Thank Goodness It's Monday #368

WHAT WE CAN LEARN FROM

BIG, “OLYMPIC” DISAPPOINTMENTS

The games of the XXX Olympiad began disappointingly for me. 

·         Not that the opening ceremony wasn’t an amazing-but-sometimes-baffling theatrical/historical extravaganza.

·         Not that the filtered-by-commercialized TV, small screen experience could have been better.

·         Not that the entrance of the sky-diving-in-pink Queen far exceeded the distracting and superfluous Rowan Atkinson flatulence “humour” (note the Brit spelling).

·         And more such …

No, no, no and no.

What I wanted – and felt disappointed by because I did not get – was:

Roger Bannister

Roger Bannister
May 6, 1954
Miracle Mile 
3:59.4

If you have even an inkling of where I’m going with this, then perhaps you were disappointed as I was.

Where was Roger Bannister? He was present, but not specifically honored. Many (including British bookies who, pre-ceremony, had him as the 1:1 favorite) suspected he would be the individual given the honor of lighting the Olympic flame in the stadium. 

Why? On May 6, 1954, the Englishman, Roger Bannister, set a record many think is – 

The most remarkable

human achievement

in any sport.

He ran the first sub-4-minute mile in recorded history.  

His time: 3 minutes 59.4 seconds. 

Yes, I know: The story of Roger Bannister and the “breaking” of the 4-minute mile barrier is a bit “old.”

But it has an Olympic twist that is seldom discussed, but should be. 

Bannister was an Olympian in 1952. But he did not win the Gold as you might have expected from the first man to run a less-than-four-minute mile. 

Nor did he win Silver. 

He did not even win a Bronze medal. 

However –

(and, as you can see, it’s a big “however”)

He's pretty sure his Olympic-sized disappointment was the reason he pursued the supposedly impossible mark. 

Olympic “Ah Ha” moment: "I failed, came in fourth in the 1,500 meters," Bannister told author James M. Clash. "Very disappointed is an understatement. But if I had gotten a Gold medal, I probably would have retired and never pursued the four-minute mile."

TGIM “Ah Ha” moment: Disappointment should not curtail us in the everyday pursuit of our hard-to-achieve goals. We should see the opportunity in not fully realizing a goal and apply a bit of mental judo to building what-not-to-do-again and what-to do-differently skills to avoid a disappointing performance on the next big challenge. 

Like breaking the 4-minute barrier. “The mile” isn’t run in the Olympics or the world championships.  So the 2012 Summer Olympics won’t change the current record. 

But the details of the Bannister story are still worth knowing and drawing inspiration from. And, at this point in these track-and-field-focused Olympic days, they’re particularly appropriate.

It begins like this: Accurate times for running a mile (1609 meters) weren’t recorded until the late 1850s. The first accurately recorded “record” time for the mile was 4 minutes 23 seconds in 1858.

Nearly a century later an under-4-minute mile was thought to be beyond the physical limit of the human body. 

Here, in his own words, is Bannister’s recounting of the situation:

“The world record was four minutes, 1.4 seconds, held by Sweden's Gunder Haegg. It had been stuck there for nine years. It didn't seem logical to me, as a physiologist/doctor, that if you could run a mile in four minutes, one and a bit seconds, you couldn't break four minutes. 

“But it had become a psychological as well as a physical barrier. In fact Australian John Landy, having done four minutes, two seconds, three times, is reported to have commented, ‘It's like a wall.’”

But in the face of this, Bannister recounts, “I just couldn't see the psychological side.”

Clearly Roger Bannister’s post-Olympic feat is irrefutable evidence that failure isn’t fatal. Clearly he had an understanding of the Motivational, Inspirational Poster Point: 

Believe

that you can reach a goal

that was previously perceived

as unreachable.

And while that’s a useful mindset and basic starting point for overcoming disappointment and enjoying lofty achievements, it’s only a foundation.

TV Time Out: Now might be a good place in the story to take a bit more than 4 minutes and, if you are so inclined, see the race itself and hear Bannister commenting on his run, here: Bannister Miracle Mile.

