I've been watching the hockey-dad trial on Court TV (where a fistfight between a player's dad and the coach resulted in the death of the coach from head injury)
During a lunch break in the trial, the TV network brought on a guest commentator who said that there's a movement underway to require parents of kids in youth sport leagues to sign up to a parental code of conduct, which has 15 statements (all shown on the TV), including this one: I will teach my child that doing my best is more important than winning. This one has direct ties to our sport (track & field)- in fact the whole term "PR" or "personal best" has always had relevance. But I'm not sure that everyone on this list supports it. In fact, those who aspire to long term improvement and betterment are sometimes belittled because they might not have a 'killer' instict in head-to-head competition. Races in Europe with rabbits, intended to help produce PRs (and newspaper headlines for WR's), are criticized on this list as often as not. Yesterday I heard that it's unlikely that meets in the U.S. can product OG A-standard times in the 1500, possibly because head-to-head is emphasized more than PR-setups and 'hot times'. Comments? Would you teach YOUR kid that trying to win is important, but always doing your best is even MORE important? Does this have meaning when it comes to race strategy?- i.e. always go for a PR, or at least the absolute best time that you could possibly run on that day, versus going out slow in a VIM (Very-Important-Meet) because you know you have a better finishing kick than your primary competitor? Or does 'always do your best' mean the race strategy itself- i.e. 'your best' is really determined by the finish place ? If the finish place itself is the objective, does the ends justify the means (the race strategy)? The rewards associated with a meet like the American Olympic Trials are directly tied to PLACE rather than time or distance. So what's an athlete supposed to do? What IS the objective? Make an Olympic team or run a PR? (or jump or throw a PR) By the way, I'm assuming that if you're training to 'peak' at a certain time, this code item means you do the best you could possibly do, GIVEN where you are in your training. So PRs are not always possible every day of the year, of course. Or if you're assigned Lane 1 in an indoor 200m race, you do the best you can possibly do, given the circumstances. Related question: On a 'back loop' in a cross country race, does stopping to attend to a seriously injured competitor have merit if it means sacrificing one's own race results? (don't laugh- it actually happened to my mother-in-law some 70 years ago as a schoolgirl in Ireland- she got a special sportsmanship award from the Irish school competition people, after stopping to help a competitor who fell and got a compound fracture, when she could have moved into the race lead) The family said the story behind this 'ribbon in a shoebox' was indicative of the way she lived her entire 70-year life (she's deceased now). Yet some people say that sportsmanship awards are only good to wallpaper an outhouse- that gold, silver and bronze are the only things that have value in our society. True or false? Is helping a seriously injured competitor something else you would try to teach your kids? Taking it a step further, is it a DUTY, and not just a meritorious thing to do? RT
