139 Fun Facts About Sports

What prize did champions at the ancient Olympic Games receive?

An olive wreath of wild olive leaves crowned each champion, though in later times winners could also collect generous cash rewards.

Who founded the International Olympic Committee?

Pierre de Coubertin, who founded the IOC, later won an Olympic gold medal himself, for a poem he entered in the 1912 literature contest under pen names.

Which stadium was the main venue of the first modern Olympic Games?

The Panathenaic Stadium in Athens, rebuilt in marble for 1896, still hosts the ceremony where Greece hands each Olympic flame to the next host.

Which word was added to the Olympic motto?

Together was added in July 2021; the IOC said the change recognised the unifying power of sport and the importance of solidarity.

Which town beneath Mont Blanc hosted the first Winter Olympics?

Chamonix billed its 1924 event as an International Winter Sports Week; only later did the IOC recognise it as the first Winter Olympics.

Which country hosted and won the first FIFA World Cup?

Uruguay, the reigning Olympic champion, beat Argentina 4–2 in Montevideo, but with Europe in the Depression only four European teams made the trip.

Which team is the only one to have played in every World Cup?

Brazil has played at every World Cup since 1930, yet as hosts in 2014 it lost its semi-final 7–1 to Germany.

Which trophy did FIFA award to World Cup winners from 1930 to 1970?

The Jules Rimet Trophy became Brazil's to keep after its third title in 1970, but thieves stole it from the Brazilian federation's Rio offices in 1983.

Who hosted the 2026 World Cup?

USA, Canada, Mexico staged the first 48-team World Cup, and growing from 32 teams stretched the tournament from 64 matches to 104.

Which country won the 2018 World Cup, watched by 3.57 billion people by FIFA's count?

France won the Moscow final 4–2, helped by a penalty the referee gave only after consulting VAR, which FIFA had approved for that World Cup.

The first Super Bowl matched the champions of which two rival leagues?

The AFL and the NFL met in a game officially called the AFL-NFL World Championship Game; the media ran with Lamar Hunt's joke name, and 'Super Bowl' became official from the third game.

After whom is the Super Bowl trophy named?

Vince Lombardi won the first two Super Bowls with Green Bay; the trophy, first sketched by a Tiffany designer on a cocktail napkin, took his name after he died in 1970.

As of 2026, which two teams share the record of six Super Bowl titles?

The Steelers and the Patriots have six each; New England could have gone clear with a seventh but lost Super Bowl LX 29–13 to Seattle in February 2026.

Which Super Bowl broke the Roman numeral tradition?

The fiftieth game was billed as Super Bowl 50 because designers found a lone 'L' didn't work in the logo; Super Bowl LI brought Roman numerals back.

Which team lost four consecutive Super Bowls?

The Buffalo Bills' four straight defeats began in January 1991, when Scott Norwood's late 47-yard field goal went wide right and the Giants won 20–19.

Wimbledon's club was founded for which sport?

Croquet: as tennis took over, the club dropped croquet from its name in 1882, but later restored it for sentimental reasons.

Who skipped Wimbledon for three years over its all-white rule?

Agassi stayed away from 1988 to 1990, then returned and won Wimbledon in 1992, his first major title.

Who won the longest match in Wimbledon history, 70–68 in the fifth set?

John Isner beat Nicolas Mahut over three days in 2010, and after another Isner marathon in 2018, Wimbledon brought in final-set tie-breaks at 12–12.

Which Wimbledon court got a retractable roof first?

Centre Court's roof arrived in 2009, letting play continue through rain and into the night up to an 11pm curfew; No. 1 Court got one in 2019.

Who has won the most women's singles titles at Wimbledon?

Martina Navratilova won nine, the record, after fleeing communist Czechoslovakia at 18, which stripped her of her citizenship.

Why was the Tour de France first organised?

To sell more copies of a newspaper: L'Auto launched the race to win a circulation war with rival paper Le Vélo, and after the first Tour its sales soared.

