The first semi-serious camera I purchased to capture sports photos was a Fuji S7000 pro-sumer model with a fixed zoom lens. It was a very nice camera, but not very good for the fast pace of sports. Here's an example of a 2004 photo using this camera.
In 2006 I was using a Nikon D70. My main sports lens for a long time was an old Nikon 70-210mm f/4 lens. It's a very high quality lens. But it has rather slow autofocus capability. However, this set up was capable of capturing some good sports photos. Check this one out of the same athlete in 2006.
Today, I mostly use a Nikon D300 camera with a 300mm lens attached for my soccer photography. Here's another example of a sports photo captured with this set up of the same athlete above this year (2009).
