Absurd, ridiculous, preposterous all mean inconsistent with reason or common sense. Absurd means utterly opposed to truth or reason: an absurd claim. Ridiculous implies that something is fit only to be laughed at, perhaps contemptuously: a ridiculous suggestion.
In my opinion it relates to athletes only because it talks about winning victory and then at the end of the poem it explains how you will soon be forgotten by saying "the name died before the man."