Which Paris street traditionally hosts the Tour de France finish?

Champs-Élysées: in 2024 the finale moved to Nice instead, because Paris was preparing to host the Olympic Games days later.

Which jersey design marks the leader of the Tour de France's mountains classification?

Polka dots on white: in 1975 Tour co-director Félix Lévitan chose them as a tribute to Henri Lemoine, a pre-war track rider who raced in red dots.

Which Tour de France climb's 21 hairpin bends are named after its stage winners?

Alpe d'Huez's 21 bends each carry a sign honouring stage winners; Dutch riders won so many of its early finishes that it became known as the Dutch Mountain.

What is the last-placed rider in the Tour de France called?

The lanterne rouge takes its name from the red lamp hung on the last carriage of a train; the first, in 1903, finished almost 65 hours behind the winner.

As of 2026, which city has Canada's only NBA team?

Toronto: the Raptors joined in 1995 alongside the Vancouver Grizzlies, but the Grizzlies moved to Memphis in 2001, leaving Toronto as Canada's only team.

As of 2026, which franchise has won the most NBA championships?

The Boston Celtics have 18, and Bill Russell played on 11 of those title teams, winning the last two while also coaching the side.

From which league did the NBA borrow the three-point shot?

The ABA used the three-pointer, along with a red, white and blue ball, to sell a flashier game than the NBA's, which took up the shot after the 1976 merger.

Which country hosted the first Cricket World Cup?

England hosted it, and in the opening match India's Sunil Gavaskar batted through all 60 overs for just 36 not out as India fell more than 200 runs short.

Who won the first Cricket World Cup final?

The West Indies won that final by 17 runs, retained the title in 1979, then lost the 1983 final to rank outsiders.

Which country has won the most Cricket World Cups?

Australia has six, the latest in 2023, when it beat hosts India in the Ahmedabad final after India had won all ten of its matches.

How was the 2019 Cricket World Cup final ultimately decided?

On boundary count: England hit 26 fours and sixes to New Zealand's 17 after the match and super over both tied, and within months the ICC scrapped the rule.

Who scored the first double century in a men's One Day International?

Sachin Tendulkar made 200 not out against South Africa in 2010, but Belinda Clark had already hit 229 not out in a women's ODI in 1997.

How was the 2019 Cricket World Cup's first stage played?

Single round-robin: all ten sides played each other once, and with only two places left for qualifiers, Zimbabwe missed out after losing to the UAE.

Which surface is Wimbledon played on?

Grass: until 1975 three of the four majors were played on it, and Wimbledon is the only one that has stayed.

Which debutant finished third at the first 32-team World Cup?

Croatia, at its first World Cup as an independent nation, knocked out Germany 3–0 in the quarter-finals on the way to third place.

Which quarterback guaranteed victory before Super Bowl III, then led the New York Jets to a famous upset?

Joe Namath made the guarantee three days out, and the 16–7 win over the favoured Colts showed the young Super Bowl could be a real contest.

Whose halftime show turned the Super Bowl into a stage for pop superstars?

Michael Jackson's 1993 show followed decades of marching bands and acts like Up with People, and for the first time the TV audience grew between halves.

Which two leagues merged to form the NBA?

The BAA and the NBL merged in August 1949, yet the NBA still counts the BAA's 1946 founding as its own start.

Who won the first Tour de France?

Maurice Garin won the first Tour in 1903 and was first home again in 1904, but was stripped of that second title amid widespread cheating.

Who invented basketball in 1891 by nailing a peach basket to a gym track?

James Naismith, a physical-education instructor at the YMCA training school in Springfield, Massachusetts, devised the game in December 1891 as a less rough indoor winter sport.

What is handed to the winner of the Masters golf tournament?

A green jacket, a club member's jacket awarded to champions since 1949, must go back to Augusta National after a year, though it stays the winner's property.

Michael Phelps's eight Beijing golds broke whose record of seven?

