<p>You guys are all talking about most grueling, but if you are talking about the most skill required, I’d still say baseball.</p>
<p>^ if you’re talking about the most skill required, I’d go with gymnastics or diving</p>
<p>tennis lol. I ran a 6:40 mile with a collapsed lung, mustn’t be too hard to make your team.</p>
<p>Swimming</p>
<p>or better yet diving</p>
<p>Swimming takes endurance and discipline</p>
<p>Diving is a hard-to-develop talent and skill</p>
<p>i think golf is pretty hard. </p>
<p>You guys! Crosscountry and track are NOT hard sports. You just train, and after a few weeks running will seem like a breeze, honestly. Its not hard at all, it just takes endurance.</p>
<p>This thread only proves to me that many of you are absolutely clueless when it comes to sports.</p>
<p>Then again, I’m not really sure whether some of you are being serious.</p>
<p>Honestly, swimming is tough. You have to have your mechanics down pat which takes lessons and private coaching and then you have to go through 8 to 10 workouts a week 2/3 hours each of literally straight swimming where you are pushing yourself as hard as you can go all the way through.</p>
<p>Im suprised no one has talked much about Water Polo. </p>
<p>Water Polo is absolutely grueling. It is more than an hour of sprinting back and forth in a pool, treading water, and trying not to get drowned. It is extremely physically tolling. The on top of that you need to learn techniques of how to play the game, strategies, and get good at throwing a ball in the water. It is a lot harder than people think to throw well when you are treading water. </p>
<p>Another sport that isnt big in the US but is very very difficult is rugby. There is so much technique and strategy that needs to be mastered before you can play well. Mix that with the fact that game play is almost none stop for 2, 40 minutes halves. It is a mixture of wrestling, football, and lacrosse or hockey or soccer all mixed into one.
You gotta be physically strong, have good cardio endurance, and have the mental stamina to endure 80 minutes of being tackled and taking hard hits.</p>
<p>In terms of mental games, tennis and golf are extremely difficult to master. They are def up there as well</p>
<p>I don’t think anyone who is a normal high school student understands what grueling is if they haven’t done wrestling. In terms of being physically and mentally grueling, wrestling is hands down and far away the hardest and most ridiculous. A) you’re cutting weight and doing the practices while malnourished. B) Actual wrestling is so hard that a match is only 6 minutes long and you’re exhausted as hell at the end. Practice is just doing that most of the time.
Water polo is probably a second, although how serious the team is varies a lot between schools, so most teams don’t practice as hard as legit water polo teams do.</p>
<p>For all those that say running and XC… pshh. Your sport is wres’ warmup - AND it only requires your legs and only entails leg pain. I mean I guess it’s hard compared to like, basketball or lacrosse practice or something but overall, yeah right.</p>
<p>For high school its a tie between swimming, soccer, and wrestling.</p>
<p>Pro level, its probably Rugby, soccer, swimming, and wrestling.</p>
<p>Yeah I totally agree with you guys about cross country. I personally don’t do it, but I ran a 10:30 mile with a sprained ankle so it can’t be that hard.</p>
<p>I mean, anyone can run. It’s really not that hard. I could get into the Olympics right now, but I have better things to do.</p>
<p>Rowing, definitely. Although, I think swimming and cross country could come close.</p>
<p>
Um, that’s basically every sport? I vote distance running, it’s your whole body paying the toll, what other sport requires that?</p>
<p>Is it possible to have a poll?</p>
<p>cheerlea… oh wait, you said a sport. </p>
<p>i know some swimmers, and it’s pretty tough from the sound of it.</p>
<p>IMO… hockey.
As a former skater, I know how much skating takes out of you. Plus, you have to have extremely heavy equipment. </p>
<p>Although, I’ve never been a cross country runner or skier. Those seem pretty grueling.</p>
<p>I say sprinting & swimming would be the hardest… </p>
<p>Swimming takes a LOT out of you.
X-Country gets hard when you run faster than you really think you can. It’s the only sport where I thought I was going to throw up/ die after reaching the finish line. You just have to push your limits in that.</p>
<p>“I vote distance running, it’s your whole body paying the toll, what other sport requires that?”<br>
Swimming.</p>
<p>Hi I play _____________________ therefore it is better because ___________________</p>
<p>yay /end</p>
<p>ESPN says boxing… I think it all kind of depends on parts of sports you find difficult- the weight of each component of sport. For pure endurance, high level XC, water polo, swimming, wrestling, rowing, XC skiing are all ridiculous. Then again, contact sports- rugby, wrestling, water polo, boxing- are difficult in an entirely different way because someone is trying to hurt you. Then you have to consider the concentration factor inherent to all sports, etc. etc. etc.</p>
<p>[ESPN.com:</a> Page 2 - Sport Skills Difficulty Rankings](<a href=“http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/sportSkills]ESPN.com:”>ESPN.com: Page 2 - Sport Skills Difficulty Rankings)</p>
<p>My two cents (out of the sports I’ve played): I think rugby is difficult all-around. It’s hard to be good at it if you’re not fairly strong, fast, coordinated, and have a high level of endurance. I find it more difficult overall than soccer- which I played for a year at the college level. The degree of coordination required by soccer is higher, though. Lacrosse had comparable levels of skill, strength and speed, but didn’t require as much endurance on account of the two-minute runs, after which you’d sub out. </p>
<p>I dabbled in water polo in college, and unless you’re already a very good swimmer, it’s tough to be competitive. I was fine with the catching and throwing and the ball movement part of the game, but I was never what I considered “fit” enough to be real competitive, especially since the rest of the team was made up of people moonlighting from the school’s swim team. I was a decent high school swimmer (alternate for state my senior year, decent at districts), but I still was sucking wind after one or two trips down the pool.</p>
<p>If you go to a high enough level, every sport gets difficult. And certain sports preclude people from the get go. I’m six feet tall, so gymnastics would be tough, being a jockey would be near impossible, etc. I’m about 175, so being a real dominant weight-lifter or football player is tough as well.</p>
<p>This is a fun discussion.</p>
<p>I love how that list ranks fencing and skateboarding above swimming and distance track running.</p>