Or you can skip it and keep reading. 

Just watch this: The fact that Bannister, after a disappointing Olympics, set an imagined-unachievable goal for himself and then accomplished it IS NOT NECESSARILY THE MOST IMPORTANT POINT here.

IMHO: For TGIM purposes the more impactful, good-for-you-and-me point is –

What happened next. Just six weeks after Bannister broke the 4-minute barrier, Landy, the Australian, set a new, faster mark with 3:58. 

But wait, there’s more: Within the following 12 months, dozens of athletes went on to break the 4-minute mile. 

Fast forward to 2012: The world record for the mile as of this posting is held by Hicham El Guerrouj of Morocco at 3:43.13. (Svetlana Masterkova of Russia holds the women's record of 4:12.56.)

TGIM ACTION IDEA: Barriers? What barriers? What was once felt to be impossible is commonplace today – the standard of all professional middle distance runners. 

TGIM IDEA IN ACTION: Even seemingly insurmountable barriers can be overcome with knowledge, understanding, dedication, practice, coaching, advancing technology and – 

Teamwork. “Wait,” you say. “One man’s triumphant crashing through a human speed record is about teamwork?”

You bet. If you watched the record-breaking race or read/hear virtually anything Bannister has to say about it, he specifically comments on the importance of his teammates and the pacesetters – Chris Brasher and Chris Chataway -- in creating his under-4-minute Miracle Mile performance.

TGIM Challenge: Who’s on your team? Whose team are you on? Are you helping each other or hindering your combined efforts. Are you all moving forward in a concerted, coordinated effort to avoid the disappointment of falling short of a goal? If not, why not? 

Learn from Olympic performances. Over 10,000 competitors with World-Class Goals and accomplishments must be doing something effective. And even the least successful athlete will acknowledge the absolutely critical support of teammates.

And speaking of World-Class Goals: How are doing with yours at this Olympic Summer Slump time of the 2012?

Disappointed? 

Then JDS. (For those who need reminding: Just Do … “Stuff”) It’s OK to be refreshing and rethinking, refiguring and rejiggering your goals. In fact it’s more than OK; it’s absolutely the right thing to do.

Just ask Roger Bannister. 

On the 50th anniversary of running his Miracle Mile, Bannister was interviewed by the BBC's sports correspondent Rob Bonnet. At the conclusion of the interview, Bannister was asked whether he looked back on the sub-4-minute mile as the most important achievement of his life. 

Surprising answer: Bannister replied to the effect that no, he rather saw his subsequent forty years of practicing as a neurologist and some of the new procedures he introduced as being more significant. His major contribution in academic medicine was in the field of autonomic failure, an area of neurology focusing on illnesses characterized by certain automatic responses of the nervous system. 

So Bannister worked at proving that neurologic failure doesn’t have to be fatal either. 

Maybe he’ll be lighting the torch at the next gathering of the Royal Medical Society. 

I’ll be cheering for that, too.

Geoff Steck   
Chief Catalyst
Alexander Publishing & Marketing

8 Depot Square

Englewood, NJ 07631
201-569-5373
tgimguy@gmail.com

P. S. It’s not as if Bannister was totally without Olympic achievement and playing a key role in an opening ceremony. Prior to his 1952 attempted run for Olympic Gold, a 19-year old Bannister was helping the British organizing committee at the 1948 London Olympiad.

His running skills came in handy at the Opening Ceremony, when the Brits suddenly realized they didn’t have a flag to carry in.

His Olympic boss told young Bannister to hustle back to the car park and find his vehicle, which had a flag in the back seat. Bannister found the car but didn’t have a key. So he grabbed a brick and broke a car window to get the flag. 

“A policeman who was in charge saw, and an Army sergeant had to restrain him and say what we were doing,” Bannister reports. 

No disappointing performance then. In the face of mounting time pressure he ran back to the stadium and delivered the flag just as the British contingent was marching into the stadium. In newsreel footage of the event, you can notice the Union Jack is smaller than the flags carried by other countries.