Mark Spitz won seven at Munich in 1972, and Phelps nearly fell short: his seventh Beijing gold, in the 100 m butterfly, came by a hundredth of a second.

How did Usain Bolt's final race, the relay at the 2017 World Championships, end?

Pulled up injured: Bolt hurt a hamstring in that relay final, after finishing only third in his last 100 m final.

As of 2026, which team has won ice hockey's Stanley Cup a record 24 times?

The Montreal Canadiens won the last of their 24 in 1993, and as of 2026 no Canadian-based team has won the Cup since.

Which sport became a permanent Winter Olympic medal event at Nagano 1998?

Curling was played at the first Winter Olympics in 1924, but the IOC ruled those medals official only in 2006, eight years after Nagano.

Which sport did William G. Morgan invent in 1895 under the name 'mintonette'?

Volleyball was meant for businessmen at Morgan's Holyoke YMCA who found the new game of basketball too vigorous.

Which sport is often described as Japan's national sport and is practised professionally only there?

Sumo wrestlers toss salt into the ring before a bout to purify it, because the ring is treated as a sacred place.

Which country's parliament banned golf in 1457 because it distracted men from archery practice?

Scotland renewed the ban in 1491, yet King James IV, whose parliament had issued it, took up golf himself about a decade later.

Why is the Kentucky Derby nicknamed 'The Run for the Roses'?

The winning horse is draped in them, and roses became the race's flower after socialite E. Berry Wall handed them to women at an 1883 party.

What drink does the Indianapolis 500 winner traditionally receive in victory lane?

Milk: winner Louis Meyer asked for a glass of buttermilk, and milk companies later sponsored the purse and handed winners a bottle to promote their product.

Who scored 100 points in a single NBA game in 1962?

Wilt Chamberlain, a notoriously poor free-throw shooter, sank a then-record 28 free throws that night for the Philadelphia Warriors.

Which player broke Lou Gehrig's 'unbreakable' consecutive-games streak, finishing at 2,632?

Cal Ripken Jr. passed Gehrig's 2,130 on 6 September 1995, and fans in Baltimore gave him an ovation lasting more than 22 minutes.

Which of these nicknames belonged to Babe Ruth?

The Sultan of Swat first starred as a left-handed pitcher, but he wanted to play every day, so he moved to the outfield and became a slugger.

Who ran the first sub-four-minute mile, in 3:59.4 at Iffley Road in 1954?

Roger Bannister ran it on light training while training as a doctor, and he went on to make his career as a neurologist.

In which city did Jesse Owens win four Olympic gold medals?

Berlin's 1936 Games were staged under Nazi rule, and Owens's four golds there were credited with crushing Hitler's myth of Aryan supremacy.

Who was the first gymnast awarded a perfect 10.0 at the Olympics, aged 14 in 1976?

Nadia Comăneci scored the first perfect 10 on the uneven bars in 1976, but the scoreboard could show only 1.00, and she earned six more 10s at those Games.

Emil Zátopek won which three events at Helsinki 1952?

5,000 m, 10,000 m and marathon: no one else has won all three at one Games, and the marathon was the first he had ever run.

Mike Powell's 1991 long jump broke whose record from the 1968 Olympics?

Bob Beamon's 8.90 m beat the old record by 55 cm, but when he landed he had no idea how far he had jumped.

What was Muhammad Ali's birth name?

Muhammad Ali was born Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr. in Louisville, Kentucky, in 1942, and took his Muslim name in 1964 after joining the Nation of Islam.

The 1974 'Rumble in the Jungle' between Ali and George Foreman took place in which city?

Kinshasa: Ali spent round after round leaning on the ropes, letting Foreman punch himself out, then won back the heavyweight title.

Which is the world's oldest annual marathon, first held in 1897?

The Boston Marathon began in 1897, and John McDermott won that first race over a course of only 24.5 miles.

In the 1980 'Miracle on Ice', a team of college players beat which hockey superpower?

The USSR had been Olympic champion since 1964, yet lost to the young Americans, who went on to win the gold medal.

