In case you missed it, there is an Olympian by the name of Michael Phelps who is trying to be the first person to win 8 gold medals in one Olympics. Mark Spitz won seven. Most of the events are individual races but a few are team events. He is part of a four man team. In other words, he can’t do it alone. And last night one of his team mates came through big.

In the final 50 meters of the 4 x 100 meter Jason Lezak swam an amazing anchor leg in which he came from behind and outtouched Frenchman Alain Bernard at the wall, keeping alive Phelps’ bid to break Mark Spitz’s record of seven gold medals. They set a world record too. With 75 meters to go the announcers pronounced the race virtually over, saying, “I just don’t think they can do it.” France would win and the US take a respectable second place. With 50 meters to go Lezak was behind by a length and he was swimming against one of the fastest swimmers in the world. Now you have to go the site and watch it, http://www.nbcolympics.com/video/player.html?assetid=0811_hd_swb_hl_l0194&channelcode=sportsw

I just watched it for the third time. I still get goose bumps. The Americans won. That much you know. You have to see it to believe it. Actually, you have to see it to believe. To believe that you should never give up. To believe that you can win by a finger tip (.o8 seconds). To believe that winning is worth the effort. To believe that sportsmanship still matters as you will see when the teams shake hands on the medal stand.

There is an old cliché about giving up on something at the moment just before you would have succeeded. One more push and you get the rock over the hill but you quit and the rock rolls back down. What rock are you pushing and do you know how close you are to the top? Of course, you don’t know how close you are but I can tell you this. Keep pushing; it may be nearer than you think. One extra stretch and Jason Lezak wins Olympic Gold. What can you win with one extra stretch?

This entry was posted on Monday, August 11th, 2008 at 11:55 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.