Culture of Hungary - Sport

Sport

See also: Golden Team and Rugby union in Hungary

Only seven countries (USA, USSR, UK, France, Italy, China, and Germany) have won more Summer Olympic gold medals than Hungary. Hungary has the second most Olympic gold medals per capita in the Summer Olympics. At the all time total medal count for Olympic Games, Hungary reaches the ninth rank out of 211 participating nations, with a total of 465 medals. This is also despite that Hungary was punished and was not allowed to participate in the Olympics in 1920 and 1984. In the Summer Olympics, Hungary has according to gold-rank always been among the top 10 best nations between 1928 to 1996, when they were allowed to compete. In the gold-rank, Hungary reached third position: 1936, 1952, 1956, and 1960. See: All-time Olympic Games medal table (2008 data)

One of the most famous Hungarians is the footballer Ferenc Puskás (1927–2006). He scored 84 goals in 85 internationals for Hungary, and 511 goals in 533 matches in the Hungarian and Spanish leagues. Puskás played in the 1954 FIFA World Cup Final against West Germany. In 1958, after the Hungarian Revolution, he emigrated to Spain, where he played in the legendary Real Madrid team that also included Alfredo Di Stéfano and Francisco Gento.

Hungarians are also known for their prowess at water sports, mainly swimming, water polo (See: Water polo at the Summer Olympics) (in which they have defeated the Soviet team in 1956), and canoeing (they have won multiple medals); this can be said to be surprising at first, due to Hungary being landlocked. On the other hand, the presence of two major rivers (the Duna and the Tisza) and a major lake (Balaton), give excellent opportunities to practice these sports. In recent years, a steady rise in the number of golfers has been experienced in the country. The sport has developed much over the past 20 years (after the fall of Socialism), but the economical situation hinders further development of golf courses at the present time. Some of the world's best sabre fencing athletes have historically hailed from Hungary. The Hungarian national ice hockey team has also qualified for their first IIHF World Championship in more than 70 years.

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Famous quotes containing the word sport:

    “Serious sport has nothing to do with fair play. It is bound up with hatred, jealousy, boastfulness, disregard of all rules and sadistic pleasure in witnessing violence: in other words it is war minus the shooting.
    ”
    —George Orwell (1903–1950)

    “Rabelais, for instance, is intolerable; one chapter is better than a volume,—it may be sport to him, but it is death to us. A mere humorist, indeed, is a most unhappy man; and his readers are most unhappy also.”
    —Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    “If a walker is indeed an individualist there is nowhere he can’t go at dawn and not many places he can’t go at noon. But just as it demeans life to live alongside a great river you can no longer swim in or drink from, to be crowded into safer areas and hours takes much of the gloss off walking—one sport you shouldn’t have to reserve a time and a court for.”
    —Edward Hoagland (b. 1932)