ABSTRACT
Introduction In the late 1970s, I was engaged in my PhD research at the University of North Dakota when I noticed an interesting optional module being offered on the taught master’s programme by my master’s degree supervisor, Bill Bolonchuk. This was called George Plimpton and Sport and seemed to be a radical departure for Bill, a hardnosed quantitative kinesiologist, so I attended the module. George Plimpton, a graduate of Harvard and Kings College, Cambridge, a close friend of Bobby Kennedy, editor of the influential literary journal The Paris Review, a CIA agent of note and occasional Sports Illustrated writer produced a number of books as he swam against Don Schollander, sparred with Archie Moore, golfed against Nicklaus and Palmer, quarterbacked for Detroit Lions and netminded for the Boston Bruins.1
