Free Sports Pictures & Backgrounds: 97 Photos

97 free sport pictures from the BigFoto library, most taken at events in Switzerland: football matches and training, beach volleyball by a lake, the riders of the Tour de Suisse, marathon runners and a triathlon start, inline skaters in a long line, street hockey, motocross riders in the air, BMX riders flying into a lake, windsurfers and kites, ski jumpers on summer mats, golf, tennis, horse jumping and Schwingen, the Swiss wrestling in sawdust.

Use them as a sports background for club websites, event posters, slides and social media, or for articles about health and fitness.

How to download: click a photo to see it large, then use Download. The originals are about 1200 × 800 pixels: right for blog posts, slides, social media, school projects and video call backgrounds.

Football

Matches, training sessions, a women’s game, teams lining up in a stadium and a Swiss-cross football on the grass.

Beach volleyball and volleyball

Beach volleyball on sand courts with the mountains behind, a referee in his chair, and volleyball on grass.

Beach volleyball by a lake below the mountains

Cycling

The Tour de Suisse peloton behind a police motorbike, sprints to the line, a time trial, a triathlon transition area and a ride along a gravel path.

Running and triathlon

Marathon runners from the start to the finish line, a lead runner alone on the road, and a triathlon swim start in a lake.

Inline skating and street hockey

Long lines of inline skaters racing on the road, skates up close, and street hockey and roller hockey matches.

Motocross

Riders in the air over a jump, dust and mud in the corners, and the start line.

Water sports

Windsurfers on the lakes, a sailing catamaran, kites over the water and a pedal boat race.

In the air and on snow

BMX riders flying off a ramp into a lake at Boardstock, a high dive, paragliders, a skier and ski jumpers training on summer mats.

Golf, tennis, wrestling and more

Golf, tennis in an indoor arena, horse jumping, rock climbing, baseball, basketball and Schwingen, the Swiss wrestling in a ring of sawdust.

About sport and sports photography

Sport is a major area of human interest and activity. A large part of our leisure, newspaper and TV time is given over to it. A pragmatic approach to defining “sport” is to look at the common usage of the term. A sport can be operationally defined as an activity characteristically involving :

Conforming to a set of rules for the activity while aiming to attain excellence.

The excellence referred to above may be measured against previous benchmarks, time measurements, performance of the other team or participants, world records, etc..

More than most types of photography, sports photography requires the right equipment:

Lens: aim to get the longest lens you can afford, say a 300mm or 400mm lens with a built in tripod mount. Choose a lens with an f stop of f/2.8 or f/4.

Then you have to use the equipment effectively:

Shutter speed: to freeze action you need a high shutter speed (ISO). Professionals use 1/1000th of a second, although expensive modern cameras will go up to 3200 ISO.

If you are a beginner you could let the camera decide the best setting by using Auto ISO, or if you wish to experiment, start with 1600 ISO.

For a picture with a player in sharp focus against a blurry background, use 1/100th of a second or 1/80th of a second.

Do not use a flash without checking first that it is allowed. Many sports authorities ban the use of flash because it can distract the players.

Shoot in jpeg format in the camera. This compresses your images and will allow you to edit and file them easily.

Lastly, to make good sports pictures, follow some of these ideas:

Know your sport: This will help you compose the shot well. You will understand the angles and positioning of the participants and will have a better idea of when to release the shutter.

Try to tell a story: Brilliant though action shots can be, a sense of the story behind the pictures will add interest. Consider photographing sports lifestyles, close-up portraits of competitors, their equipment, crowd reactions and the setting of the event.

Do something different: While studying other people’s sports photos in magazines is a valuable exercise, in the end something original will be more striking. Consider unusual angles, experiment with camera settings, or work on the photographs with some of the commercially available software for improving digital photographs.

More free photos

Questions about these sport photos

Can I use these sport pictures for free?

Yes, for personal and commercial projects. All we ask is a link back to BigFoto.com; the box at the top of the page has a credit link you can copy.

Can I use photos of athletes in an advert?

Our licence covers the photo, but recognisable people have rights to their own image. For adverts and products, choose photos where no single person is the main subject, such as the peloton, the skaters in a line or the riders in the air.