Certainly not I.
Posted on 07/15/2011 10:50:36 PM PDT by Route797
LOUDON, N.H. — Jimmie Johnson has two titles he is especially proud to have linked to his name. Five-time NASCAR champion. AP Male Athlete of the Year.
Johnson was swept into a brief Twitter feud this week because of his inclusion as a nominee for male athlete of the year at the ESPY Awards.
Seahawks receiver Golden Tate posted on his account, @ShowtimeTate, "Jimmy johnson up for best athlete???? Um nooo .. Driving a car does not show athleticism."
Tate, 22, angered NASCAR fans and posted, "12th man get these rednecks off me."
More Tate tweets:
• "I've driven a car on unknown roads at night at 90mph no big deal. No sign of athletism."
• "Guarantee he couldn't in million year play any SPORT."
• "give me 6 months of training and I bet I could compete."
NASCAR defenders got Tate's attention.
"Apologies for my offensive comment to NASCAR fans. I actually read up on it and NO I couldn't race a car 150 mph," he wrote.
(Excerpt) Read more at seattletimes.nwsource.com ...
90? ...lol.
Race car driving requires great hand-eye coordination and stamina.
Sounds like his agent screamed at him to apologize and shut up.
Unlikely.
Golden Tate would be dead.
Look, I'm not defending NASCAR here, Mister Tate, but why don't you shut up? You play for the SEAHAWKS.
You only look particularly spectacular because the Seahawks are so spectacularly lousy.
Keep idiots away from Twitter. One reason I don’t tweet.
At Daytona and Talledega, 150 is what they slow down to in the turns.
My advice to Golden Tate, should he ever be foolhardy enough to actually try to race in NASCAR:
Drink a gallon of Colyte prep and take a Fleet enema the night before the race. It’ll make your driving suit a lot more comfortable.
Football only requires 1 ball....NASCAR requires 2...nuff said. And yes I root for Seahawks being the local team here.
How many minutes out of 60 is Tate actually doing something? A 500-mile race will take three hours or more to complete with the driver never leaving the car which can be 130 deg. inside, making split-second decisions constantly.
Nobody seems to have an problem calling golfers athletes.
It’s really funny when ‘athletes’ bag on racers as not being “athletes.” I’m not a big NASCAR guy but to be amped on adrenaline almost non stop for 500 miles at 200 mph... Most people are exhausted after a 2 hour trip in the passenger seat.
I challenge anyone thinking that racing requires no athletic ability to strap in to the passenger seat of a SCORE off-road Trophy Truck and do 1000 miles in Baja.
750 Horsepower 30 inches of wheel travel and no Air conditioning or onboard entertainment systems. Takes about 20 hours or so.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXWHE7toicA
Nope, just a Sunday afternoon drive ;)
I would think that Golden Tate would be right if the NASCARs had air conditioning. But doing that for several hours wearing all that gear has got to be taxing. I’ll bet racing cars is more athletic than golf.
Rednecks? Why not Crackers?
Certainly not I.
I’ll bet racing a car requires more physical and mental stamina, and heat-tolerance, than being a baseball player. Baseball requires quick bursts of strength and speed, but there’s a lot of rest time in between. In baseball, you’re spending 95% of your time standing around (and you’re guaranteed half the game, minus at-bat and on-base, sitting in a shaded dugout with iced gatorade at the ready). I don’t see any big controversy over whether baseball players are athletes or not.
Hawks’ fan here as well. You’d think would weed out the idiots with the Pete carroll era.
He’s not fit to scrape mud off a redneck’s farm boots.
Every racer I ever saw getting out of a car (or truck) was soaked in swear and clearly ‘exerted’ if not outright tired. Even the local limited lap events are pretty demanding. It gets pretty hot in there with no insulation on the floor/firewall.
Years ago one of the off-road magazines ran a series on one of the sport’s biggest name stars of the day, Ivan “Ironman” Stewart and his physical training routine. Most race fans have probably heard the name somewhere along the lines - Toyota truck commercials, video games etc. It was pretty much Olympic caliber training stuff. Stewart got the name from racing, and repeatedly winning, the Baja 1000 solo.
He was far away from ‘not an athelete.”
OK, ‘fess up. When did you take my picture?
Actually Nascar drivers are in very good physical shape. They need to be for the stamina it takes. I don't know of a fat Nascar driver. But I see plenty of morbidly obese football players. 400 lb. linemen? That ain't muscle weight.
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