08 July 2011

List #17: Sports I Enjoy Watching

(in no particular order)

1.  NASCAR.  My mom was an auto-racing fan before I came along.  In fact, before I came along, she and her second husband used to drive from Kansas City to Indianapolis for the Indy time trials.  So I grew up watching NASCAR (and IRL, but mostly NASCAR) and rooting for Bill Elliott and Cale Yarborough.

2.  American football.  This was another sport my mom taught me to love.  She TRIED to teach me to love the Chiefs.  It didn't take.  (Go Raiders!)  She DID, however, successfully teach me to hate the Dolphins and the Cowboys.

3.  Ice hockey.  Another sport mom brainwashed me into loving.  Before I came along, she had season tickets to the Kansas City Scouts.  I would have been going as a baby, but they relocated just as came along.  When the KC Blades rolled into town, we got season tickets again.  When I moved to Philly, it became difficult to follow my team (the SJ Sharks) since everyone out here is Flyers-crazy and the Sharks aren't even in the same conference.  When I go home for the winter holidays, we try to catch a Missouri Mavericks game (the Blades left a couple of years after I left KC).

4.  Tennis. Finally - a sport Mom did not introduce me to!  When Mom was married to her second husband, this sport didn't get watched much - he didn't allow it because "it doesn't make sense."  Uh, okay then.  I started watching it because Lindsay Davenport and Monica Seles are hot.  Then I started loving it because it's a great sport.  Then in 2000, Marat Safin defeated Pete Sampras to win the US Open and take the #1 world ranking (at the age of 20), and I watched a lot of that tournament live.  I was hooked.  Marat (who is fluent in four languages, at last count), then went on to set a record for most racquets broken in pro tournaments.  If you know much about me, you know I like my athletes to be smart, fiery competitors (and cute doesn't hurt).  Marat fit the bill nicely.


5.  Olympic sports.  I like both the Summer Games and the Winter Games.  There are few of the sports that I dislike.

6.  X-Games.  My mom and I both like to watch these.  I *think* I started watching these first (one of the years Philly was hosting them), but my Mom REALLY latched on to them.  Two years ago, she yelled at me when she mentioned Shaun White and it took me a minute to place his name.  "YOU DON'T KNOW WHO SHAUN WHITE IS?  DIDN'T I RAISE YOU RIGHT?"  The guys in line around us waiting to go drifting were dying laughing.  (We are at a NASCAR race.)

I also occasionally watch golf and WWE.  Mom sometimes watches golf, but we rarely overlap on the same events.  And even Mom was shocked to find out I watch wrestling.  Shaddup and leave me alone.  We all have our vices.

2 comments:

  1. Ok kuddos to your mom for teaching you to hate the Cowboys. You can ask my friend Moe abbout the conversations he tried having with the Angie when her blanket statement was "the Cowboys stink"

    I used to watch tennis obsessively - During the McEnroe/Connors/Llendl era. Sort of drifted away since. I think it was a time factor thing.

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  2. I always thought Martina Navratilova was hot.
    For me it's NASCAR, Indy, F1, and the Red Wings, all sports Os introduced me to. I LOVED playing football (I was once asked to join the Unicorns, a semi-pro team out of Lansing, Michigan), and I love watching minor league baseball at the stadiums, but not so much watching baseball or football on tv. No feeling for basketball at all, I think I became allergic to it when I lived in Indianapolis.
    I had the chance to become a woman wrestler in Japan (but kept the teaching gig instead) all those little regrets. If I had life to do over again, I would join a roller derby team, now THAT looks like fun!

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