Sport – life – is woven of very personal stories.
Objectives, competition, training, frustration, overcoming, acceptance, ambition, starting over, teamwork, suffering, satisfaction, losing, winning.
All very dense concepts before which, with sufficient context, it is difficult not to empathize, not to get emotional.
Of all the stories surrounding the edition of the Beijing Olympic Games that are taking place these weeks, I would like to highlight the great example of Lindsey Jacobellis, who won the gold medal in snowboard cross on Wednesday the 9th.
But make no mistake: this is not just another medal among the incredibly large number she already had.
Until this instance, this was her competitive snowboarding record:
- 31 gold medals in world snowboarding.
- 10 X Games gold medals.
- 6 times world champion.
And what about the Olympics? 4 appearances, with only one silver medal in 2006, in Turin.
Flashback to those Turin Winter Olympics in 2006.
16 years ago.
Lindsey was a great candidate to win the snowboard cross competition, which debuted as an Olympic discipline that year.
She was leading the final race, with only one other competitor still standing, leading her a distance of 43 meters (3 seconds). Everything indicated that she would be crowned the winner, but two jumps before the finish line, Lindsey made a jump that did not need to be done, a jump that caused her to fall and allowed her competitor to take her place to get the gold medal, while Lindsey got the silver.
A silver medal is such an achievement that it is second only to gold, although it may be difficult for one – and especially others – to appreciate it when gold was so close at hand.
Lindsey would continue competing and collecting medals in multiple events – mostly wins! –, but for years the Olympics would be a kind of adventure that would not see her victorious.
At the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver she finished 5th. In those of 2014 in Sochi, she was 7th. And at the 2018 which took place in Pyeongchang, she came in 4th.
Nonetheless, that event in Turin would be the one that people would permanently remind her of.
In 2018, Lindsey said:
Wouldn’t it just be nice if the media didn’t harangue me for something that happened 12 years ago?
I’m sure we can go into everyone’s past 12 years ago and pick out something that they coulda, shoulda, woulda done. It’s just mine was on a world stage that people have a hard time forgetting, or they just think that’s the only thing that’s happened or that it defined me as an athlete.
I’m hoping that through all the years that I’ve been doing this, that these things will all come together and help keep me calm and focused, and hopefully I’ll come through.
Hopefully these are all small positive steps, moving forward, that could potentially have things line up for me right for this one.
It was not going to be in that instance where this hope would be fulfilled, but 4 years later.
2022.
16 years after her only Olympic medal, Lindsey performed once again at the Olympics.
She entered the round of 16 in the 5th position, and won that instance, as well as the quarter finals, semifinals, and the big final… at 36 years old. By far the oldest of the 32 seeds.
7 years older than the immediate younger.
19 years older than the youngest… who is 17 years old.
Of course, we cannot conclude that everyone that keeps trying will eventually win.
Everyone who competes is trying, and victories are not going to be distributed equally.
But for those who want to continue competing, for those who want to continue trying to win, how powerful are examples like this one from Lindsey, or Rafa Nadal winning the last Australian Open.
These examples, well employed, can be a powerful force to focus, to dive into the depths of what it really means to desire, to want something and challenge yourself, to comprehend the efforts that need to be made, to scrutinize and find latent areas for improvement when you already seem to be at the top of your game, to get to know oneself.
And all of this even though history, odds, or whatever people think seem to be against us.
What a pleasure seeing you win, Lindsey! Pure joy! Big congrats!
