Julia Lucas - A Profile in Courage & Class
Many have written about the race and the following links will give one a detailed account of the race:
"The Women's 5,000 Final - The Olympic Trials At Its Absolute Best"
"Julia Lucas -- Class Act"
If you want to see race highlights (5 minutes) click - "Culley, Huddle Punch London Tickets In 5000m"
Julia's father, Scott Lucas, is an accomplished writer. His recent tribute article to Julia, "A Father Laments his Daughter's Lost Olympic Dream" is an instant classic:
"The most important goal in the Olympic Games is not to win, but to
take part; just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph,
but the struggle. The essential thing is not to have conquered, but to
have fought well." — Olympic creed
It's funny how true that little chestnut is.
My daughter, Julia Lucas, missed her recent shot at an Olympic berth by
4/100ths of a second in the women's 5K race on a recent drizzly night in
Eugene, Ore.
Julia is 28 years old. She's spent half of those years running. Fifteen,
40, 100 miles a week, 40 weeks a year, for 13 years. Running on asphalt
and concrete, grass, dirt, mud and gravel. In cold rain, warm rain,
heat waves and through air cold enough to still the breath of a sled
dog.
Running past seven stress fractures, one broken leg, through anemia,
over missing toenails too ugly and numerous to count, past sleep and
meals and dates with boys. She's run with an occasionally swollen ego,
and less occasionally a shattered one. Running to get better and better,
faster and faster. Running to be the fastest girl at Myers Park High
School, at North Carolina State University, in the Atlantic Coast
Conference and this great state, in our part of the country, the rest of
the country, running to be her best. She ran all the way to the
starting line of the Olympic Trials as the fastest American woman to run
the 5K this year. And it only took 13 years.
She toed the start line fit, willing and ready for the biggest run of her life.
Julia is a hometown favorite in Eugene, and she was cheered when she
took the lead with 1,000 meters to go. I could not see the finish line,
but I heard the collective groan as the woman chasing Julia caught and
passed her with a chest and shoulder lean at the line. I looked at
Margaret — my wife, Julia's mother — and we shared a hard instant that
stole a piece of our hearts. That collective groan was for Julia, and we
knew it.
The stadium stilled to silence for a few seconds. The hushed rising
murmur around us confirmed her unlikely loss. I stood, stunned and
reeling, surprised to find my feet still holding me up. Margaret and I
weaved through various no-entry zones to find Julia.
We found her 15 minutes later, on the rubber walkway between the media
and athlete's tents, being escorted by an Olympic monitor to the drug
testing area (as an official alternate, she's required to be tested).
She looked like I felt: bound up in a world of unexpected hurt. Her
mother wrapped her in a full body mother's hug. I joined with a double
wrap. The Olympic Official looked away and waited.
No one cried.
I could not be more proud of my daughter. She has worked relentlessly
for what she has achieved. Always gifted — beginning with sprints to her
bus stop in Cotswold — she has repeatedly out-worked and outrun those
more gifted than she.
Did crossing the line fourth make Julia a loser? For that day, yes.
Would crossing the line a second sooner have made Julia a winner? Yes,
for that day.
What makes Julia a winner in the long-term — a lifetime — is her courage
and resilience; her ability to rebound, reassemble and remake herself
for all the many tomorrows left to come. I look forward to her next
rising.
My daughter will move on, in the running world and beyond. She needs no
litany of clichés to get back on her feet, or back in the saddle, or to
keep her eyes on the (next) prize. That's inside her and always has
been.
And she doesn't need more hugs, or cries or consoling texts, voice- or
e-mails; though they keep coming and she keeps mustering the good will
and grace to accept them.
And my bird-boned, lion-hearted, muscle-y daughter doesn't need her
father's endless expressions of the pride and joy he feels for her giddy
wins and hard losses, her courage, and for her continuing fearsome
struggles.
Those are burdens she's gonna have to bear.
{Many thanks to Patrick McHugh for highlighting Julia's story. Patrick writes one of my favorite blogs. He's a very wise man who is a High School Athletic Director and Track & Field Coach at North Shore Country Day School in Winnetka, IL}
Courage:
Julia ran a very courageous and bold race at the trials. She decided to separate from the pack with three laps to go and had a 1.84 second lead with one lap to go on her nearest competitors, Julie Cully & Molly Huddle. She had a 4.98 second lead on Kim Conley, who clipped her at the tape for third place.
Julia believes that running is an expression of self, and that in order to be the best runner you can be, it requires all of yourself. Nothing is more courageous to me than an athlete who gives her all and is willing to put it on the line to accomplish her goals/dreams. If you know the complete story of the 5000M race at the trials, you will appreciate this Julia Lucas quote: "7 interviews in 7 days, and I'm astonished I have to keep saying this: Who wants to go to The Olympics on a technicality?"
Her father and many others {love this Ron Bellamy article - "Julia Lucas is Back on Solid Footing Once Again in the 5,000 Meters"} have done a great job in presenting the courageous side of Julia as it relates to track; but Julia demonstrated greater courage on the day she decided to run into a burning building to save the life of a child when she was in college. Julia talks about that day and herself in the video featured below:
Susan Kelly posted this comment after reading Scott Lucas' tribute to Julia: "This is beautifully written and certainly portrays the Olympic spirit
from a parent's perspective. I enjoyed it and have shared it everywhere I
can. It's Teddy Roosevelt's - "Man in the Arena" through and through."
The reference to Roosevelt's "Man in the Arena" speech intrigued me. It's an American classic & I've never read or heard of it before. I Searched Google and came across an excellent blog that was written by Michael McKinney in 2010 celebrating the 100th Anniversary of Theodore Roosevelt’s The Man in the Arena Speech. This excerpt from McKinney is applicable to Julia:
"Roosevelt firmly believed that one learned by doing. It is better to stumble than to do nothing or to sit by and criticize those that are “in the arena” he explained. 'The poorest way to face life is with a sneer.' It is a sign of weakness. 'To judge a man merely by success,' he said, 'is an abhorrent wrong.' The famous paragraph from that speech, reproduced below, expressed the standard by which he judged himself and others:"
How one handles adversity/defeat tells more about a person than how one handles victory. Rudyard Kipling states in his classic poem, "If" - "If you can meet with triumph and disaster, and treat those two imposters just the same...." Just listen to Julia's interview after her 5000M race to see how she exemplifies Kipling's words. She also is a shining role model in adhering to the words of John Wooden and his father Joshua when dealing with defeat/adversity -- "No Whining, No Complaining, No Excuses:"
Before the Olympic Trials I had never heard of Julia Lucas, and I follow track & field. Today, I've not only heard of her, but I admire and respect her approach to life. Here's to a champion, both on and off the track!It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, and comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.Class:
How one handles adversity/defeat tells more about a person than how one handles victory. Rudyard Kipling states in his classic poem, "If" - "If you can meet with triumph and disaster, and treat those two imposters just the same...." Just listen to Julia's interview after her 5000M race to see how she exemplifies Kipling's words. She also is a shining role model in adhering to the words of John Wooden and his father Joshua when dealing with defeat/adversity -- "No Whining, No Complaining, No Excuses:"
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