Coaches, commentators, sportswriters and athletes themselves are always ones for a good quip so we’ve collated some of the best sport-related quotes for all moments in life.
From the late great to Muhammad Ali to UFC’s Ronda Rousey – you heard right, the Ultra Fighting Championship’s athlete – some of these quotes will resonate with you more than others.
Our favourite is the one from Cool Runnings – uhuh, the Jamaican bobsleigh film – who needs Shakespeare when you’re reading through Sports Liberated’s posts!
We’re going with the quotes as they were said – as far as we know – so let’s just go with using ‘man’ in the generic sense it was intended, shall we?
So get stuck in and let us know your favourites on our Facebook page or let us know any new ones – we’re suckers for this inspiring quotes malarkey.
Best quotes
Photo: Pixabay
“Sports do not build character… they reveal it.”
John Wooden, American basketball player
“Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on earth.”
Muhammad Ali, American boxer
“Your opponent, in the end, is never really the player on the other side of the net, or the swimmer in the next lane, or the team on the other side of the field, or even the bar you must high-jump. Your opponent is yourself, your negative internal voices, your level of determination.”
Grace Lichtenstein, journalist
“The man who views the world at 50 the same as he did at 20 has wasted 30 years of his life.”
Muhammad Ali, American boxer
“It had long since come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them. They went out and happened to things.”
Elinor Smith, pioneering aviator
“Load up your mind with pictures capturing your preferred tomorrow. Put the remembrances of the past in a place where they won’t block your view.”
Gary Carter, American baseball player
“The men who try to do something and fail are infinitely better than those who try to do nothing and succeed.”
Lloyd Jones, New Zealand author
“Keep trying. Stay humble, Trust your instincts. Most importantly, act. When you come to a fork in the road, take it.”
Yogi Berra, baseball player
More sport-related quotes
“If you’re unwilling to leave someplace you’ve outgrown, you will never reach your full potential. To be the best, you have to constantly be challenging yourself, raising the bar, pushing the limits of what you can do. Don’t stand still, leap forward.”
Ronda Rousey, American professional wrestler
“I always turn to the sports page first. The sports page records people’s accomplishments; the front page nothing but man’s failures.”
American Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren
“Every shot not taken is a goal not scored.”
Wayne Gretzky, Canadian ice hockey player
Photo: SplitShire via Pexels
“I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life and that is why I succeed.”
Michael Jordan, American basketball player
“Worry more about your character than your reputation. Character is what you are, reputation merely what others think you are.”
John Wooden, American basketball player and coach
“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, American tennis player
“Sports do not build character…they reveal it.”
John Wooden, American basketball player and coach
“Excellence is not a singular act but a habit. You are what you do repeatedly.”
Shaquille O’Neal, basketball player
“Do not let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do.”
John Wooden, American basketball player and coach
Photo: Torsten Dettlaff
“Success is never final, failure is never fatal. It’s courage that counts.”
John Wooden, American basketball player and coach
“Winners build on mistakes. Losers dwell on them.”
Arnold Mori
“A gold medal is a wonderful thing but if you’re not enough without it, you’ll never be enough with it.”
Cool Runnings
“I never ran 1,000 miles. I could never have done that. I ran one mile 1,000 times.”
Stu Mittleman, American ultra-distance runner
“You’re never as good as everyone tells you when you win, and you’re never as bad as they say when you lose.”
Lou Holtz, American football player
Push, push, push
“The secret of winning football games is working more as a team, less as individuals. I play not my 11 best, but my best 11.”
Knute Rockne, American football coach
“I am just like the millions, not one in the million. I am no different from others. Any girl can do what I did; all they need is doggedness, determination, the will to push hard and push through boundaries, and never-ending commitment to achieve their goal.”
Sakshi Malik, Indian Wrestler
“If you don’t really have a dream, you can’t really push yourself; you don’t really know what the target is.”
MS Dohni, Indian cricketer
Photo Abhiram Prakash
“Good work habits help develop an internal toughness and a self-confident attitude that will sustain you through every adversity and temporary discouragement.”
Paul J Flever
“Mental toughness is not being affected by anything but what’s going on in the game or competition no matter what coaches, other players, or refs are doing. It’s being able to block out what’s not important.”
Jenny Brenden, basketball player
“Make sure your worst enemy doesn’t live between your own two ears.”
Laird Hamilton, American surfer
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