Olympic Dream Fulfilled
In May of 1999 I hit the Olympic A standard in the 10,000 meter. This earned me a trip to the World Championships in Seville, Spain that summer. Fortunately, my time carried over to the following year, so I had the A standard going in to the 2000 Olympic Trials. Unfortunately, I didn’t make the team that year. I remember watching Meb, Culpepper and Abdi pull away from me with 5K to go. I tried to stay with them as long as I could, but I just couldn’t keep up. There probably isn’t a day that goes by where I don’t think about that moment and how bad I wanted to be an Olympian.
It was the summer of 1984 when my Olympic dream began. I just turned 13.
With the Games already in full force in Los Angeles, my father made the impulse decision to load the family in the beat up station wagon and drive the 700 plus miles from Ashland, Oregon down to southern California in order to soak up the Olympic experience. We certainly didn’t have event tickets, nor could we possibly afford them. My dad figured we could just find a spot on the street, along the end of the marathon course, and watch the women’s marathon enter the stadium.
Once we arrived in LA, I remember getting up extra early and driving towards the stadium on a hot summer day to catch a glimpse of the race. We found a parking spot which seemed like ten miles a way and trudged towards where the marathon course met the stadium entrance. As we got closer and closer we could hear the stadium speakers blaring that Joan Benoit (now Benoit Samuelson) was opening up a huge lead over the field. Our excitement grew and we walked faster hoping to get a good spot on the street. By the time we reached the course, the streets were so crowded that there was no chance that my dad and his three boys could ever find an open spot to watch the runners go by. The speakers from the stadium continued to scream that Benoit was still leading with just a few miles to go. We could now here the crowd inside the stadium chanting “U-S-A, U-S-A, U-S-A…”
At that moment my dad told my oldest brother, Bob, to stay with me and Tim. He said that he would be right back and for us not to move. I saw my dad disappear into the huge crowd. Ten minutes later my dad emerged with a huge smile on his face. He had three tickets in his hand. He gave them to us and told us to run as fast as we could to the stadium. We looked at him and asked him why he wasn’t coming. He just kept on smiling and told us to run, FAST! As the three of us raced towards the stadium with tickets in hand, I turned around and saw my dad standing there laughing. I later learned that my dad found a scalper and bought three tickets that were being sold for an outrageous price. He had just enough money for three tickets. It was probably all the money he had for our entire trip to California.
The three of us boys entered the stadium. The ushers pointed us towards the Olympic Flame and told us our seats were at the very top row, right under the Flame. We climbed the hundreds of steps and found our seats moments before Benoit entered the stadium. It was the most thrilling experience I have ever had. Over 100,000 people screaming “U-S-A, U-S-A” were in complete hysterics as Benoit came charging in with her silver uniform and white cap in hand. At that very moment I wanted to become an Olympian and I spent the next 20 years doing everything I could to become one. It was not to be.
However, this blog isn’t about an Olympic dream unfulfilled. I would, in fact, argue the opposite. After all, I learned how to chase something with reckless abandon. I learned how to believe in myself and not some statistic. I learned how to risk it all. I learned that I am capable of wrestling the wolves until I am spent. Perhaps this is what the Olympic dream is really about. Thanks, Dad.
PJ
Last 5 posts by Pete Julian- Keep Your Hand On The Burner - February 14th, 2008
July 15th, 2008 at 3:34 pm |
Pete - that is an awesome post. On some fronts, your references to your journey towards the Olympics reminds me of a quote from TR.
It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.
July 15th, 2008 at 7:47 pm |
Every so often someone catches the essence of the Olympic dream. The image of a wide-eyed boy running into the stadium and getting caught in the moment, then dedicating everything in pursuit of a dream - priceless.
Thank you!
I wish more people could/would so vividly share the life changing moment when the Olympic spirit was kindled.
July 17th, 2008 at 1:19 pm |
Reading Pete’s story gave me chills, I remembered what I was doing on that same August morning in 1984. My boyfriend and I had gone out for a 10-mile run, hoping to return in time to watch the women’s marathon. It was early in the morning when we headed out the door into a typical Michigan summer day; the three ‘Hs’: heat, humidity and haze were in abundance. Since I was a better hot weather runner I dropped my boyfriend at six miles, he stopped for water at a gas station and told me to go on, he’d take his time getting back. The first thing I did when I walked in the front door was to turn on the TV, and I’ll never forget hearing the announcer’s voice before the picture came into view: hushed, almost reverent, describing a run for the ages. Then, there she was: a diminutive figure on the screen, cap turned askew, singlet and shorts looking too big for her fire-plug body, eyes straight ahead and the most calm, beautiful look of focused composure and confidence I had ever seen, and have yet to see again, on any athlete. I forgot to get water, I wasn’t thirsty any longer, I wasn’t tired, I wasn’t hot…I plopped down and sat cross-legged in front of the TV, as close as I could get as if somehow by leaning in I could will myself to be there, and when my boyfriend finally arrived and I turned to look at him as he walked in the door, I knew that he understood that the moisture on my cheeks wasn’t sweat.
At the age of 34 I was too old then to seriously consider that I could ever make the Olympic team. I had after all only been running for three years, and although I was a good local and regional runner, I was sensible enough to know that I would never achieve such a lofty goal. But, I could try to make the marathon trials. In 1987, after several unsuccessful attempts at breaking the 2:50 time standard to qualify, I ran Grandma’s Marathon. The day was much the same as I imagine it was in LA in 1984: bright sun and hot temperatures. That morning when I woke up it was already nearly 60-degrees, and the forecast was for temps to reach the high 70s but the first thought that went through my mind as I opened my eyes was: “Today is the day, today is the day. No matter the heat, the humidity, the glaring sun…today is the day, today is MY day.” I imagined that that was exactly what Joan had been thinking on HER day three years earlier.
Through 20 miles I was on pace to run a 2:48 but just after the 20-mile mark my right shoe came untied. It happened within a few seconds, suddenly the laces were flapping from side to side with every step, spectators were calling out to me, the laces seemed to be loosening every time my foot hit the ground; I had to make a decision, fast. That’s when her image, the picture that was forever burned into the back of my mind, came into clear view, I saw Joan, I saw her focus, I saw her resolve and I knew that it was time for me to “be like Joan.” It took less than a minute or so for me to decide that I had no time to stop, retie the laces and get back into the pace I’d settled into; I would run until the shoe loosened so much that it would come off, then I would finish wearing only my left shoe. I ran, eyes straight ahead, determined and confident, no longer hearing people along the course shouting the obvious, the laces flopped, the shoe stayed on. When I ran under the clock and took my first step over the finish line, the shoe slipped off my foot. My time was 2:48:18, I had achieved my goal…I would run in the 1988 women’s Olympic marathon trials.
Today my certificate of participation in the Olympic marathon trials from the United States Olympic Committee and my bib numbers, dry-mounted and framed, hang on the wall in my home office. I look at them every day, and every day I see her: the woman who inspired me to be greater than I ever believed I could be, who made my believe in myself, who taught me that working hard for what you want and trusting in yourself despite any obstacles that get in your way, will make your dreams come true.