20 best movies like Personal Best (1982)

A teenager overcomes odds to run a 4-minute mile race.

A coming of age drama following the life of Matt Hamill, the first deaf wrestler to win a National Collegiate Wrestling Championship.

The story of a New York pro baseball team and two of its players. Henry Wiggen is the star pitcher and Bruce Pearson is the normal, everyday catcher who is far from the star player on the team and friend to all of his teammates. During the off-season, Bruce learns that he is terminally ill, and Henry, his only true friend, is determined to be the one person there for him during his last season with the club. Throughout the course of the season, Henry and his teammates attempt to deal with Bruce's impending illness, all the while attempting to make his last year a memorable one.

A young man aspiring for recognition of his talents battles against his estranged father's sentiment towards him as the father deals with his own demons.

This is the story of a teenager named Gracie Bowen, who lives in South Orange, New Jersey, is crazy about soccer, as are her three brothers and former soccer star father. Although Gracie wants to join her brothers and father in the nightly practices, she is discouraged by everyone except her elder brother, Johnny. Her father does not believe that girls should play soccer and tells her that she is neither tough enough nor talented enough to play with the boys team. Undeterred, Gracie finds reserves of strength she never knew existed, and persists in changing everyone's beliefs in what she is capable of, including her own. She faces an uphill battle when she fights to give women the opportunity to play competitive soccer. But as the beautiful and strong person that she has always been but she also brings her family together in the face of their own tragedy.

In 1966, Texas Western coach Don Haskins led the first all-black starting line-up for a college basketball team to the NCAA national championship.

Sensitive study of a headstrong high school football star who dreams of getting out of his small Western Pennsylvania steel town with a football scholarship. His equally ambitious coach aims at a college position, resulting in a clash which could crush the player's dreams

Talent can only get you so far. For golfer Luke Chisholm, that turns out to be Utopia, Texas -- where he's left stranded after blowing his pro debut.

As bareknuckled boxing enters the modern era, brash extrovert Jim Corbett uses new rules and dazzlingly innovative footwork to rise to the top of the top of the boxing world.

Rudy grew up in a steel mill town where most people ended up working, but wanted to play football at Notre Dame instead. There were only a couple of problems. His grades were a little low, his athletic skills were poor, and he was only half the size of the other players. But he had the drive and the spirit of 5 people and has set his sights upon joining the team.

When Dr. Marcus Sommers realizes that he and his troubled, estranged brother David may be prone a fatal brain disease that runs in their family, he decides to make peace with his sibling, and invites him on a trip to the Rockies. There, the brothers bond over their shared enthusiasm for cycling and decide to enter a grueling bike race through the mountains. However, Marcus' health soon begins to fail, and David must compete without his brother at his side.

In the late 1930s, a young machinist named Maurice Richard distinguished himself as a ice hockey player of preternatural talent. Although that was enough to get him into the Montreal Canadiens, his frequent injuries cost him the confidence of his team and the fans. In the face of these doubts, Richard eventually shows the kind of aggressive and skillful play that would make him one of the greatest players of all time as "The Rocket." However for all his success, Richard and his fellow French Canadians face constant discrimination in a league dominated by the English speaking. Although a man of few words, Richard begins to speak his own mind about the injustice which creates a organizational conflict that would culminate in his infamous 1955 season suspension that sparks an ethnic riot in protest. In the face of these challenges, Richard must decide who exactly is he playing for.

The coach of a women's swim team parlays her success into an opportunity to build her school's men's golf team.

The more you love, the harder you fight.The world looks at Billy Flynn and sees a has-been who seemingly never was, an ex-boxing champion slammed to the mat years ago by booze and gambling. But Billy's son TJ sees what the world doesn't. He knows his flawed but loving father is, was and always will be The Champ.

A biographical drama based on the life of fictional Haryana based wrestler & mixed martial arts specialist Sultan Ali Khan.

A Taiwanese high school baseball team travels to Japan in 1931 to compete in a national tournament.

A chronicle of Babe Ruth's phenomenal story--from his hard knock beginnings at a Baltimore orphanage, to his meteoric rise to baseball superstardom and his poignant retirement from the game. His amazing career included seven American League pennants, four World Series championships, two tempestuous marriages and a wild lifestyle that earned him numerous suspensions.

In this uplifting film based on a true story, coach Jim Ellis (Terrence Howard) shocks the community and changes lives when, aided by a local janitor (Bernie Mac), he sets out to form Philadelphia's first black swim team. But the odds are against them as they battle rigid rules, racism and more.

When a plane crash claims the lives of members of the Marshall University football team and some of its fans, the team's new coach and his surviving players try to keep the football program alive.

A young coach turns a losing high school football program around to go undefeated for 12 consecutive seasons.

In a last-ditch effort to save his career, sports agent JB Bernstein (Jon Hamm) dreams up a wild game plan to find Major League Baseball’s next great pitcher from a pool of cricket players in India. He soon discovers two young men who can throw a fastball but know nothing about the game of baseball. Or America. It’s an incredible and touching journey that will change them all — especially JB, who learns valuable lessons about teamwork, commitment and family.

A biopic of 20-year-old Francis Ouimet who defeated his golfing idol and 1900 US Open Champion, Harry Vardon.

Billy "The Great" Hope, the reigning junior middleweight boxing champion, has an impressive career, a loving wife and daughter, and a lavish lifestyle. However, when tragedy strikes, Billy hits rock bottom, losing his family, his house and his manager. He soon finds an unlikely savior in Tick Willis, a former fighter who trains the city's toughest amateur boxers. With his future on the line, Hope fights to reclaim the trust of those he loves the most.

The story of golf icon and legend, Bobby Jones, who retired from competition at the tender age of 28.