The first Formula One World Championship race was held in 1950 at which circuit?

Silverstone sat on a deserted wartime RAF bomber airfield, and it became a circuit after drivers began racing on its empty runways.

Golf's Ryder Cup is named after what kind of person?

Samuel Ryder, an English seed merchant from St Albans who sold seeds in penny packets, donated the trophy; the first official match was played at Worcester, Massachusetts, in 1927.

Badminton was once known as 'Poona', after a garrison town in which country?

India: Poona is today's Pune, but the game took its lasting name from Badminton House, the Duke of Beaufort's estate in Gloucestershire.

'Ping-pong diplomacy' began in 1971 when which country invited the US table tennis team to visit?

China made the invitation at the world championships in Japan, and within months President Nixon announced that he too had been invited.

Which football club is nicknamed the Red Devils?

Manchester United lost much of its team in the 1958 Munich air crash, yet Matt Busby's rebuilt side won the European Cup ten years later.

Rugby union takes its name from what?

A Warwickshire town's school, Rugby School, gave the game its name, and its pupils wrote down the game's first rules in 1845.

Which word describes a score of zero in tennis?

Love means zero, probably from playing 'for love', meaning for no stakes, and the points then run 15, 30 and 40.

Which ski jumper first represented Great Britain at the Olympics in 1988, finishing last in both events?

Eddie 'the Eagle' Edwards trained with no funding and no British ski jumps, yet the Calgary crowds adored him despite his last-place finishes.

Which jersey number did the NHL retire league-wide in honour of Wayne Gretzky?

99 is retired for every NHL team, and Wayne Gretzky went into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1999, the year he retired, without the usual wait.

Between his Chicago Bulls title runs, Michael Jordan retired to play which sport professionally?

Baseball: Jordan quit the NBA in 1993 to play in the minor leagues, then returned in 1995 and won three more titles.

Rafael Nadal won a record 14 titles at which Grand Slam tournament?

Rafael Nadal won the French Open on his 2005 debut and won every match there until Robin Söderling beat him in 2009.

At which 2017 tournament did Serena Williams win her 23rd major singles title?

Serena Williams won her 23rd major at Melbourne Park in 2017, beating her sister Venus in the final while in the early stages of pregnancy.

Who became the youngest player to win a World Cup, at 17 in 1958?

Pelé arrived nursing a knee injury and missed the first two games, then scored a hat-trick in the semi-final and twice in the final.

As of 2026, Tiger Woods's 15 majors trail whose record of 18?

Nicklaus won his 18 between 1962 and 1986, while Woods won the 2008 U.S. Open on an ailing knee, then waited until the 2019 Masters for another major.

As of 2026, which player holds the record of eight Ballon d'Or awards?

Lionel Messi won the eighth in 2023, the year after he helped Argentina win the World Cup.

At which Olympics did Simone Biles withdraw from several events, citing 'the twisties'?

Tokyo: Biles lost her air awareness mid-twist and pulled out of several events, yet still took bronze on beam and won the all-around again in Paris.

Lord Stanley held which post when he donated hockey's Stanley Cup in 1892?

Governor General of Canada: Lord Stanley bought the bowl for ten guineas, but he left in 1893 and never saw a championship game or the Cup presented.

The Kentucky Derby is the first leg of which American horse-racing series?

Triple Crown: the Preakness and Belmont Stakes follow, and after Affirmed swept all three in 1978, no horse did it again until American Pharoah in 2015.

Which woman, entered under her initials, finished a 1967 marathon after an official tried to pull her off the course?

Switzer had entered as 'K.V. Switzer', so she wore an official bib, and five years later women were first admitted officially.

The Rugby World Cup trophy is named after which man, said to have first picked up the ball and run?

William Webb Ellis supposedly ran with the ball in 1823, but there is no direct evidence it happened, and some historians call the story a myth.

The British Empire Games, first held in Hamilton in 1930, are now known by what name?

