Control-line: a Hobby or a Sport?

[Matt Colan]

These things tend to come to me.  How do you view CL stunt?  I personally view it as a sport because it takes a special set of skills to fly, and I compete like I also do in basketball, and baseball.  For you guys that don't fly in competition wil probably view this as a hobby.

Let's hear the opinion's, you've heard mine already

Edit for typo

[minnesotamodeler]

that's more or less my view...building is a hobby (you do it indoors at home); flying is a sport (you do it outside, in the field).  So it's both.  Very non-controversible, huh!

[Richard Grogan]

Both. The building and collecting of models is the hobby part, the sport part is me standing in the circle trying not to fall down!I don't compete much anymore due to a physical handicap.If anyone laughs at me when/if I fall down,I'M being a SPORT for not kicking their little A**(es)!  Butt,its all good.  

[Joey Mathison 9806]

watch this video and you tell me        http://community.webshots.com/user/mathison205

[Bruce Hautamaki]

What video? Good pics but no video???

[Steve Helmick]

Bruce...try  http://good-times.webshots.com/video/3024363970080327009CjGWIX

It's a hobby... Steve

[Bruce Hautamaki]

Ahhh jet speed! Always good!

[Mike Keville]

It's a hobby.

Granted, some consider it a sport.  If that was the case, it would be featured on the Sports pages of your local newspaper.

It isn't.

The average citizen couldn't care less.  ("Oh, the kind you twirl around on a string?")

We know better.

They don't.

It's a HOBBY.

[Joe Just]

It is neither a sport or a hobby.  IT IS A DISEASE!  I caught it in 1948 and have never recovered. Nor do I ever want to!

Joe Just

[Matt Colan]

Yet, the sports part of cable news has a sport called, hot dog stuffing and puking contest. Why?  Maybe we should combine  the two, eat, twenty dogs, then go fly some really fast planes and puke in the circle. Then we could make the sports news big time. Might even attract some wild wimmin. 

ESPN does air the hot dog eating contests, and I don't watch them because I find it disgusting.  Grandpa and I have talked from time to time about golf and stunt, what would people much rather watch, hitting a ball into a hole, or PRECISION AEROBATICS.  We say precision aerobatics, but some people do have other interests. can't ignore that.

Phil Granderson had a column in Model Aviation one time (can't remember month or year) where he talks about this very thing, which gave me the idea to post this.

[Steve Helmick]

What baffles me is the current rage for showing Poker tournaments on the "Sports" channels. I guess there is some sweating involved, but c'mon, it's sitting on your butt! While ESPN is showing poker tournaments, they shuffle the NASCAR off onto ABC. As soon as the race is over, they're gone, no interviews or winner's circle celebrations. This tells me they don't care about the SPORT of auto racing. Gotta get the "Punky Brewster" reruns started on time, ya know...    Steve

[Dave Rolley]

ESPN does air the hot dog eating contests, and I don't watch them because I find it disgusting.  Grandpa and I have talked from time to time about golf and stunt, what would people much rather watch, hitting a ball into a hole, or PRECISION AEROBATICS.  We say precision aerobatics, but some people do have other interests. can't ignore that.

Phil Granderson had a column in Model Aviation one time (can't remember month or year) where he talks about this very thing, which gave me the idea to post this.

I don't want to watch, I want to be doing it.  One of the hardest things I've done was WATCH the F2C (FAI Team Racing) racing at last year's World Championship.  It was hard because we didn't make the team and weren't competing.  Come on Coach, put me in!  I want to play!

Interestingly, the French F2C pilots have to pass an annual physical to be eligible to participate in international competition because F2C is considered a sport in France (I don't know about the other events).

Dave

[Geoff Goodworth]

I think building is a hobby but competing is a sport.

As for the comment about CLPA not making the sports pages, Synchronised drowning while smiling is an Olympic sport as is curling. 

I have to question the interest in televised billiards and snooker as much as televised golf.

Cheers, Geoff

[Serge_Krauss]

Not all that long ago, there was a large disagreement over just this thing and how to promote the CL hobby/sport or whatever. There should not have been. Althought most professional athletes probably no longer view their sports as hobbies, any sport is still someone's hobby, regardless of whether s/he participates or just watches. If anyone enjoys it, but it is not a necessity, then for him/her, it's (by definition) a hobby. Many hobbies are sports. Flying in competition is a sport and, for most, also a hobby - something they like to do in their spare time. There aren't many pros out there! Building is most often a hobby, but not for everyone. Sports and hobbies are neither mutually exclusive nor identical categories; they overlap, and CL is both sport and hobby. 'sorry to be so clinical about this, but sometimes dictionaries are where the answers lie. Of course, some of us harbor larger views, ...thought Krauss as he rolled his Spitfire into a screaming dive after the feared BF-109 of Adolf Galland...

SK

[Rudy Taube]

By most common definitions, if you fly our planes in competition by a set of rules then it is a sport. LINK:

             http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sport

As others have said, the building/finishing part is definitely a "hobby", not a sport.

