Americans love labels almost as much as they love categories.

Our culture seems obsessed with identifying, classifying and properly filing everyone and everything, even the things that are supposed to be fun; a break from that sort of thinking.

For instance, what is a sport? What, if anything, is the difference between a sport and a game? Who gets to decide these things?

It’s not as frivolous a conundrum as you might think. In a world where major league video game tournaments draw arena-sized crowds and the World Series of Poker regularly dominates ESPN airtime, it can quickly get confusing.

The American Heritage Dictionary defines sport as, “An activity involving physical exertion and skill that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often undertaken competitively.”

You might not agree with that, but Anders McInnis, 9, a soon-to-be-junior-Olympian, said that his passion, competitive cup stacking, is absolutely a sport by any definition.

Don’t believe him? Give it a try, he said. There’s more to it than you think.

What the stack?

Sport stacking, also known as speed stacking (or just “stacking” to those who love it), is an individual and team competition in which plastic cups of various sizes are stacked in specific sequences. Whoever does it fastest wins.

There are doubles and a relay event, too, in categories decided by age.

Anders, a Odyssey Multiage Program third-grader, fell in love with stacking about six months ago when, after he’d been absently playing around and stacking some regular plastic cups, his father showed him a YouTube video of a speed stacking tournament.

He was hooked and set to it with gusto, practicing for at least an hour every day at home, getting his friends involved and even starting a stacking club at school.

All his hard work and sweat (yes, you do get sweaty, he said) paid off recently when he earned a spot at the fifth annual World Sport Stacking Association’s 2016 Amateur Athletic Union Junior Olympic Games Sport Stacking Championship at the George R. Brown Convention Center in Houston, Texas next month.

Nineteen other sports will hold championships there as well.

McInnis, who also enjoys basketball, said his favorite part of speed stacking competitions is the fun, easygoing atmosphere and camaraderie among the players.

You’re basically playing against yourself and your own best time, so everyone can compete and still be friends, Anders said.

“You’re not mad at the other team if they win,” he said. “If you lose, you’re not like, ‘Oh, man!’

“It’s fun because you stack and when you stop the timer you see the faster time and you like getting a lot better at it. It’s fun to get a new record because you’ve been practicing and practicing.”

Founding the club at school gave Anders the chance to share his favorite sport with classmates, something he said was not only a blast but made him a better stacker too.

“If I taught someone it and they might start stacking, which means that there’s more people I know who stack and I could stack with,” he explained. “And it feels good when you show someone because it’s like you’re showing them something that you like a lot and then it feels good when they like something that you appreciate.”

Anders said he has a lot of favorite stackers who he regularly searches for online. His mother, Mary McCormic-McInnis, said that she especially enjoys that so many famed and renowned stackers are close to her son’s age, people he can realistically look up to right now.

“They’re kids,” she said.

Growing in popularity

Though there is an active adult division, the sport has grown in popularity exponentially around the world since its beginnings in the early ’80s, mostly with a younger demographic.

“It’s really kind of an individual sport but it’s also social,” she said. “One thing my husband said that I hadn’t thought about is his heroes are all kids, which is really unique as far as sports. That’s been sort of a neat thing to see.”

Anders earned his spot at the Junior Olympics at a recent tournament in Portland, Oregon.

It was a big surprise, he remembered, because not only did he not think he did well enough to qualify, but it was also his first tournament ever.

“It felt really, really good,” he said, remembering when he received a letter inviting him to Texas.

Dedication? Discipline? Physicality? Hand-eye coordination? The thrill of victory?

Sounds an awful lot like a sport.

There is an ongoing fundraising effort to support Anders’ trip to the Junior Olympics. Visit www.gofundme.com/26UFGUS to learn more and donate.