The Commonwealth Games trace back to an 1891 proposal by John Astley Cooper for contests that would strengthen the unity of the British Empire.

Who won the first Olympic marathon in 1896, in 2 hours 58 minutes?

Spyridon Louis, a Greek runner from Marousi, near Athens, won on home soil and became a national hero.

The marathon's 26.2-mile distance comes from the course used at the 1908 Olympics in which city?

London: the 1908 race started at Windsor Castle and finished in front of the royal box in the stadium, and that length became the standard.

Tennis's Davis Cup began in 1900 as a challenge between which two nations?

Great Britain and the United States met after Harvard player Dwight Davis dreamed up the contest and paid for the silver punchbowl trophy himself.

Which yacht ended the New York Yacht Club's 132-year hold on the America's Cup in 1983?

Australia II's controversial winged keel helped end a run of American defences that dated back to an 1851 race around the Isle of Wight.

Snooker is said to take its name from British Army slang for what?

A new recruit: first-term Army cadets were called 'snookers', and an officer is said to have mocked a fellow officer's raw play with the word, though dictionaries call its origin uncertain.

Which astronaut hit two golf balls on the Moon, using a six-iron head fixed to a sampling tool?

Alan Shepard had to swing one-handed in his stiff Apollo 14 spacesuit, and joked that his second ball flew 'miles and miles and miles'.

Football's yellow and red cards, introduced at the 1970 World Cup, were inspired by what everyday sight?

Traffic lights gave referee Ken Aston the idea as he waited at a junction: yellow for a caution and red for a sending-off would be understood in any language.

Olympic gold medals, last made of solid gold in 1912, now consist mostly of which metal?

Silver must make up at least 92.5 percent of every Olympic gold medal, which carries only about six grams of real gold as plating.

Which of these contests was an Olympic medal event at every Summer Games from 1900 to 1920?

Tug of war let a country enter more than one club, so a single nation could win several medals. The IOC dropped it after 1920 to trim the programme.

Which Caribbean country's 1988 Winter Olympic bobsleigh debut inspired the film Cool Runnings?

Jamaica's four-man crew lost control on its third run in Calgary, crashed and did not officially finish. The film is only loosely based on the real team.

NASCAR's earliest drivers honed their skills outrunning the police while hauling which illegal cargo?

Moonshine runners of the Prohibition era used small, fast cars to evade the law, then began racing one another as a matter of pride.

Which NFL team takes its name from a poem by Edgar Allan Poe, who is buried in its home city?

Baltimore Ravens was the name picked in a fan contest that drew 33,288 voters, and the club first unveiled three costumed mascots, raven brothers named Edgar, Allan and Poe.

Which president presented the 1995 Rugby World Cup wearing the host nation's Springbok jersey?

Nelson Mandela wore a number 6 Springbok shirt and cap as he presented the cup to captain François Pienaar, a scene that became the climax of the film Invictus.

Which heavyweight was disqualified in 1997 for biting off part of Evander Holyfield's ear?

Mike Tyson lost his boxing licence over the bite, though it was later reinstated. The rematch had been billed as 'The Sound and the Fury'.

Which NFL team is a community-owned nonprofit, the only one in America's major professional leagues?

Green Bay Packers shares were set up so that no shareholder could ever profit from moving the club, which has kept it in the smallest market in North American pro sports.

Which Argentine star scored the illegal 'Hand of God' goal in a 1986 World Cup quarter-final?

Diego Maradona followed it four minutes later with a solo run past five opponents that became known as the 'Goal of the Century'.

Which tennis champion beat Bobby Riggs in the 1973 'Battle of the Sexes' at the Houston Astrodome?

Billie Jean King won in straight sets before a worldwide television audience estimated at 90 million. Riggs, then 55, had beaten Margaret Court four months earlier.

Which Brooklyn Dodger broke the Major League colour line in 1947 and had number 42 retired by every team?

Jackie Robinson was the first professional athlete in any sport to have his number retired across a whole league, and every April 15 all players wear 42.

