INSPIRATIONAL OLYMPIC MOMENTS TO PONDER! Where’s Your Spirit?

WHAT'S AN OLYMPIC MOMENT?
Are there any memorable, special, or inspirational moments in the Olympics over the past 3000 years? I can’t think of any. What about you? “What about Dorothy Hamill’s hairstyle in 1976?” That’s memorable, but not really inspirational. “How about Franz Klammer’s downhill race with total abandon in Innsbruck?” As the last one to ski, he even said: “I thought I was going to crash the whole way down.” That event would qualify.

CRITERIA FOR A MOMENT
Just what criteria or ingredients make up a memorable and inspirational Olympic moment? As an avid Olympics fan for over 40 years, I suggest the following:

• Overcoming pain and/or injury to win or just finish the event
• Overcoming emotional tragedy or trauma during the event
• Overcoming major obstacles with unusual drive and perseverance
• Unbelievable, mind and heart boggling performance that stunts the audience
• Racial, ethnic, or national barrier-breaking performance

Overall, these moments may not involve medals or breaking records, but rather exhibit the BEST OF THE HUMAN SPIRIT. They move us in a very special way. 

BERK'S FAVE MOMENTS 
My baker’s dozen examples are listed below. Interestingly, most are from the summer Olympics. For further info on any of these moments, Google the athlete or event. You may or may not agree with my picks. Let me know yours. Here they are:

• Cathy Freeman (Sydney, 2000)
• Kerri Strug (Atlanta, 1996)
• Muhammad Ali (Atlanta,1996)
• Dan Jansen (Lillehammer, 1994)
• Derek Redmond (Barcelona, 1992)
• Jamaican Bobsled Team (Calgary, 1988)
• Lawrence Lemieux (Seoul, 1988)
• Greg Louganis (Seoul, 1988)
• U.S. Ice Hockey Team (Lake Placid, 1980)
• Nadia Comaneci (Montreal, 1976)
• Franz Klammer (Innsbruck, 1976)
• Wilma Rudolph (Rome, 1960)
• Jesse Owens (Berlin, 1936)

I hope these names trigger incredible memories in your noggin. May the story behind each one of these athletes inspire you and pump you up to fly over tall buildings in a single or double bound. (Question: What if Superman took more than 1 bound? Did anyone know?)

VANCOUVER
I can’t wait for the stories to emerge from the Vancouver events. I hope you all will have the opportunity to experience an amazing event so you can fist bump everybody within your reach. We all need a motivational jolt to press on to overcome the challenges and obstacles in our professional and personal lives. There’s probably no substitute for courage, hard work, and determination. Somehow, it's so motivating to see those attributes in the athletes to jog your mind and heart so you can emulate them.

Enjoy the Olympics! I know I will. I hope it lights a professional fire within your belly or spleen.

COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC

PREPARING FOR THE ACADEMIC OLYMPICS: Go for the Bronze! (A Parody, Part I)

We’re less than 2 weeks away. I’m sooo excited. I’m finally going to replace the 2 rear tires on my SUV. WAIT! That’s not that exciting. It’s the Super Bowl! “WROOONNG AGAIN!"

It’s the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver! Where have you been? In a Peruvian rainforest? And this February 12th, guess what? The organizers don’t have to ship in dump-truck-loads of snow for the skiing events from a neighboring country like Seattle.

OLYMPIC SCHEDULE
I love the Winter Olympics—“the thrill of victory, the agony of frigid temps!” Hand warmers galore! It starts with the stimulus package-like, AIG CEO bonus-type, wastefully-expensive, opening ceremonies that last for 3 days, except in Siberia, where, due to the time-zone difference and the excessive use of commas in this sentence, it lasts 3 months. The colorful parade of athletes and Olympic flame-lighting are followed by the closing ceremonies with a few events and buckets of commercials in between.

Unfortunately, this spectacle only rolls around every 16 years, except when it falls on the Jewish New Year or Kwanza. In those cases, it’s rescheduled during spring break in an extremely cold country like Antarctica.

OLYMPIC HIGHLIGHTS
My fave dozen events this year are the following:

• 8m snowball fight
• 2-man windshield scrape
• 15.75m snow shovel toss
• 6-man bobsleigh with only guys named bob
• ladies 500m taser speed skating
• 10km jet-propelled ski jump
• individual men’s Olympic village cafeteria-tray luge
• Whistler Blackcomb Mountain alpine snow-eating contest
• women’s round robin boulder curling
• men’s pairs Super E-F-G downhill skiing
• psycho-aerial men’s drainpipe snowboarding
• 4 x 7.5 x MC square km women’s biathlon with 81mm mortars

It is so exciting to watch event after event, while trying to pronounce the names of the athletes. Eventually, the star athletes become deeply etched in our memory along with the theme song “Ode to Frosty the Snowman.”

Tomorrow I’ll continue this rollicking romp through the 2010 Olympic events and, maybe, just maybe, get to the point of the blog title.

COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC