The Greatest Athlete of All

The Beijing Olympics is finally over, and I have to say that it was a spectacle to behold. The chinese have done themselves proud, and it will be difficult to remember another Olympic games as remarkable as Beijing had been.

However, all must remember again that the Olympic Games was, and always will be, about the athletes. This group of elite sportsmen, who spent countless hours training and perservering, with only one one goal, to push their limits and attempt the surpass the physical limits of the human body.They have a capacity for enduring pain, and that is something few individuals have. Despite all that, they carry on, because they love their sport.

But who is the greatest athlete of them all?

Perhaps one of the most decorated athletes of all right now would be Michael Phelps. Having won 8 gold medals at the Beijing Olympics, along with 7 world records and 1 Olympic record, he has achieved the impossible. Some attribute this to a very good body build, nearly to perfection for a swimmer. An abnormally large armspan, extra big feet that act like propellors, and a slim torso to decrease drag in water. These are scientific explanations for the feats achieved by this great man.

What I feel though, is that science can merely explain a small part of his success. He is a winner not because he has the best physique for swimming, but rather because of his attitude. Phelps had dedicated his life to swimming. He had been training to swim for nearly his whole life, starting at the tender age of seven. He excelled and dominated throughout his life, because he wants to push his limits and do what he loves.

How about Bryan Clay? He is the decathlon champion in Beijing, and usually the winner of the decathlon earns the unofficial title of the "Greatest Athlete in the World". It is not an easy event. To win, one must not merely be able to run well, but must also throw and jump well. It requires great discipline and perseverance to last through all ten events in the two days, and also requires extreme traning and hard work to develop the body to a point where one can compete at the world's stage.

The more remarkable thing about Clay is that he is so much smaller than the other athletes. The average decathele is about 190cm, while Bryan Clay is merely 180cm, a full 10 cm shorter.He does not however resents at the fact that he has a disadvantage, but rather improves himself in other areas to back up his weakness. A true sportsmen never whines, but merely pushes himself harder. That is what Clay does. And that is why he is a winner.

At this point, we think again. What defines a great athlete. Is it merely his achievements? Or is it his attitude. I say it is the mind over the body. Michael Phelps and Bryan Clay are both examples of the minds triumph over the body. They exhibit startling levels of endurance and grit, and that brings them to the top of their field.

But I say, there is no greatest athlete. The are merely many exceptional ones. Phelps is a great athlete, so is Bryan Clay. But not only winners are great athletes. The greatest athletes are those who push themselves not only to the maximum, but beyond it. They don't have to be stars. A school athlete who breaks her shin bone, but crawls to the finish line has demonstrated remarkable spirit. A school athlete who refuses to let his opponent run away from him, despite obvious signs of fatigue and exhaustion, deserves as much applaud as any of the medal winners.

Roger Bannister, the first man to do a four minute mile, said this," Doctors and scientists said that breaking the four-minute mile was impossible, that one would die in the attempt. Thus, when I got up from the track after collapsing at the finish line, I figured I was dead."

The potential of the body can be stretched further by the potential of the mind, for the mind has no limits. And all those who have figured this out, and applied it, are together the world's greatest athletes.

GL