Movies about athletics

Ronald's high-school valedictory address praises books and condemns sports. His girlfriend Mary condemns his attitude. Fearing to lose her to rival Jeff, he decides to go to college and pay more attentions to sports.

John is a timid student who works at the University Bookstore. He is studying to be a botanist and has a secret crush on the lovely Julia. One day, one of his letters gets mailed accidentally and Julia receives it. When the letter says that he is a fraternity man and a big track star, Julia rushes right over to see him. But John is neither and Spike, Julia's boyfriend, is a track star at a nearby college. John does not want to enter the track meet, so Julia tries to use psychology on him. That and a good wrestling hold make John timidly agree to enter the race, but Spike still scares him.

A small country on the verge of bankruptcy is persuaded to enter the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics as a means of raising money.

John Kent (Monte Blue') wins the Olympic decathlon but is disqualified on a charge of professionalism. William Stevens (Kenneth Harlan), the second-place finisher, is awarded the title and trophies. Six years later Kent is running a moving truck for a living and training his young son Johnny (Bruce Bennett) to become an athlete. Chance brings about a meeting between Ken and Stevens, now a prosperous business man, with a little daughter, Joan (Joan Fontaine), who makes friends with young Johnny. As the years pass, the grown-up Johnny has developed to where he stands a chance of becoming an Olympic athlete and is in love with Joan. Mr. Stevens also wants to see Johnny succeed, and is annoyed that his attention to Joan may interfere with his training. Rich girl Patricia Stanley (Suzanne Kaaren) is also interested in Johnny, a proceeding which suits wealthy young athlete Duke Hale (Reed Howes), who is Johnny's main rival in sports and for Joan. Stevens, in an effort to repay the elder Kent for the wrong done him in stripping him of his rightful Olympic title, makes Johnny a member of the athletic club that sponsors the preliminary track-and-field events leading to the choosing of the American team for the Olympic Games. Johnny wins first place in the initial trials and is carried away by the flattery of the social set, which leads to a quarrel and separation from his father. At a party given by Patricia, Johnny drinks heavily, and Joan, feeling she is partly to blame for Johnny breaking his training, tells him she is through if him, hoping to bring him to his senses.

California school boy and Stanford University student Bob Mathias was the first man to win two Olympic Gold Medals in the Decathlon in the 1948 and 1952 Olympics. The film begins with him as a 17-year-old schoolboy in Tulare, California where his high school track coach, played by Ward Bond, encourages him to train for the Olympics, with the Dacathlon in mind. His story, far from over, ends here with his victory in the 1952 Olympics and with Mathias in the U.S. Marine Corps. He and his wife, Melba, play themselves in one of the few movie bios that doesn't play fast and loose with the facts, especially in a bio with the subject playing himself.

Geordie is a very small boy who feels that the girl he loves is ignoring him because of his size. He decides to take a correspondence course in body-building. At 21, Geordie becomes one of the tallest and strongest men in Scotland.

In 1896 it is announced that the Olympic Games will be revived in Athens. A young shepherd, Spiridon Loues, decides to enter the 26-mile marathon. Once in Athens, he meets Christina Gratsos, a young woman from his hometown who is now the personal maid of Eleni Costa, Greece's most glamorous actress. Though he has arrived after the qualification date, Spiridon's athletic prowess so impresses Coach Graham of the American team that he is permitted to enter the contest. Eleni informs the press that she will marry the victor, confident it will be her lover, Lieutenant Vinardos.

A young thief takes up long-distance running when he is sent to a borstal.

A 16-year-old tomboy and high school athlete finds herself caught between being beating boys at sports and having a boyfriend, while her conservative father opposes women's rights in his campaign for mayor.

During the housing shortage of the Summer Olympic Games in 1964, two men and a woman share a small apartment in Tokyo, and the older man soon starts playing Cupid to the younger pair.

Four marathon runners (one from England, one from the U.S., a Czechoslovakian, and an Australian Aborigine) prepare to run in the Olympic games. The film follows each one and shows what their motivations are for running in the games.

A down on his luck coach travels to Africa where he spots the world's greatest athlete - a white Tarzan-type. The coach brings him back to the U.S. of A. to compete.

A young boy who still wets the bed finds escapism from his abusive mother and his own embarrassment by going running after school.

This is the story of a 40-year-old divorced teacher whose life is changed by her decision to enter the Boston Marathon.

The story of an Olympic high jumper, played by Brent Carver, who loses his leg and yet doggedly persists in his pursuit of athletic glory. Released a year before Terry Fox's Marathon of Hope, this made-for-Canadian-TV movie, which also stars Sex and the City's Kim Cattrall, has been described as a tear-jerker.

A prisoner gets a chance to take part in the Olympics.

The story follows three teenagers through their senior year of high school in the 1960s, focusing on the star athlete of the group.

American marathon runner Michael Andropolis sets his heart on representing his country at the Olympic games. Meanwhile his marriage has fallen apart and his children have no respect for him. He sets out on his task with determination and hope that his success will resolve his personal problems.

A neo-Nazi doctor tries to make a superwoman of his daughter who has been specially fed, exercised, and conditioned since she was a child in preparation of the Olympics.

The fact-based story of John Baker, a former collegiate track star turned elementary school phys ed teacher who, after being diagnosed with terminal cancer, spends his remaining time coaching a losing girls' track team to a winning season.

Two British track athletes, one a determined Jew and the other a devout Christian, are driven to win in the 1924 Olympics as they wrestle with issues of pride and conscience.

A masked killer begins murdering students on the school track team after a track runner dies upon completion of a 30 second 200-meter race.

The intertwined lives and loves of three highly ranked athletes striving for the national team; Chris bounces between the beds of male coach Terry and her female friend, competitor, and role model Tory.

The story of Billy Mills, the American Indian who came from obscurity to win the 10,000-meter long-distance foot-race in the Tokyo Olympics in 1964.

USA decides to change the world's balance of power by providing Finland with a nuclear bomb. which could mean the start of WW3.