Think you know your sport? Then test your knowledge with our quiz of the year.
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Click the link below the photo for the answers!
Part I – Olympic Glory
1.Great Britain won 19 gold medals at the Olympics in Beijing. How many of those were in events where the participants have to stay on their feet?
b Prior to 2008 the best Olympic performance by an athlete from Bahrain was Reyadh Rasheed Saad Al-Ameeri finishing 14th in the men’s hammer in 1992. Which Bahraini athlete eclipsed that record in the best possible style in Beijing?
3. The opening ceremony for the Olympics won the highest TV ratings in the history of the world. How many people are estimated to have tuned in to watch the lip-synching children and partially-faked pyrotechnics?
4. American swimmer Michael Phelps established a new record for the number of gold medals won during a single Olympics. How many did he win, and how many of those were in individual events?
5. Only one nation has won at least one gold medal at every summer Olympics since the modern Games began in 1896. Name them.
6. Usain Bolt stunned the world with his world record of 9.69 seconds in the Olympic 100m final. But who came second?
7. Bolt also set a world record in the 200m final, with a run of 19.30 seconds that eclipsed Michael Johnson’s 19.32 at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. But who was the last person to hold both 100m and 200m records?
8. Which innovation in athletes’ equipment had such a huge impact at the Games was described as “technological doping”?
9. At the 2008 Games China topped the medal table for the first time, with a stunning 51 golds. True or false: China have already won twice as many golds in the 21st century than they won during the entire 20th century.
10. Rebecca Adlington won two gold medals for Britain in the swimming pool. Who won Team GB’s other swimming medal?
Part II – Football heaven, football hell
11. In December Cristiano Ronaldo (pictured) became the third Portuguese player to win the Ballon d’Or. Who were the other two?
12. Which Premier League player became in 2008 the first person to captain his club in all four divisions?
13. How many points did Spurs earn in the league this season under Juande Ramos?
14. Which three players missed penalties during the shoot-out that decided the 2008 Champions League final between Manchester United and Chelsea?
15. Who was the top scorer in the Championship in the 2007-08 season?
16. True or false: last year’s FA Cup semi-finals were the first in which only one of the teams was from the top division of English football.
17. None of the home nations were represented at Euro 2008. When was the last time that happened at a European Championship?
18. Newcastle manager Joe Kinnear unleashed one of the most memorable football tirades of all time after the pressure of the job – which he’d been doing for all of a week – became too much for him. How many times did he swear at Mirror journalist Simon Bird?
19. Sheikh Mansour has made headlines with his lavish bankrolling of Manchester City under Mark Hughes. But how much profit did previous owner Thaksin Shinawatra make on the sale?
20. Fabio Capello has made a decent start to his time as England manager, with England looking likely to cruise to qualification for the 2010 World Cup. How many league titles has Capello won in his managerial career?
Part III – Making a racquet
21. Justine Henin announced her sudden and unexpected retirement in May despite being at the top of the ATP rankings at the time. How many Grand Slam titles did the Belgian win during her career?
22. The epic battle between Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal at Wimbledon was the highlight of the tennis year, but neither man even made the final of the 2008 Australian Open. How long had it been since Roger Federer had missed a Grand Slam final?
23. Superscot Andy Murray seems to have matured by about five years over the last 12 months, both professionally and personally. In September he became the first Brit to make a men’s Grand Slam singles final since Greg Rusedski at the 1997 US Open. But who was the last Brit to manage the feat before Rusedski?
Part IV – Men with odd-shaped balls
24. Ospreys and Wales winger Shane Williams won the IRB player of the year, and also picked up the Rugby writers’ award. He is now the Welsh national team’s greatest every try scorer, but has he averaged 0.55, 0.72, 0.91 or 1.12 tries per match for his country?
25. Martin Johnson was named as the new England rugby coach in April after Brian Ashton was given the chop following a disappointing Six Nations campaign. But how many of England’s 14 coaches have a better winning percentage than Ashton?
26. Jonny Wilkinson made a brief return to fitness this year. In the five years from his first cap in 1998 to the World Cup final in 2003, Jonny Wilkinson made 52 appearances for England. How many has he made in the five years that have passed since that final?
Part V – Keep your motor running
27. The last two Formula One drivers’ championships have been decided by a single point. Before 2007 when was the last championship decided by such a small margin?
28. Lewis Hamilton won five races this season. No champion has won the title with fewer victories since 1989. Who won the drivers’ championship that year?
29. Valentino Rossi won the MotoGP riders’ World Championship this year after two seasons of missing out. How many world titles has he now won across the different classes of bike?
30. Sebastien Loeb won an unprecedented fifth consecutive WRC crown in 2008. How many rallies did he win during the season?
Part VI – Cue the cycling and horses
31. What was the combined highest break scores of Ronnie O’Sullivan and Ali Carter on their way to the final of the 2008 World Championship?
32. Which three players won more than one ranking tournament during the 2007-08 snooker season?
33. Who won the 2008 Tour de France?
34. Including the positive tests revealed in October, how many riders were caught doping at this year’s Tour de France?
35. Which former Grand National-winning jockey was forced to retire as a result of injuries sustained during the 2008 race?
Part VII – American – and Irish – Idols
36. The 2008 baseball World Series was won by the Philadelphia Phillies – but who were their unlikely opponents in the final series of matches?
37. The 2008 Superbowl between the New York Giants and New England Patriots was the second most-watched US television broadcast of all time. Did they get (a) 45 million, (b) 98 million or (c) 112 million viewers?
38. Tiger Woods won his 14th Major at the US Open. How many competitive holes did he play in doing so?
39. Padraig Harrington won the Open Championship at Birkdale, but the story of the week was Greg Norman’s incredible performance at the age of 53. How many years was it since Greg Norman had won the Open?
40. Who was the top points scorer at the 2008 Ryder Cup?
Part VIII – Arctic monkeying
41. Which German 21-year-old became the youngest woman ever to win the biathlon World Cup series?
42. Which maverick American skiier won the overall Alpine skiiing World Cup?
Part IX – Fighting for their rights
43. Joe Calzaghe is now without doubt one of Britain’s greatest-ever boxers – but how many fights has he now won?
44. Who is Ricky Hatton’s new trainer – and who did he replace?
Part X – Unlucky dip
45. Who was the last British male to win an Olympic gold on the track?
46. Edd China set the land speed record in November 2008 for the world’s fastest: (a) horse, (b) desk, (c) bed?
47. Evander Holyfield got back into the ring at the age of 46 to resurrect his boxing career – and found himself facing Nikolai Valuev, who at seven foot tall towered over Holyfield by 10 inches. But how much weight advantage was the former champ giving away?
48. Takeru Kobayashi of Japan is 5’8″ tall and weighs just over nine stone. Joey Chestnut of the USA is 6’2″ and weighs 15 stone. Which world-famous title did they go into a play-off decider for in July of this year?
49. The year’s biggest headline grabber away from the world of sport was undoubtedly the election of Barack Obama to the US presidency. But what does the president-elect have in common with England fly-half Danny Cipriani and Welsh football legend Ryan Giggs?
50. Mohammad Ahansal of Morocco won the 245km, seven-day Marathon des Sables for the second time in 2008. But as he crossed the finishing line, did he: (a) perform a highly-acrobatic cartwheel, (b) fall to his knees and pray, or (c) run to the side of the road and vomit?
