re: Which of these sporting feats is the toughest and easiest?

Most high school pole vaulters suck

Can I say...going from short course to long course has absolutely sucked for me this past month. I had no problem knocking out 200 sets in a 25 m pool...I am struggling to do 100 sets in a 50m. 200 skips have sucked donkies. Plus, the sun and heat banging on me during the swims does not help. It's been tough to get in the 4000s.

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Can I say...going from short course to long course has absolutely sucked for me this past month. I had no problem knocking out 200 sets in a 25 m pool...I am struggling to do 100 sets in a 50m. 200 skips have sucked donkies. Plus, the sun and heat banging on me during the swims does not help. It's been tough to get in the 4000s.

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What's the old saying? Long Course is swimming. Short Course is turning.

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I think it is. That's why hitting it 1/3 of the time gets you to Cooperstown.

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Agreed if we are talking about being able to do it consistently. But if you give 1000 Joe schmos a chance to hit a fastball, a few will be able to do it once because of blind luck. No one is going under 5 in an IM or catching a flyer on a 50 yd field goal by chance. It all depends on the stipulations of the question

I've never down the penalty kick. But have done all of the others multiple times. I'd say most people would have trouble with any of them.

fine lets pretend its pros and not shmoes doing it.

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since 2010, NFL kickers have made 61.9 percent of their field goal attempts — from 50 yards or more.

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you think MLB hitters make contact with 61.9% of the 95 mph fastballs they swing at?

sure there are a ton of variables that would go into this such as someone with a stronger leg than hand/eye coordination but hitting professional pitching is the most difficult exercise to execute in all of sports.

Out of all of those listed, with a field goal you're depending on 8 guys to do an average/good job and 2 guys to perform perfectly before you even have a chance to kick the ball, so I'd say FG is up there in difficulty.

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Good catch. In Division I swimming last year, 782 swimmers attempted a 400 IM SCY. 780 were under 5:00. If my math is right, a 5:00 LCM is a 4:24.50 SCY. 740 of the 782 achieved this (94.6%) No way 94.6% of the 50 yard FGs in Division I football were made. I'm changing my mind to the field goal.

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I'm not sure I disagree with your conclusion, but I don't agree with your reasoning. A guy isn't going to be swimming in college if he sucks. Once he gets to college his coach isn't going to put him in something like a 400/500 IM if he isn't going to be competitive. That 94.6% is a seriously biased sample.

I took the question to mean which outcome is more likely if you had 10,000 trials of truly random guys.

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I was just looking at 17-18 boys.

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Even if we are talking LCM, breaking 5:00 is only a AAA time. There are at least several who can do this is LA.

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You people are saying something is doable by saying "at least several in the state" have done it. That's still a tiny fraction of people. Even if they are just in high school. And I believe swimming is a sport that a good high school student will be leaps and bounds better than an average person. I don't swim with a master's group, it's just a local gym pool. I average about 1:45 per hundred and swim for distance (triathlon training, 1 mile plus). I still am the faster person in the pool 75% of the time. I know that is absolutely not a measuring stick to real swimmers (that other 25% a real swimmer comes in and makes me look like I'm standing still). But it's a measuring stick to normal people who dabble. Most people are slow and if you don't have technique at an early age, you will struggle to ever get down in the low 1 min per hundred range....even just freestyle. I am ecstatic when I can swim a sub 1:20 for a few intervals.

To those saying 95 mph fastball is hard to hit...hittig a baseball is not harder because it's fast. It's hard because if movement, offspeed pitches, and placement. Put over the middle of the plate like a pitching machine, and people will get the timing. I'm assuming that's what the scenario entails. We had a catcher that could hit the 90s (again, I admit it was around 91-92 not quite 95). He had a cannon. Could throw the ball from home over left field fence when doing long toss to warm up. He kind of sucked as a catcher, but played college due to his arm. He constantly got rocked when they tried to let him pitch in high school. There are definitely people out there throwing 95 who have no shot at D1 college much less pros. 95 mph is special, but it's only a portion of being hard to hit.