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Who is the Fittest?
Every now and then someone tests, compares and analyses athletes, and comes up with a list of the fittest and label someone as the 'fittest athlete in the world', or something similar. For some, the fittest is the athlete with the highest aerobic (endurance) capacity. However, fitness should not be just defined by just one ability, there are a range of components and abilities that make up fitness, and most sports require the athletes to be proficient at many of these. Being fit for a sport requires that the athlete reach or exceed the level of competence in just the fitness capacities of that sport, which makes it hard to compare athletes from different sports. See information about testing for the fittest athlete and some more candidate for the title.
The fittest guy will not necessarily be the world's greatest athlete, a title that requires not only superior fitness but exceptional sporting skill and possibly other attributes. See the discussion on the world's greatest athlete. You may also be interested in reading about the Fittest Sports, which looks at which sports are considered to have the fittest athletes.
With fitness being a hard thing to define, these lists are always controversial. Here are some lists of the fittest individual athletes.
Men's Fitness Magazine's Fittest List
In 2009 Men's Fitness Magazine published their list of the top 25 fittest guys in the world for 2009. Their nominated fittest guy was tennis star Rafael Nadal, who is certainly very fit. The fitness of some of the others in their list is questionable though. The next listed fittest guy in the world was the Australian actor Hugh Jackman, then another actor Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje. It is clear that they list Nadal as their fittest guy, but the order of the others in their top 25 list may not necessarily be in order of fitness. Their method of selection of these fittest guys is also not mentioned
- Rafael Nadal - tennis player
- Hugh Jackman - actor
- Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje - actor
- Josh Hamilton - baseball
- Usain Bolt - sprinter
- Rudy Reyes - Iraq War Vet/Actor/Trainer
- Paul Ridley - the youngest American to row solo across the Atlantic
- Shani Davis - speed skater
- Bod Burnquist - Pro Skate-Boarder
- Sir Richard Branson - euntrepenuer
- Richard Roll - Entertainment Lawyer/Producer/triathlon runner
- Tim Tebow - college football player
- LeBron James - NBA player
- Jared Padalecki - actor
- Simon Dumont - freestyle skiier
- Manny Pacquiao - Light-Welterweight Boxer
- Adrian Fenty - politition
- Robert Downey Jr. - actor
- Kevin Rose - internet CEO
- Phil Keoghan - TV Host (The Amazing Race)
- Akon - singer
- Georges St Pierre - UFC Fighter
- Lewis Hamilton - F1 Driver
- Clive Owen - actor
- Larry Fitzgerald - NFL player
Related Pages
- Can we determine The World's Greatest Athlete?
- Vote for the Greatest Athlete of All Time
