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Every time the Olympics are getting close I find myself really not caring.  And yet, every time they start, I’m addicted to the t.v.  The Olympics are what sports are all about.  The chance to represent your country and competing with honor.  There are two completely different things I love about them.. the first is watching a guy like Michael Phelps try to make history as the most dominate athlete of the games by trying to win 8 gold medals.  So far he has 5, and he’s heavily favored the rest of the way.  But the part of the Olympics that really grabs my attention are the athletes that have no shot at winning, they know it, and we know it.  But they are there to give it their all, and be proud to represent their country. 

One of my favorite moments in Olympics history happened in the 2000 games in Sydney.  Eric Moussambani of Equatorial Guinea was ready to swim in the 100m freestyle.  There were only three swimmers in his heat, and the other two guys false started and were disqualified.  That left Eric “the Eel” to swim alone.  It didn’t take long for the crowd to realize that he had no shot to challenge for a medal.  But as the swim continues, the crowd is won over, and so was I.  If I remember the story right, he had never swam this far in his life, and he’d never been in a pool this big, but he gave everything he had for his country.

In my personal experience, sports can be more than what happens on the field.  When this crowd saw “the eel” struggling to finish, they lifted him on their shoulders and cheered him to the end.  I was living in Grand Junction, Colorado at the time playing college baseball, and a day or two later there was an article in one of the newspapers about “the eel.”  I cut it out and I hung it in my locker for the entire season.  Eric Moussambani swam, what I believe to be, the slowest 100m in Olympics history.  Yet his picture hung in my locker and inspired me to give it my all, every day.  When I think of the Olympics, that’s what I remember.

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