[Serge_Krauss]

By most common definitions, if you fly our planes in competition by a set of rules then it is a sport. LINK:

             http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sport

As others have said, the building/finishing part is definitely a "hobby", not a sport.

Of course we are agreed on the sport aspect of competition flying (as I wrote above), but it is also a hobby - that too by dictionary definition. That's the point: an activity is not just exclusively a sport OR a hobby. Most sports ARE hobbies. To anyone who hates building, but must do it to compete at the Nationals, it's not much of a hobby. However, even the building can be a sport; "Junkyard Wars" at Brodak's pretty much qualifies as sport under the definitions in Websters as well as Wikipedia. So even there you have both.

SK

SK

[PerttiMe]

It is neither, or it is both. I am not too worried about it.

A while ago, there was a similar thread at a mountain biking forum. Some found it denigrating to call riding a bike on trails a "hobby", others found it strange that people would take it seriously enough to call it a sport.

(Is your 'plane a toy, or not, by the way...    )

[Rudy Taube]

Of course we are agreed on the sport aspect of competition flying (as I wrote above), but it is also a hobby - that too by dictionary definition. That's the point: an activity is not just exclusively a sport OR a hobby. Most sports ARE hobbies. To anyone who hates building, but must do it to compete at the Nationals, it's not much of a hobby. However, even the building can be a sport; "Junkyard Wars" at Brodak's pretty much qualifies as sport under the definitions in Websters as well as Wikipedia. So even there you have both.

SK

SK

Well said Serge.  :-)

[Clint Ormosen]

I don't loose weight and I don't make money doing model airplanes. Hobby!

[PaulGibeault]

It's a hobby up until you take it to the F.A.I. level... .
It becomes a sport when you represent your country at it, after a very rigorous qualifying at a national team trials. (often "a trial by fire" when your model is not working properly). It may be a sport when you're required to wear a uniform while doing it...
At the FAI level, you can compete with (& get soundly beat by) professional sportsmen whose job & or livelyhood DEPENDS on how well their equipment performs. In certain other countries, FAI national team members have been paid full time to build & fly models if they were good enough (i.e on the podium at a world championship). The biggest & nastiest political fallouts have often stemmed from who made or did not make the world championship team. Legal staff have been hired in a few disputed cases...
- IMHO from my perspective anyways....

[Perry Rose]

I agree with Ty, especially the last two posts.

[John Stiles]

These things tend to come to me.  How do you view CL stunt?  I personally view it as a sport because it takes a special set of skills to fly, and I compete like I also do in basketball, and baseball.  For you guys that don't fly in competition wil probably view this as a hobby.

Let's hear the opinion's, you've heard mine already

Edit for typo

I tend to view it as recreation

[Shultzie]

 
Seems like after viewing these photos....the answer is blowin in the wind?

[Jim Thomerson]

In terms of presenting our activities to the public, we need to talk sport, whatever it actually is that we do.  i like the idea that building is a hobby and flying is a sport. 

[John E Rakes]

Thats a good question, but one may have to look at it this way. I have never been to a sporting goods store and bought motors, fuel, kits, arfs, or to think of it, anything related to airplane modeling. I know I live in a small city, but never been to a hobby store and bought football helmets or baseball bats. I know opinions vary and everyones got one, but it sounds like a hobby to me. 

[John Miller]

Sporting goods stores rarely carry all the supplies needed for every sport. I've yet to see fencing supplies at Big 5.

A hobby is done for your own amusment, or recreation. Building, and casual or sport flying is a hobby.

It's when the element of competition enters that we are in the realm of a sport. When there's a winner and losers, it's a sport.

Pool playing is a hobby,  until the money comes out. The winner is the guy who has the most afterthe shooting is finished.

Like Larry Cuningham says, "he's only in this for the wimmin, and the money". That's the mark of a true sportsman...

[Les McDonald]

Click on this link, it's a pretty good read from the September 1964 issue of Sports Illustrated.
Bob Gialdini brought a new mentality into stunt back in the sixties and everything he says in this article still holds true.
There are two pages so don't miss the second!
                                                                                                          Les McDonald
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1076404/1/index.htm

[Mike Ferguson]

It's like golf - depends on who you are.

It's a hobby, or a sport, or an obsession.  Sometimes all three at once.

Beautiful thing is that there isn't a wrong answer.

[Jim Thomerson]

Back in the 40's and early 50's, I loved to go to Bateman's Sporting Goods in San Angelo, TX, which incuded a very well stocked airplane hobby shop. 

[Gene O'Keefe]

For me, it's the most relaxing "HOBBY" I've ever enjoyed.

    Geno

[W.D. Roland]

For fun = hobby.

For competition = sport = work.

David

[Dennis Moritz]

Building and flying is the hobby. The name calling, strictly for sport.

[Jim Kraft]

Any one who watches me fly would say it was a hobby. I ride motorcycles also, but not in competition. I tell my wife it is great sport.

[Russ Danneman]

it's whatever you make it.