Unlock Your Inner Athlete: 70 Inspirational Sports Quotes From Legends

Sports are the acme of hard effort and devotion for sports lovers. Even the most naturally talented athletes must give their best to reach the summit of their sport.

We watch sports for the thrills, but we follow them much more for the drama. Nothing beats witnessing a team come back from a 3-0 deficit to win the fourth game, or a boxer rise from the ground to score a comeback after a knockout.

Sports are about those wonderful moments when human willpower and passion triumph over adversity. These are the memories we have.

Given the nature of athletics, it's not unexpected that sportsmen have had inspirational and motivating things to say about hard effort, dedication, leadership, winning, and more. The most inspiring sports quotes for players and supporters are listed here.

Sports Quotes that Inspire You

• Losing is the only way to demonstrate that you're a decent sportsperson.
• When you're riding, the only thing that matters is the race you're in.
• Age isn't a factor. It's a mental constraint you impose on yourself.
• "Only he who can see the invisible can perform the impossible," says a Wilson tennis ball at the junction of two lines on a tennis court.
• My biggest attribute, I always believed, was my brain aptitude, not my physical ability.
• A trophy is covered with dust. Memories endure a lifetime.
• The first step is to develop a love for jogging. I adore the mornings, the trails, and the speed on the track. And if any youngster excels at it, that's great, too.
• The majority of individuals quit up just when they're ready to succeed. They called it a day on the one-yard line. They surrender in the last seconds of the game, one yard from a game-winning touchdown.
• If you want to live in peace with yourself, you must accomplish something noble and not cowardly in your life.
• "There may be individuals with more skill than you, but there's no reason for anybody to work harder than you do," says a baseball player during a New York Yankees practice.
• Baseball is the only sport in which a player may be deemed an excellent performance if he succeeds three times out of ten.
• Single individual practicing sportsmanship is vastly superior to a group of fifty preaching it.
• Stamina, speed, strength, skill, and spirit are the five S's of sports training, with spirit being the most important.
• With money in his pockets, an athlete cannot run. With hope in his heart and aspirations in his brain, he must flee.
• A small girl who fell in love with the game and never looked back lies somewhere behind the athlete you've become, the hours of practice, and the coaches who have pushed you... Perform for her.
• On a 100-meter sprint track, there are two blue lanes.
• "There's nothing like a challenge when you've got something to prove."
• Never give up, never give in, and when we get the upper hand, may we be able to manage the victory with the same dignity with which we handled the loss.
• It's not about having the desire to win; everyone has it. What important is the will to prepare to win?
• Failure may be transformed into remarkable success with perseverance.
• I've realized that every setback may lead to something positive.
• Ensure that your deadliest adversary does not reside between your ears.
• A guy stands on the edge of a cliff, staring down into a large valley below him.
• "Set lofty objectives for yourself and don't stop until you achieve them."
• When I stopped trying to make them miss the ball and began attempting to make them hit it, I became a better pitcher.
• Outwork them if you can't outplay them.
• People sometimes inquire as to what I do during the winter months when baseball is not available. What I do, I'll tell you. I watch out the window, anticipating the arrival of spring.
• The majority of individuals never run far enough on their first wind to realize they have another.
• Do you know which section of the game I like the most? The chance to participate in games.
• "If at first, you don't succeed, you are running about average." 
• The key to unlocking our potential is consistent work, not strength or intellect.
• When better is anticipated, mediocre isn't good enough.
• The resolve of a person is what separates the impossible from the achievable.
• Champions keep playing till they've figured out what they're doing.
• You were destined to be a gamer. It was destined for you to be here. This is your time.
• "What you lack in skill can be made up for with drive, effort, and giving 110 percent all the time," says a fan at PNC Park before a Pittsburgh Pirates game in April.
• If you don't prepare, you're setting yourself up to fail.
• The way you answer to the challenge in the second half will decide whether you are a winner or a loser at the end of the game.
• Failure may be transformed into remarkable success with perseverance.
• Sports benefit society by serving as vivid instances of achievement.
• The concept is that you are competing against yourself. It's all about self-improvement and striving to be better than the day before.
• Two safety pursuing a wide receiver on a football field with a ball
• "Easy Street's path runs into the sewage."
• You're never actually playing against another player. You're playing yourself, and when you hit your boundaries, that's when the real fun begins.
• What distinguishes something is not what you have to gain, but what you believe you have to lose.
• The greater the joy of triumph, the more difficult the victory.
• It's not about your hitting power. It's all about how hard you can take a blow and keep going.
• Even the most gifted players may not always succeed. Some players are not even selected for the squad. It's more about what's on the inside.
• A single individual may be an important part of a team, but he cannot form a team.
• Before a Nebraska football game, Memorial Stadium and the Sea of Red supporters.
• “Nobody who ever offered his best regretted it.”
• Stubbornness is typically seen as a bad quality, but I believe it has served me well.
• You must take the initiative and participate in the game. Confidence makes the difference in a deciding set.
• When you win, you should say nothing, and when you lose, you should say less.
• The most difficult talent to master in this sport is the ability to compete full out, give it your best, and yet lose no matter what you do. It takes a unique kind of death instinct to battle through that.
• The only limit is one's imagination. You can accomplish anything as long as your mind can imagine it, as long as you really believe it.
• Behind his gloves, a boxer thinks about a Joe Frazier phrase to get motivated.
• "When I'm out there, I don't feel sorry for my brother." "I'm in this to win."
• During my 18 years as a batter, I batted about 10,000 times. I must have struck out 1,700 times and walked 1,800 times. A baseball player is expected to get 500 at-bats every season. That means I went seven years without hitting a single pitch.
• That offers me peace of mind since I never left the field feeling I could have done more to prepare.
• Leadership, like coaching, is about winning men's hearts and minds and convincing them to believe in you.
• You win some, lose some, and some get rained out, but you have to dress for all of them.
• Even when the odds are stacked against you, always give it you're all.
• At an NBA game in Brooklyn, a Spalding basketball flies past the net. "You have to demand things of yourself before you can accomplish them."
• To reach your full potential, you must first identify your own limitations, and then have the guts to go beyond them.
• Show me a man who is terrified of looking terrible, and I'll show you a person you can always defeat.
• Fear and reward may both be used to encourage people. Both of these strategies, however, are just temporary. Self-motivation is the only thing that lasts.
• When you know that you gave it your all–win or lose–you discover that you have greater peace of mind and can enjoy yourself, get more sleep, and relax.

Inspirational Sports Quotes From Legends