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Lead Stories: Sunday, September 7, 2008

Jon Rankin:
A Letter to the Goddess of Victory: Falling In-Love
(Elite Athlete Blog - Entry #3)

Posted January 2nd, 2008 at 4:00 PM by Jon Rankin

Section: News & Results, Track & Field, Elite Athlete Blogs, Jon Rankin

Welcome to the official blog of rising U.S. track & field star
Jon Rankin; the inaugural member of TheFinalSprint.com’s
Elite Athlete Blog Series. Make sure to check back every other Wednesday for Jon’s latest entry.

I assume you heard it at least one hundred times already, so bear with me as I say it to you one more time:
‘Happy New Year!’ to all of you.

In this entry I will be sharing a letter from my newly minted journal. It’s a letter that describes how I feel about the sport that I play (I want to achieve all that I’m capable of achieving) and also, a girl that has helped re-ignite my passion for life—a passion that I thought only existed in dreams before she won my heart.

I write this letter and will write any subsequent letters to a Goddess known as Victory. In these letters I personify the word victory because in sports victory and the idea of victory is talked about so much that it sounds like it’s something tangible, something that can be touched; and sometimes, even someone that is real. Victory is unique because the concept behind victory and what it really is goes beyond finishing first. I’ve gained a greater sense for the broadness of the definition and meaning of the word from a mentor of mine, Mebrahtom (”Meb”) Keflezighi who tells all that he meets: “RUN TO WIN.”

The interesting thing about his mantra is that it sounds like he is saying run to get first place, and that’s all. But what he is really saying is that you must run in such a way that you’re always giving your best. If you can do this then you’re truly “running to win.”
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