Is G.A. a sport, or is it a hobby? What?

What is flying to me?

  • It's a sport.

    Votes: 7 9.2%

  • It's a hobby

    Votes: 65 85.5%

  • It's my business

    Votes: 9 11.8%

  • I fly aerobatic, it's a sport.

    Votes: 1 1.3%

  • I fly aerobatic, it's a hobby.

    Votes: 1 1.3%
  • Total voters
    76
John Baker

John Baker

Final Approach
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Display name:
John Baker
I've had people call my flying a sport, a hobby, a pastime, and a few have called it a ridicules waste of money.

My own thought is that it is more of a hobby for most G.A. pilots, I'm talking non aerobatic, just basic A to B flying. I found that sitting on my butt pulling and turning a yoke, and pushing a peddle now and then to be of less than an athletic effort.

I of course am not talking about people who earn their livings off of flying, just the average pilot who flies what most of us fly.

-John
 
It is a sport for people with lots of BMI. No sport here.
 
How about a category for "It's a mode of transportation?"
 
its pure badassery. but I didn't see that as a poll option.
 
It's transportation,a hobby,and a passion.
 
None of the above - it's the joy of flying. "Hobby" is not the correct word for it, "Hobby" doesn't do it justice.

Like drinking a fine wine or 100yr old scotch is not quenching your thirst, flying is not a hobby for me.
 
It's too difficult for what most folks would call a hobby and too easy to be called a job. ;)

Not sure what I'd call it. Marketing folks trying to find people with the right combination of interest, aptitude, and resources to buy in, use all of the terms mentioned.

Passion doesn't really cut it either. I'm as passionate about a lot of things I do NOT do as the ones I do. ;)
 
Like driving a car, it can be a sport, a hobby, a business, or transportation, or any combination of them. Since my annual airplane mileage is abut ten times my car mileage, it could be seen as my primary transportation
 
According to the FAA, if the airplane has 2 seats and weighs less than 1320 pounds, it's a sport.
 
I think it's a sport. It's a hobby too, but mainly a sport.
 
Capt. Geoffrey Thorpe said:
According to the FAA, if the airplane has 2 seats and weighs less than 1320 pounds, it's a sport.
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FAA's definition is rather odd. They say 100hp means sports, yet when you put 300hp in to an airplane that has the same number of seats and weighs the same it's no longer a sport. :mad2:
 
A couple weeks ago I pushed my plane from its parking spot to the wash rack. Then it was a sport.
 
I don't think hobby is really the correct term, passion, joy, the feeling of freedom and immense pleasure/pressure/anxiety all rolled into one activity.

For me "Sport" involves some athletic ability or skill, with competition in there as well. If you include not killing yourself by screwing up as skill and competition against the laws of physics then I guess its a sport :D
 
denverpilot said:
It's too difficult for what most folks would call a hobby and too easy to be called a job. ;)

Not sure what I'd call it. Marketing folks trying to find people with the right combination of interest, aptitude, and resources to buy in, use all of the terms mentioned.

Passion doesn't really cut it either. I'm as passionate about a lot of things I do NOT do as the ones I do. ;)
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I never thought of flying as being that difficult to learn. You can become a reasonably skilled pilot in 100 hours or so. Compare that to playing the piano. I knew a piano teacher who told me that for someone who has a decent amount of natural aptitude for the piano, it would take 1500 hours to "start sounding like a pianist", and 6000 or more hours before they could play some of the more advanced classical music.

Granted, there are some people who just shouldn't fly, but I think most of us could become decent pilots.
 
"There is no sport equal to that which aviators enjoy while being carried through the air on great white wings. The exhilaration of flying is too keen, the pleasure too great, for it to be neglected as a sport." The Wright Bros thought of it as a sport...I wouldn't disagree with them.
 
FormerHangie said:
I never thought of flying as being that difficult to learn. You can become a reasonably skilled pilot in 100 hours or so. Compare that to playing the piano. I knew a piano teacher who told me that for someone who has a decent amount of natural aptitude for the piano, it would take 1500 hours to "start sounding like a pianist", and 6000 or more hours before they could play some of the more advanced classical music.
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But once you buy your piano you can play around all you want for free... unless you take lessons which are probably less than flying lessons unless you are paying the piano instructor $100+/hour. And you can not touch it for years and come back to it without lessons and without thinking you're going to get into trouble, physical or legal.
 