Dick Fosbury won 1968 Olympic gold with a backwards 'Flop' that transformed which athletics event?

High jump rivals of the day used the 'straddle', crossing the bar face down. Fosbury found it too hard to coordinate, so he went over on his back instead.

Which nickname went to the 1992 American Olympic basketball squad led by Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson?

The Dream Team was the first American Olympic squad to include active NBA professionals, and it beat its opponents by an average of 44 points.

Which quarterback, chosen 199th in the 2000 NFL Draft, went on to win seven Super Bowls?

Tom Brady was the seventh quarterback taken that year, a sixth-round afterthought who earned a reputation as the biggest steal in draft history.

The Spanish football rivalry known as El Clásico sets Real Madrid against which club?

Barcelona believed it had an agreement with Alfredo Di Stéfano before he controversially joined Real Madrid instead, one of the feuds that fed the rivalry.

Which machine, first built by a California rink owner in 1949, resurfaces ice rinks?

Zamboni is a trademark that became the everyday word for any ice resurfacer. Its inventor, Frank Zamboni, had started out in the refrigeration business.

Which swimming stroke, born from a loophole in the breaststroke rules, sends both arms over the water at once?

Butterfly arms were legal because the old breaststroke rules said only that the arms must be pushed forward simultaneously; critics said it broke the spirit of the rules.

What is the name of the Māori ceremonial dance that New Zealand's All Blacks perform before rugby matches?

Haka are often described as war dances, a label Māori scholars reject: the dances serve many ceremonial purposes beyond preparing for battle.

In legend, Pheidippides ran from the battlefield of Marathon to which city with news of victory?

Athens is where he is said to have burst in, cried 'we have won!' and dropped dead. The historian Herodotus records only a far longer run to Sparta to ask for help.

Which Winter Olympic sport, born from military ski patrols, combines cross-country skiing with rifle shooting?

Biathlon punishes every missed target with a penalty loop or added time, so a fast skier can still lose the race on the shooting range.

Who passed Babe Ruth's career total of 714 home runs in 1974 after a winter of hate mail and death threats?

Hank Aaron hit number 715 off Dodgers pitcher Al Downing, who happened to wear 44, the same shirt number as Aaron himself.

Muhammad Ali's 1975 'Thrilla in Manila' was the third and final bout of his rivalry with which heavyweight?

Joe Frazier never came out for the last round: his own chief second, Eddie Futch, asked the referee to stop the fight after the 14th.

Which chestnut colt won the 1973 Belmont Stakes by 31 lengths, a run often called the greatest race ever?

Secretariat covered the mile and a half in 2:24 flat, the fastest ever run on dirt, breaking the track record by more than two seconds.

Which Los Angeles Lakers star adopted the nickname 'Black Mamba' and once scored 81 points in one game?

Kobe Bryant borrowed the name from an assassin's codename in the Kill Bill films, hoping his game could strike as fast as the snake.

Which team, the only one to race in every Formula One season since 1950, wears a prancing horse badge?

Ferrari took its prancing horse from the aeroplane of First World War flying ace Francesco Baracca, whose family let Enzo Ferrari use the design.

Which skateboarder landed the first documented '900', two and a half mid-air spins, at the 1999 X Games?

Tony Hawk repeated the trick in 2016 at the age of 48, exactly 17 years after the first one, and said it would be his last.

Which fruit, served with cream, do spectators traditionally eat at the Wimbledon tennis championships?

Strawberries and cream are said to trace back to a dessert served to Henry VIII at nearby Hampton Court, though the story is no more than a rumour.

Which stick-and-ball sport was created by Indigenous peoples of North America as early as the 12th century?

Lacrosse is the oldest organised sport in North America, and Jesuit missionaries were writing descriptions of matches by the 1630s.

Which club won the 2015–16 Premier League title after starting out as 5,000-to-1 outsiders?

Leicester City had been bottom of the table late in the previous season, surviving only through one of the league's great escapes from relegation.

