sporthunder.com

The rules of sport intend equal chances for competitors and some protection for participants, yet they must establish barriers for physical acumen so that the test creates a challenge that yields differences in success. Despite these factors, periods and sites display variations in the aesthetic features of performance. Artistic gymnastics and figure skating are examples where whole events include express and implied aesthetic criteria of performance. Derogatory comments on performances that technically accord with rules occur in all sports, such as displaying poor manners (one could not remove an article of clothing without penalty in the 1924 Tour de France), insufficient effort, clumsy execution, mean-spirited demeanor, or an inadequately flashy end (“the victory of a moribund,” said Henri Degranges, the race director, of Maurice de Waele’s victory in the 1929 Tour de France).
Body proportions and comportment themselves may produce reasons for aesthetic valorization or criticism. The body of the gymnast was of a mature woman through the early 1970s, but with the performance of Nadia Comaneci in the 1976 Olympics, the women’s gymnastics body was required to conform to new standards. Dress conventions for athletes required to meet the same physical demands of contrived hazard show how standards of aesthetics override demands of the sport itself. While purity was expressed by nudity in the ancient Olympics, dress conventions of participants since that time reflect prevailing national standards. Participation in sports and interest itself may depend on a minimal preoccupation with the body as a medium of cultural identity and memory. Restrictions on clothing suitable for maximum athletic performance may exist in current cultures (Islamic, for example) that exclude women from performing since they may have to display, inappropriately, anatomical parts.
An athlete’s nonathletic identity and orientation may enter into an aesthetic evaluation of the performer’s sport proficiency and success. One’s sexual orientation, for example, though entirely unrelated to eligibility to perform, quality of effort, and event success, may affect evaluations by other performers, journalists, and spectators. In the mid-twentieth century, when public views of age- and sex-appropriate activities stereotyped older, married women as unfit for sport, aesthetic evaluations of momentous athletic accomplishments done by mothers could be muted or negative. Francina “Fanny” Blankers-Koen won four gold medals for Holland in the 1948 Games in London (100m and 200m runs, 80m hurdles, and the 4 5 100m relay). But her initial entry into the Games was strongly criticized by the public and press in her country, because she was married, had borne two children, and was thought too old to compete. (Aesthetic guidelines for tastes are often mutable, of course, as once this athlete had won, her country liberally welcomed her home as a heroine.)

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