Best Endurance Sports

The Top Ten
1 Marathon

How is this not number 1? I mean, people actually DIE doing marathons because they don't have enough endurance and get dehydrated... It's mind boggling to me on how a race, that's dependable on endurance only, is not number 1.

Hands down, this should be number one. I have completed a 5K race and I was in the 5th spot. You cannot imagine how much effort and endurance it takes to achieve a position in the top 5 spots in a marathon.

Marathon should be the sport with the most endurance.
Soccer (football) players stop for about 10 secs for a 'break' every time they sprint...

2 Triathlon

I would say Ironman triathlon is definitely the most endurance sport and probably the reason just 0.001% of the population has completed it. It is continuous strength from beginning to end and can take 17 hours to complete. What other sport are you continuously doing for 17 hours straight with no breaks.

People say swimming takes a lot of training but try adding running and cycling training to that. If you want to compete at a high level you have to be 100% dedicated as many of the top athletes could do well in any of the three disciplines in the olympics!

3 Soccer Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a sport played between two teams of eleven players each. It is played with a spherical ball. The objective is to score the ball in the other teams goal.

As for team sports go Football/soccer requiring the most endurance. 90 minutes of nonstop running and with only a 15 minute break. Basketball has significantly smaller courts and 48 minutes long in total. Football/Handegg is only 60 minutes in total but if you tally up the time when the ball is actually in play, the action amounts to a mere 11 minutes. Baseball although still requires skill (like all the sports mentioned before) but is vastly less physically demanding then the rest. A lot of standing waiting for the ball to be hit and running a short distance for bases. This was my breakdown of why Football/Soccer is more demanding the the most popular sports played in the States.

4 Boxing Boxing is a martial art and combat sport in which two people wearing protective gloves throw punches at each other for a predetermined set of time in a boxing ring..

As a boxer myself it should be number one. It's a mental and physical sport. People who say it's not an endurance sport has never been in the ring or seen a match. Three minutes per round can feel like hours. It should be number one

Boxing has to be one of the hardest sports out there. Not only mentally but physically, You're playing chess and you are the piece. Dancing, punching, pushing, and even worse, you can't kick.

This is not an endurance sport! I don't know why it's top 3. I know it's hard, but it should be on the top of top 10 muscular strength sports... Not endurance! It's only 3 minutes... Not 3 hours!

5 Track&Field
6 Cross Country Skiing

Arguably the most hardcore sport one can subject themselves to... 15th is a large understatement... almost as large as THESE GUNS yeet skiing is the epitome of endurance, feel free to fight me on it because I'll probably win

Cross country skiing has been proven a number of times to be the most cardio demanding sport their is.. Absolutely no unfit athletes, rock hard abs and training every day of the week not to mention racing at -20, sometimes for as long as 50km and the best in the world can do this in 1hr:30 and yes, that's 50km!

7 Swimming Swimming is an individual or team sport and activity. Competitive swimming is one of the most popular Olympic sports, with events in freestyle, backstroke, breaststroke, and butterfly.

Most people are afraid of eating too much, we swimmers are afraid of not eating enough. I burn 2 days of the food I ate in only a sixth of my practice. We burn the most calories of all sports. We are glad that the pools we swim in are cold because after a while, your entire body is pretty much giving off steam. The young kids who decide to quit because swim is too hard, they still have no idea. They swam 25's. We swim 500's and more at a time. When people think of swimming, they think of diving to the bottom and coming back up. NO. It is nothing like that. Try to imagine this: You are running an 800. You are holding you breath and can only breath once every 100. You are kicking a 3 pound weight ball as you run. That is equal to a 200 freestyle.

8 Water Polo

On top of the fact that swimming is hard enough from lap to lap, you have to continue pass and shot on the move. Water Polo is one of the most enduring sports in which you are constantly on the move. While eggbeating you are swimming lap to lap and passing without any breaks! Can you imagine doing all of that with no stop? To make matters worse water polo is a very rough sport and involves a lot of contact including punching, kicking, and drowning.

Believe it or not,studies have proved that SYMCHRONISED swimming is just as hard as water polo, but requires your strength in different ways. A water polo player needs violence (sort of) but a synchronised swimmer needs to use all their strength and look like it's easy and graceful meanwhile.

9 Wrestling Wrestling is a combat sport involving grappling type techniques such as clinch fighting, throws and takedowns, joint locks, pins and other grappling holds.

I run cross country, I've played football, I've tried soccer, but nothing compares to the difficulty of wrestling. Wrestling doesn't receive a lot of credit, but it sure requires more than every other sport I've tried. Imagine working full force in practice, then going home to constantly monitor your eating habits just to make weight. I've never seen that out of any other sport in high school

Go and ask one of your buddies to wrestle for two minutes. Then see how winded you are afterward. Then, imagine doing that against someone who's better than you and won't quit til the whistle blows. Toughest sport I've ever done.

10 Tennis Tennis is a racket sport that can be played individually against a single opponent or between two teams of two players each.

The longest Tennis match lasted 11 hours in 2010 at Wimbledon. With little break, tennis is an extreme feat of endurance.

You can be on that court for 2-3 hours, with barely any break. That pretty tough.

The Contenders
11 Football American football is a sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end.

They always are standing around for 90% of the game.

