured activities are games like cricket, football, swimming,
cycling, etc. Encourage your child to play games and help him specialise in any type
of sport if he excels or has a liking interest in it.

The advantages of sports :

a. Tones up muscles and strengthen bones : Physical fitness. Keeps our body
in excellent shape. It makes the body supple.

b. Generates sprit of camaraderie : It teaches a child about teamwork and

unselfish play. Playing for team and not for personal accomplishment.

c. Teaches to accept defeat gracefully : It assists a child in developing the

skill for handling disappointments.

d. Generates healthy spirit of competition : Positive competition is a healthy

competition.

e. Channelize energies constructively : Sports channelizes the mental and

physical energy in a more positive manner thus preventing your child from
going into wrong company, etc. It inspires and energizes youngsters.

f. Builds self esteem and confidence : Sports improves body postures and
lends a grace to the body, thus enhancing self esteem. It boosts a child's
morale when he excels on a specific skills he has e.g. If he is very good in
fielding and bowling in the sport of cricket. He can work more towards that
skill it makes him feel more confident.

g. Builds good immune system : It improves body immune system thus

promoting good health. It builds good appetite.

h. Make a child more disciplined.

Importance of Sports and Games

'All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy'. Rightly said so, that education without activities is always
incomplete. A child may mug up the history textbook, but for how long? May be till the last bell of
exams but if it gets a bit of interactive touch, then the same student may have such a memorization and
understanding that he will not only just forget it ever in his life but also implement it in his life with an
equal degree of effectiveness.

The clear cut inference is this that if the education is the car then sports and activities are the keys to
drive on towards the success! Yesterday I read a newspaper report which showed the tendency oildren
to remain away from all sorts of physical activities. I felt really sorry to hear this. Friends if you think that
if Newton had just studied days and nights to bring to the world his greatest achievement, 'The
Principia', then you should also know where from he had got the idea, he got it from the falling
applewhen he was observing nature's beauty and strategies!
So friends, reserve your playing time atleast for an hour a day, out of the tens of them which you devote
in studying!!Look the world with different angles and you will realize that still there are infinetly many
corners unexplored. See beyond your farthest point of visuality and know how beautiful the nature is!
Enter the world of sports and games, a world beyond the pages of your books...!

The excellence is achieved only by allround development. Einstein, the greatest genious, was a studious
guy but he was also a thinker, a violinist and much more. So don't ever think to become an Einstein or a
Newton, just going through bundles of paper is sufficient..you need to live in the world for that and
without sports, games, activities, entertainment that will ever remain incomplete!!

Quotations on Importance of Sports…

Kahlil Gibran
March on. Do not tarry. To go forward is to move toward perfection. March on, and fear not the
thorns, or the sharp stones on life's path.

Walter Dill Scott

Mental attitude is more important than mental capacity.

Gabriel Heatter
Mere longevity is a good thing for those who watch Life from the side lines. For those who play
the game, an hour may be a year; a single day's work an achievement for eternity.

Donald Trump
Money was never a big motivation for me, except as a way to keep score. The real excitement is
playing the game.

Casey Stengel
Most games are lost, not won.

Brian Tracy
Most people achieved their greatest success one step beyond what looked like their greatest
failure.

Milton Garland
My advice is to go into something and stay with it until you like it. You can't like it until you
obtain expertise in that work. And once you are an expert, it's a pleasure.

Abraham Lincoln
My great concern is not whether you have failed, but whether you are content with your failure.
Wilma Rudolph
My mother taught me very early to believe I could achieve any accomplishment I wanted to. The
first was to walk without braces.

Hank Aaron
My motto was always to keep swinging. Whether I was in a slump or feeling badly or having
trouble off the field, the only thing to do was keep swinging.