Which figure skater was clubbed on the knee in 1994 in a plot tied to rival Tonya Harding?

Nancy Kerrigan recovered quickly and finished second at the Winter Olympics weeks later; the attacker had been hired by Harding's ex-husband.

Which Ethiopian runner won the marathon at the 1960 Rome Olympics while running barefoot?

Abebe Bikila won again four years later, once more in world-record time, only weeks after an operation for acute appendicitis.

In golf, which bird gives its name to a score of three under par on a single hole?

Albatross is the usual name, though Americans often call it a double eagle. A hole-in-one on a par four counts as one too.

What do ten-pin bowlers call three strikes in a row, with 'wild' and 'golden' versions for six and nine?

A turkey comes one step after a 'double', two strikes in a row, which some bowlers call a 'Barney Rubble' because it rhymes.

Which Chicago ballpark, home of the Cubs since 1916, is known for its ivy-covered outfield walls?

Wrigley Field got its ivy in 1937, when Bill Veeck, the son of a former club president, planted vines against the outfield walls.

Which Korean martial art, built mainly around kicking, has been an Olympic medal sport since 2000?

Taekwondo translates roughly as the way of striking with foot and hand, and was developed in the 1940s and 1950s by Koreans who had studied karate.

Which two universities meet each year in the Boat Race, a rowing contest on the River Thames?

Oxford and Cambridge first raced in 1829, and in all the years since they have finished level only once, in the dead heat of 1877.

Which cast-bronze prize, awarded since 1935, goes each year to the top player in college football?

Heisman Trophy sculptor Frank Eliscu modelled the figure on his old classmate Ed Smith, a New York University player who was given a trophy of his own in 1985.

Which paddle sport, invented in 1965 on Bainbridge Island, is played with a perforated plastic ball?

Pickleball was named the official state sport of Washington in 2022, having first spread across the Pacific Northwest from its island birthplace.

Which Los Angeles Lakers guard, nicknamed 'Mr. Clutch', was the model for the silhouette on the NBA logo?

Jerry West picked up the extra nickname 'the Logo'; the emblem's designer has said he based the 1969 design on a photograph of him.

Which move did American college basketball outlaw from 1967 to 1976, a ban often blamed on Lew Alcindor?

The slam dunk ban is sometimes called the 'Lew Alcindor rule', after the dominant college star now known as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

Which tennis player completed the first 'Golden Slam' in 1988, winning all four majors and Olympic gold?

Steffi Graf is also the only player to have won each of the four major singles titles at least four times.

Which sprinter, portrayed in Chariots of Fire, refused to run a 1924 Olympic heat held on a Sunday?

Eric Liddell gave up his favoured 100 metres on religious grounds, switched to the 400 metres, held on a weekday, and won it.

Which club became 'The Invincibles' by going unbeaten through all 38 Premier League games of 2003–04?

Arsenal stretched the unbeaten league run to a record 49 games. The nickname was borrowed from Preston North End, undefeated back in 1888–89.

Which NFL team went unbeaten in 1972 under coach Don Shula, winning every game including the Super Bowl?

Miami Dolphins defenders of that era were dubbed the 'No-Name Defense' for their lack of big names, yet the team led the league in both offence and defence.

Which sport divides its matches into periods called chukkas, each lasting about seven minutes?

Polo riders change mounts between or even during chukkas, and an outdoor match between two teams of four lasts up to two hours.

Which figure skating jump, named after its Norwegian inventor, is the only one with a forward take-off?

Axel jumps need an extra half turn because of that forward launch, which is why a triple Axel has been called 'more a quadruple jump than a triple'.

What nickname is given each year to the very last player chosen in the NFL Draft?

Mr. Irrelevant and his family are invited to a week of mock honours in Newport Beach, California, including a roast and a trip to Disneyland.

Which golf trophy replaced the belt that Young Tom Morris kept after three straight Open Championship wins?

Claret Jug is only the popular name: the inscription reads 'The Golf Champion Trophy', and Morris's name was the first to be engraved on it.