12 Mixed Martial Arts Mixed martial arts is a full-contact combat sport that allows the use of both striking and grappling techniques, both standing and on the ground, from a variety of other combat sports and martial arts.
13 Cycling

Dood there is no competition for cycling.
And really? Soccer?
You can stand in soccer the best thing you can do in cycling is stop pedaling.
For hours at a time you are either sitting on your gouch or out of the sattle pulling many watts.
If you are a competitive cyclist you could be riding up to 24 hrs a week or 772 km (480) a week and if your not riding then you ate recovering eating and stretching.
I'd like to see a soccer player ride 100 km (60m) averaging at least 30 km per hr (18 mph).
And I would love to take up a challengers kick a ball and run around a field.

14 Rowing

Nope... Have any of you ever felt like throwing up and kept pushing yourself until you did... Never stopping... And continuing on afterward... Rowing is pure hell of a sport but its addicting so there's no quitting. 5Ks are the worst... In the blistering heat... Your whole body aches... You feel like quitting but you have to much pride to let the rest of your boat down and your team... So you continue on and push yourself harder

I personally have rowed until my hands bled from blisters, thrown up while on a rowing machine (erg), but although it sounds all bad... I wouldn't trade it for the world... Because rowers have the BEST teammates!

15 Basketball Basketball is a sport played by two teams of five players on a rectangular court. The objective is to shoot a ball through a hoop 18 inches in diameter and 10 feet high mounted to a backboard at each end.

I did it, and I did football and others too, basketball and swimming is rly hard!

16 Motocross

Only moto riders would rate this at number 1. You are going 100% nonstop for 30 mins. People might say that all you are doing is holding on to a bike with a motor, and that's wrong. I've been dirtbiking for 6 years now and now I can jump 10 feet, and even with all that hard training for 6 years, I can't even ride 100% for 15 mins. Also every time I have a friend ride my little 110 kawi pitbike, they get tired after 5 mins of slow riding. Motocross should be at #1 and every single moto riders out there would agree with me. Also I do track and field, best in my 6th grade, and Motocross is 10 times harder that track and field, even when every body calls me a try hard because I try so hard, but Motocross is still 10 times harder and you need so much endurance for it's so I think this should be at the #1 spot.

17 Hockey

Field hockey is the most revolutionary sport in terms of speed and intensity. Rules are changed frequently just to speed the game up! Professional teams require around 22 on a yoyo test. Much higher than most other sports.

18 Horseback Riding Horseback riding (or Equestrian) is one of the most intense sports known to man. Not only because it's physically challenging, but it takes more than athleticism. Horseback riding takes commitment, time, patience, and most importantly building a bond with your horse. If you don't have a good relationship... read more

To ride, you must NEVER lose control of your mount. This includes using leg muscles for whatever time you are on. If you let go, the horse doesn't know what to do, and, if you are riding a green (inexperienced) horse, they could throw you off. You must keep directing this horse with your leg muscles the whole time you are on. You cannot stop.

Horse back riding gets breaks but you don't dismount when your on a break. And when your on break your actually just waiting for other people. You always have to be in alert. I know someone at my barn who was just waiting normally and her horse spooked and she broke her arm. You always have to know you are on a living breathing soul.

19 Lacrosse Lacrosse is a contact team sport played between two teams using a small rubber ball and a long-handled stick called a crosse or lacrosse stick.

In you run so much more than most sports mainly in midfield and they also have to check shoot and hit people at the same time. My coach told me that if he ever sees any of us walking on midfield we'll be taken out and won't want to play us again so it's like we have to run or we don't play.

You run up to 5 miles as a midfielder, and yes there are breaks but you are always running as a middie on the field.

20 Cross Country Running

You think it's easy, til you try it. I went in already fit from years of soccer, swim, volleyball, and other sports, but none had prepared me for this. Training starts in May and continues thought the entire summer, even though the season officially begins in September. Practice is everyday for at least 2 hours, and regardless of hot/cold/rainy/ or muddy it is, meets and practices are never canceled. Truly one of the most physically and mentally demanding sports.

Case A: our sport is your sports punishment
Case B: it's all about endurance
Case C: run 70+ miles per week without an off season and come back and complain about your sport is harder. These are quality miles, not just a 15 minute jogging pace. I think that marathoners do deserve number 1, but this should be second. We do all the ab and arm conditioning as other sports, in addition to one or two running workouts a week.

21 Rugby

Rugby 7s requires you to run non-stop for 7 minutes, water break and then another 7 minutes. Within this period you often need to tackle other players going their fastest (takes a lot out of you) or you need to be sprinting, and throwing the ball. This sport works everything! definitely should be #1

Rugby is #22?! I'd like to think it's one of the manliest, grittiest sports out there.

22 Badminton Badminton is a racquet sport played using racquets to hit a shuttlecock across a net. Although it may be played with larger teams, the most common forms of the game are "singles" and "doubles".
23 Volleyball Volleyball is a team sport in which two teams of six players are separated by a net. Each team tries to score points by grounding a ball on the other team's court under organized rules.
24 Baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of nine players each who take turns batting and fielding.

Oh poor you all you do is stand around the field most of the time... I've never seen a fit baseball player!

Really? 13? Horrible playing 4-5 games in a week? 162 games!

25 AFL

AFL is a clear #2 behind Marathon, perhaps because people don't know about the sport...

An average AFL player runs ~15km (9.5 miles) per 2 and a half hour game, along with incororating the physical hardness of tackling, bumping and well...fighting, AFL is EASILY the #2, if not #1...

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