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Five daily blogs about life's 5 big choices on five different sites.
Guido Muller, Jack (Bear), jeff noel…minutes after Guido set a new Masters Track World Record in 2009…
Last week, Michael Sullivan of Gilbert, Arizona set an Indoor American and World Record in the M50-54 400m in 52.44 at the Masters Indoor Track & Field Indoor National Championships, in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Had I been there, no doubt, I would have captured Michael’s world record, the same way jeff noel captured this one in 2009.
Amazing happens.
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Let’s shake it up a little bit today. You good with that? Good. Let’s go back to this past summer.
Here’s the scene. Early August, 2009. Sunny, clear, 70 degrees.
Finland.
Master’s Track & Field 2009 World Championships. Men’s 400 meters, 70-74 year old age group.
Enter a German man.
Click here to see the secret this “old man” reveals about getting and staying healthy.
PS. If you are too busy to follow this and invest two more minutes, please go look in the mirror and say something like, “I really do want to get healthy and stay healthy, but I just really don’t want to work very hard at it.”
Have you ever had something really important or “big” in your life, a long-time dream perhaps, where you where getting close to the end of your journey?
And you were so close you could see the glorious end in sight, but then the unthinkable happened.
How did you deal with it? Did it work out for you?
Where you forced to compromise? Or maybe (gasp), quit?
Pain in the as foot.
Pain in my left foot. Still.
It plagued me during the August Master’s Track & Field World Championships. In fact, it has bothered me all year.
In the Spring, it seemed to be a dominant topic at Lane 8.
By June however, I pretty much had stopped writing about the pain, but not because it went away.
Eventually, I had to suck it up and do what needed to be done to make it happen.
In Finland, it didn’t turn out the way I had dreamed, but that’s the beautiful lesson – nothing turns out the way we dream.
It’s either better or worse, but never the same.
Friday we went to Twistee Treat, like we always do, and our order came out the drive thru window, like it always does (without ordering).
The friendly Twistee Treat employee, Lori (may or may not be her real name), asked, “How’d it go?”
We’ve been going to Twistee Treat for four years and Lori was always there on Mondays and Fridays. For the past year or so though, Lori has a different schedule, we rarely see her.
Quickly, my brain started working overtime to remember what Lori was referring to. Nothing.
So I sort of embarrassingly asked Lori, “How’d what go?”
“The track meet.”
Then it hit me. I gave Lori a Lane 8 business card at some point and must have described the Lane 8 vision. You know, “If your goal isn’t impossible….I don’t care if I get the worst lane and come in last.”
Because I’ve had time to process, and have overcome the reluctance to just spit it out, I was able to come right out with it, “Forty-third. In the world.”
“There were 5,300 athletes from 80 different countries. In my event (400m) alone, there were 63 athletes aged 50-54. Eight of them were Americans. Seven made it to the semi-finals. I was the one that didn’t.”
43rd. In the whole world. Ya with me?