You would have read this headline and thought to yourself, how does one compare being a professional poker player to a sports athlete? You would not be blamed for feeling this way.

Fundamentally, poker and athletics are the polar opposite of each other. As a poker player, you sit all day at the table and play a game that tests, for the most part, your mental skills rather than your physical ones.

Athletics on the other hand, tests your physical health and capabilities on the field you play in with less mental aptitude compared to poker.

As different as these two fields are, they are also very similar. Professional Poker players and pro athletes share a lot in common than you may think and, it should not be crazy to even call poker a sport and poker players athletes.

Should playing poker be considered a sporting activity?

Yes it should. This is because Poker can be played for amusement, is competitive, and nearly always needs both physical and cerebral aptitude to regularly play and win at the top levels.

Online poker players who participate in multi-tabling must have excellent hand-eye coordination, and both live and online players must be physically fit to play extended sessions.

Cambridge dictionary defines sport as a game, competition, or activity needing physical effort and skill that is played or done according to rules, for enjoyment and/or as a job.

This is just a definition of the word sport. If you are not convinced though, there are some other reasons that you should consider and we will list them.

Poker requires skill

This is a crucial distinction that a big section of the populace overlooks. There is a reason why the same poker players win over and over again.

Everything you do in poker necessitates a decision. Every poker hand you choose to play has a number of these little considerations. In fact, determining whether or not to play a hand is one of the most important decisions.

Every action in poker requires expertise to determine if it has a positive expectation and will gain money in the long run. This is the portion that most people struggle with. Short-term luck can cause a winning decision to lose money and a bad decision to gain money.

Just like in professional sports, one of the biggest requirements to be a great athlete is skill. What separates the good players from the bad ones are their skill level which allows them to reach even greater heights when they play in order to win.

You cannot be a good poker player or a good athlete who can win consistently without skill, which brings us to our next point.

You need to be dedicated to play poker

A lot of us know the stories of some of the most successful athletes. A lot of them start playing their respective game at a very young age and they were able to get to the top with years of hard work and determination. The same can be said about the best professional poker players.

Due to the age restriction of poker, it is difficult to find kids gambling from the age of eight but there are examples of some of the poker greats learning to play poker at the age of 15.

For example, Daniel Negreanu, arguably the greatest poker player ever, the six time World series of poker winner started playing poker from age 15 but at the time, he was still too young to become a poker pro.

Regardless of when you start, the dedication, the hours spent in practice, the amount of real life gatherings and events missed and the amount of sacrifices made are exactly the same.

You might see them as different sports now but the truth is the best poker players are committed athletes who give everything to be good at the poker game.

Poker can be played for fun

Anybody who has played poker for even a few minutes knows how fascinating it is. You’ll be hooked the first time you go all-in against another player and hit that miraculous river card.

For many individuals, the most enjoyable aspect of poker is decoding the several riddles that must be solved. These are only a handful of the thousands of decision moments that might occur at any time throughout a poker hand.

Even if you get a little nitpicky about the definition of a sport, or you are even doubtful of whether poker is a sport, you can’t deny that poker performs well by this iteration of the word “entertainment” as well.

The World Series of Poker (WSOP) continues to receive high ratings year after year. Individuals enjoy watching the game because they want to be the ones who win the large sum of money.

Professional Poker players compete against each other

Poker clearly qualifies as a sport in terms of competitiveness. In reality, the entire concept of poker is based on competition. In the heart of the game, one professional poker player competes against another to determine which is the winner.

Apart from the obvious, the top professional poker players in the world are not those who are card-playing geniuses. The most successful players are those who can understand what their opponents are doing and develop a winning strategy.

In other words, being a good competitor determines who the top players are.

Poker is actually physically taxing

A poker player must put in the hours “grinding” at the table in order to win money. They must also play when the lesser competition is there, whether it fits into their preferred timetable or not. These lengthy sessions may be psychologically and physically exhausting. The truth is that the better a player’s physical condition, the better he or she will perform.

If you consider the average age at the World Series of Poker final table each year. It’s quite uncommon to see a player beyond 30, much alone 40. This is because young guys have the and stamina that the older players do not

The issue of Poker being gambling/Sports betting.

The truth is, most, if not all sports operate similarly to poker tournaments. Some sporting leagues have to pay a certain fee to enter the tournaments which could be compared to a poker tournament buy-in. After these tournaments, the athletes earn a prize money which is also similar to poker as well.

Did we forget to mention that, like professional athletic sports, you can bet on poker players to be the winning player in certain tournaments? If that does not categorize as sports betting, we do not know what will.