The life story of Brazilian football legend, Pele.

A broken-down alcoholic prizefighter struggles to keep custody of his adoring son.

Soul Surfer is the inspiring true story of teen surfer Bethany Hamilton. Bethany lost her left arm in a shark attack and courageously overcame all odds to become a champion again, through her sheer determination and unwavering faith.Bethany (AnnaSophia Robb) was born to surf. A natural talent who took to the waves at a young age, she was leading an idyllic life on Kauai, participating in national surf competitions with her best friend Alana (Lorraine Nicholson), when everything changed. On Halloween morning, a 14-foot tiger shark came out of nowhere and seemed to shatter all her dreams.Soul Surfer reveals Bethany's fight to recover from her ordeal and how she grappled with the question of her future. Strengthened by the love of her parents, Tom (Dennis Quaid) and Cheri (Helen Hunt), and supported by her youth group leader Sara (Carrie Underwood), Bethany refuses to give in or give up, and begins a bold return to the water.

Beyond the Mat is a 1999 professional wrestling documentary, directed by Barry W. Blaustein. The movie focuses on the lives of professional wrestlers outside of the ring, especially Mick Foley, Terry Funk, and Jake Roberts. The film heavily focuses on the World Wrestling Federation (WWF), often criticizing it and its chairman Vince McMahon. It also follows Extreme Championship Wrestling, it's rise in popularity, and many other independent wrestlers and organisations.

Based on the incredible true story, The Express follows the inspirational life of college football hero Ernie Davis, the first African-American to win the Heisman Trophy.

In 1961, Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle played for the New York Yankees. One, Mantle, was universally loved, while the other, Maris, was universally hated. Both men started off with a bang, and both were nearing Babe Ruth's 60 home run record. Which man would reach it?

A baseball legend almost finished with his distinguished career at the age of forty has one last chance to prove who he is, what he is capable of, and win the heart of the woman he has loved for the past four years.

Housewife and mother Penny Chenery agrees to take over her ailing father's Virginia-based Meadow Stables, despite her lack of horse-racing knowledge. Against all odds, Chenery - with the help of veteran trainer Lucien Laurin - manages to navigate the male-dominated business, ultimately fostering the first Triple Crown winner in 25 years.

The dramatic and inspirational story of a young pitcher who becomes the first woman to play Major League Baseball.

A street smart runner develops an intense rivalry with an equally ambitious wealthy young athlete.

Story of a promising high school basketball star and his relationships with two brothers, one a drug dealer and the other a former basketball star fallen on hard times and now employed as a security guard.

A track coach in a small California town transforms a team of athletes into championship contenders.

Two men meet in the ring for a fight that will change their lives.

Unable to cope with his military father's sudden death in combat, quick-tempered teen, Conor, starts getting into serious trouble. During an intense lacrosse camp, his father's old friend challenges Conor to get his life on track and become a man.

When Sarah has a chance to go to a first class university and to join its premiere athletic club, her suburban mother is fearful of the change and refuses to help financially. But Sarah's roommate knows that they will get a grant if they marry. Sarah agrees but only to discover that her true heart lies elsewhere. Sarah prefers to run.

When a high school football star is suddenly stricken with irreversible total blindness, he must decide whether to live a safe handicapped life or bravely return to the life he once knew and the sport he still loves.

An ex-boxer, living with the knowledge that his fight career was cut short by a crooked manager, channels his bitter disappointment in a single-minded quest for boxing championships for his three sons. We see them in pee-wee Silver Glove matches with dad constantly pushing them. Ten years later, they're young men, with dad as both father and manager. A professional promoter, Nick Everson, wants to sign the boys, but dad rejects those offers. Then, in expressions of their varied relationships with their father, each son makes his own decisions. Can dad ever step aside, and can the family hold together?

Hardened by years in foster care, a teenage girl from Brooklyn’s Brownsville neighborhood decides that wrestling boys is the only way back to her estranged father.

The legendary Roberto Duran and his equally legendary trainer Ray Arcel change each other's lives.

Ned Hanlan was Canada's most successful sculling champion at the turn of the 20th century. This dramatization of his life begins in his youth, when the wild young man is informally adopted by a gambler who promotes Ned on the sculling circuit, betting on the boy's rowing skills solely to make money off him. Later, a ruthless businessman named Knox takes over Ned's career, but when Ned realizes how dishonest Knox is, he finds another manager. Walter is an inventor and the first honest man Ned has dealt with in his career and, under Walter's guidance, Ned rises to great success in the sculling world.

A losing coach with an underdog football team faces their giants of fear and failure on and off the field to surprising results.

Zamperini returns to California where he wound up marrying Cynthia Applewhite while wrestling with untreated PTSD, suffering constant nightmares, angry, bitter and deeply depressed, his wife convinces Zamperini to attend the 1949 Billy Graham Crusade.

The true story of Gabby Douglas who becomes the first African American to be named Individual All-Around Champion in artistic gymnastics at the Olympic Games.

On these streets everyone is fighting for a way out, but after a lifetime of hard knocks, a down-on-his-luck cage fighter gets the opportunity of a lifetime when he is chosen to compete against the MMA world champion during a massive competition. The stakes are high and the reward great...but should he lose, it will cost him his life.

Two men, working as professional boxers, come to blows when their careers each begin to take opposite momentum.

Based on true events amid the wreckage and chaos dealt by Hurricane Katrina; one basketball coach in Marrero, Louisiana just will not give up. Coach Al Collins(Forest Whitaker), gathers other players from hard-hit schools and builds a team actually worthy enough to go to the state playoffs. A very honest look at what can be done with the right people having the desire and fortitude to pick up and