It was a sport then, now not at all, at least not with a motor. Also note the Wrights preferred flying gliders, and went back to them and set early duration records. That is sporting, motor GA flying not at all.
deltafox said:
"There is no sport equal to that which aviators enjoy while being carried through the air on great white wings. The exhilaration of flying is too keen, the pleasure too great, for it to be neglected as a sport." The Wright Bros thought of it as a sport...I wouldn't disagree with them.
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ClimbnSink said:
It was a sport then, now not at all, at least not with a motor. Also note the Wrights preferred flying gliders, and went back to them and set early duration records. That is sporting, motor GA flying not at all.
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Air racing is a sport, as is competition aerobatics. Other types of power flying probably are either a means of transportation or recreation.

My daughters are competitive dancers. They keep trying to convince me it's a sport, I keep telling them it's a performing art.
 
Everskyward said:
But once you buy your piano you can play around all you want for free... unless you take lessons which are probably less than flying lessons unless you are paying the piano instructor $100+/hour. And you can not touch it for years and come back to it without lessons and without thinking you're going to get into trouble, physical or legal.
Click to expand...

Average piano teachers charge about the same hourly rate as do average flight instructors. There are some advanced piano teachers that command a good bit more.

When you get down to it, what we pay for flight instruction is really not that much. Renting the airplane, on the other hand...

When you think about it, being a piano teacher is a much better gig. When you get a student, they usually stay for at least a year and come every week. There's no weather worries. Plus , when your student does something stupid, it just sounds bad. I have yet to hear of a piano teacher being killed in a piano crash.
 
FormerHangie said:
Average piano teachers charge about the same hourly rate as do average flight instructors. There are some advanced piano teachers that command a good bit more.

When you get down to it, what we pay for flight instruction is really not that much. Renting the airplane, on the other hand...
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Right, that's what I was getting at.

FormerHangie said:
When you think about it, being a piano teacher is a much better gig. When you get a student, they usually stay for at least a year and come every week. There's no weather worries. Plus , when your student does something stupid, it just sounds bad. I have yet to hear of a piano teacher being killed in a piano crash.
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Haha, but then you get these reluctant kids (I was one of them) whose parents force it on them. I still have the piano although I haven't touched it in a long time. Even if I walk over there and try to play it after I hit "Submit Reply" I won't crash. :D
 
Everskyward said:
But once you buy your piano you can play around all you want for free... unless you take lessons which are probably less than flying lessons unless you are paying the piano instructor $100+/hour. And you can not touch it for years and come back to it without lessons and without thinking you're going to get into trouble, physical or legal.
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Unless, of course, you have a BMI over 40.
 
Everskyward said:
But once you buy your piano you can play around all you want for free... unless you take lessons which are probably less than flying lessons unless you are paying the piano instructor $100+/hour. And you can not touch it for years and come back to it without lessons and without thinking you're going to get into trouble, physical or legal.
Click to expand...

Don't tune your piano regularly and you won't want to play it all that often.
 
Bob Noel said:
Don't tune your piano regularly and you won't want to play it all that often.
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Haha, you guys got me to open it up and play something. It doesn't sound bad to me, just kinda like a honky-tonk. But I may have a tin ear.
 
FormerHangie said:
Average piano teachers charge about the same hourly rate as do average flight instructors. There are some advanced piano teachers that command a good bit more.

When you get down to it, what we pay for flight instruction is really not that much. Renting the airplane, on the other hand...

When you think about it, being a piano teacher is a much better gig. When you get a student, they usually stay for at least a year and come every week. There's no weather worries. Plus , when your student does something stupid, it just sounds bad. I have yet to hear of a piano teacher being killed in a piano crash.
Click to expand...

An hour a week = 52 hrs in that year, that's less than most flying students for a PP.
 
denverpilot said:
Passion doesn't really cut it either. I'm as passionate about a lot of things I do NOT do as the ones I do. ;)
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It's a fascination, not a passion. The whole idea of rising off the surface of the earth has always fascinated me; there's a magic to it, as well as the gratification of being able to do something that only a tiny fraction of the world's people can do. There's the amazement of being lifted by nothing more than air. There's the thankfulness of being able to cover distances impossible in recent human history.

And most people take it all for granted.

Dan
 
George Carlin said it is not a sport unless it has a stick or a ball. Airplanes have both so flying must be a sport!
 
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