Culture of Brazil - Sports

Sports

Main article: Sport in Brazil

Football is the most popular sport in Brazil. Many Brazilian players such as Pelé, Ronaldo, Kaká, and Ronaldinho are among the most well known players in the sport. The Brazilian national football team (Seleção) is currently among the best in the world, according to the FIFA World Rankings. They have been victorious in the FIFA World Cup a record 5 times, in 1958, 1962, 1970, 1994, and 2002. Basketball, volleyball, auto racing, and martial arts also attract large audiences. Tennis, handball, swimming, and gymnastics have found a growing sporting number of enthusiasts over the last decade. Some sport variations have their origins in Brazil. Beach football, futsal (official version of indoor football), and footvolley emerged in the country as variations of football. In martial arts, Brazilians have developed capoeira, vale tudo, and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. In auto racing, Brazilian drivers have won the Formula One World Championship 9 times: Emerson Fittipaldi in 1972 and 1974; Nelson Piquet in 1981, 1983, and 1987; and Ayrton Senna in 1988, 1990, and 1991.

Brazil has undertaken the organization of large-scale sporting events: the country organized and hosted the 1950 FIFA World Cup, and is chosen to host the 2014 FIFA World Cup event. The circuit located in São Paulo, called Autódromo José Carlos Pace, hosts the annual Grand Prix of Brazil. São Paulo organized the IV Pan American Games in 1963, and Rio de Janeiro hosted the XV Pan American Games in 2007. Brazil also tried for the 4th time to host the Summer Olympics with Rio de Janeiro candidature in 2016. On October 2, 2009, Rio de Janeiro was selected to host the 2016 Summer Olympics, which will be the first to be held in South America.

Read more about this topic:  Culture Of Brazil

Famous quotes containing the word sports:

    “Short of a wholesale reform of college athletics—a complete breakdown of the whole system that is now focused on money and power—the women’s programs are just as doomed as the men’s are to move further and further away from the academic mission of their colleges.... We have to decide if that’s the kind of success for women’s sports that we want.”
    —Christine H. B. Grant, U.S. university athletic director. As quoted in the Chronicle of Higher Education, p. A42 (May 12, 1993)

    “I looked so much like a guy you couldn’t tell if I was a boy or a girl. I had no hair, I wore guys’ clothes, I walked like a guy ... [ellipsis in source] I didn’t do anything right except sports. I was a social dropout, but sports was a way I could be acceptable to other kids and to my family.”
    —Karen Logan (b. 1949)

    “It was so hard to pry this door open, and if I mess up I know the people behind me are going to have it that much harder. Because then there’s living proof. They can sit around and say, “See? It doesn’t work.” I don’t want to be their living proof.”
    —Gayle Gardner, U.S. sports reporter. As quoted in Sports Illustrated, p. 87 (June 17, 1991)