Regular readers of this column know I prefer to keep it local – there are so many good sports stories originating from our area that there’s typically plenty of fodder for discussion.
Occasionally, though, something so unprecedented and so amazing happens that it transcends geographical boundaries and stirs something in all of us.
I’m talking, of course, about the Olympics. Specifically, the XXXIIV Games of the Olympiad, currently unfolding in and around Paris. If you’re a sports fan and you haven’t been paying attention, well, I feel bad for you, because you’re missing out on an athletic showcase unlike any other.
The storylines are limitless; pick an event, tune in for a while and you’re bound to see something you’ve never seen before.
But, beyond the competitive achievements of the world’s best athletes, there’s plenty to learn from the athletes themselves. Maybe you’ll never set a world record in pole vault, but you can approach every day as if a gold medal is on the line. Here’s how:
It’s not how you start, it’s how you finish
There are very few individual sports titles that have instant global significance. “World Champion” is one. “Gold Medalist” is another. But, every four years, the world turns its attention to the competition for “The World’s Fastest Man;” a title given to the gold medalist in the men’s 100m race. American Noah Lyles earned that title over the weekend with an incredible photo-finish win. Fifty meters into the race, Lyles was in last place, but as the race passed the halfway point, Lyles found an extra gear and passed … everyone. To anyone who had been paying attention in the lead-up to the event, Lyles’ gold medal shouldn’t have been a surprise. In fact, with quintessential American bravado, the sprinter had been telling anyone who would listen that he could do it and would do it. Then, he did it.
Don’t give up
Maybe winning isn’t everything. There’s significance in competing, too. Akani Simbane is the undisputed king of African sprinting competition, setting the continental record for the 100m in 2021. Simbane, a South African, finished fifth at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics with a time of 9.94 seconds. He qualified for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics (held in 2021 thanks to the pandemic) where he finished fourth, improving his time to 9.93 seconds. Over the weekend in Paris, Simbane recorded a personal best time of 9.82 to finish … in fourth place, by 1/100th of a second. “I might not be getting the medals and stuff,” Simbane told a South African newspaper, “but what I’m doing is changing how sprinting is seen in South Africa and I’m motivating a lot of kids, and that is really great.”
Don’t be afraid to ask for help
Simone Biles was already one of the greatest gymnasts of all time when the Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympics rolled around. There, she was expected to cement herself as the greatest ever, qualifying for all four individual-event finals. Then, the bottom fell out for Biles. Suffering from “the twisties,” a psychological condition that causes gymnasts to lose air awareness during flips, twists and turns, she withdrew from the team finals and three individual events but still earned the bronze medal on balance beam. She took the next two years to recover and seek mental health treatment before returning to world competition in 2023. By Paris 2024, Biles was back and once again winning meets, a comeback punctuated by team, individual all-around and vault gold medals, along with a silver in the floor exercise – all of which cemented her G.O.A.T. status. But where Biles really made her mark was with her openness to discuss her mental health struggles and set an example for those needing help. We don’t typically allow our great athletes to humanize themselves, but Biles did, and we’re all better for the experience.
Quit your day job
Feeling adrift? Not sure where you fit in? Women’s road race gold medalist and American cyclist Kristen Faulkner knows how you feel. Faulkner, who came out of nowhere to win the race by almost a minute, shocked the cycling world with a finishing kick that left her competitors in the dust. When I say “out of nowhere,” I mean that literally, as Faulkner wasn’t even originally scheduled to compete in the event but was given a spot when a teammate dropped out about a month before the games. A native of Homer, Alaska, Faulkner was working as a venture capitalist in New York when in 2017, on a whim, she signed up for a free cycling class in Central Park. “A few weeks later I won my first race, and that’s when I knew I wanted to see how far I could go in the sport,” Faulkner told NBC Sports. She’s now a professional road-racer, but that’s not even the biggest twist; Faulkner actually qualified for the Olympics as a track cyclist, and still has a chance to medal there as part of the women’s team pursuit event. Her story of reinvention and triumph is enough to make anyone want to get off the couch and do something and yet another reason why the Olympics are must-see TV.
Philip Poe is sports editor.
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You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 36 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.
