Quotes & Sayings About Athletics

Whether you're trying to excel in athletics or in any other field, always practice. Look, listen, learn - and practice, practice, practice. There is no substitute for work, no shortcut to the top. — Frank Robinson

Athletics is in my blood. — Haile Gebrselassie

There is no better leader in collegiate athletics than Tom Brady. — Lloyd Carr

I've always played sport. I played rugby, I was involved in athletics, I played cricket ... I'm an outdoors kind of guy. — Jai Courtney

In athletics, the idea of possibility is presumed. It's not 'if;' it's 'how.' — Aimee Mullins

Athletics and physical activity are important parts of youth development, in my experience and view. — Chris Gabrieli

Athletics provided a life preserver for me, and that maybe kept me out of trouble. I never partied in high school. I mostly just dated. — Bill Fagerbakke

The biggest concern with female athletes is they don't naturally compete. And so I think a part of what we do here exceptionally well that separates us from other programs is we train them to compete. So a huge challenge in women's athletics is to get them to compete against their teammates and friends in practice with the same intensity they compete with their bitter rivals. So that's a huge challenge for me, to get the women in practice to go after each other the way you would a rival — Anson Dorrance

Sri Chinmoy was a once in a lifetime spiritual leader who touched the lives of millions of people through his teachings, art, athletics, and music. He was a student of peace and he embodied peace. Sri Chinmoy was a great man and his life's work significantly helped to build world harmony and will continue to do so. — Al Gore

The de-spiritualization of asceticisms is probably the event in the current intellectual history of mankind that is the most comprehensive and, because of its large scale, the hardest to perceive, yet at once the most palpable and atmospherically powerful. Its counterpart is the informalization of spirituality - accompanied by its commercialization in the corresponding subcultures. The threshold values for these two tendencies provide the intellectual landmarks for the twentieth century: the first tendency is represented by sport, which has become a metaphor for achievement as such, and the second by popular music, that devotio postmoderna which covers the lives of contemporary individuals with unpredictable flashes of inner emergency. — Peter Sloterdijk

The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974, which was designed to ensure privacy and properly regulated access to student records, has become "the shield behind which higher education hides the academic corruption in college athletics. — Jay M Smith

Everybody deserves a shot at playing sports. It shouldn't matter in the least if that person is gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender. Building community through healthy and inclusive activities should be one of the main focuses behind athletics, and that isn't possible if you exclude LGBT individuals, especially our youth. — Mardy Fish

Combining the experience of a seasoned university president with the analysis of a respected legal scholar, Derek Bok explores what he concludes are 'signs of excessive commercialization in every part of the university.' His somber assessment of the current state of athletics, scientific research, and distance education, and his call for review and restraint, should engage the attention of every faculty senate in the country. He has given us a timely, candid, courageous, and important book. — Frank H. T. Rhodes

I always said I wanted to be a great athlete, ever since I was an overweight little kid. I just love competing in any kind of athletics. — Herschel Walker

I've always loved working out. When I was little, my dad used to make me and my sister do 10 press-ups every day before we brushed our teeth in the morning. It was like a boot camp! Then I did a lot of athletics at school and was a dancer. — Fleur East

Hair the color of lemons,'" Rudy read. His fingers touched the words. "You told him about me?"
At first, Liesel could not talk. Perhaps it was the sudden bumpiness of love she felt for him. Or had she always loved him? It's likely. Restricted as she was from speaking, she wanted him to kiss her. She wanted him to drag her hand across and pull her over. It didn't matter where. Her mouth, her neck, her cheek. Her skin was empty for it, waiting.
Years ago, when they'd raced on a muddy field, Rudy was a hastily assembled set of bones, with a jagged, rocky smile. In the trees this afternoon, he was a giver of bread and teddy bears. He was a triple Hitler Youth athletics champion. He was her best friend. And he was a month from his death.
Of course I told him about you," Liesel said. — Markus Zusak

Not a lot of people know me outside of athletics and believe it or not I am actually quite shy. The exhilaration of a win or tears after falling are the extremes. It takes me a while to get to know someone, but once I do I am very loyal to my old friends. — Sally Pearson

If your intent is that athletics and sports are tools or devices to reach higher levels of mind, then your workout sessions become meditation. — Frederick Lenz

We do believe in setting goals. We live by goals. In athletics we always have a goal. When we go to school, we have the goal of graduation and degrees. Our total existence is goal-oriented. We must have goals to make progress, encouraged by keeping records ... as the swimmer or the jumper or the runner does ... Progress is easier when it is timed, checked, and measured ... Goals are good. Laboring with a distant aim sets the mind in a higher key and puts us at our best. Goals should always be made to a point that will make us reach and strain. — Spencer W. Kimball

The need of exercise is a modern superstition, invented by people who ate too much and had nothing to think about. Athletics don't make anybody long-lived or useful. — George Santayana

The Greeks' sculpture and athletics celebrated the human form, their literature and music human passion, their discourse and philosophy human reason. In — Steven Pressfield

There's lots of people my age (and younger) that have grown up in chaotic environments and I just happen to be one of the first ones to make it to pro sports. It's more a societal thing than an athletics thing. — Chris Kluwe

A big part of my life is music education because it changed my life - but arts, academics and athletics should all be equally treated in the school. — Flea

When I was in school, there was no such thing as girls' athletics. — Karen DeCrow

To me, we must learn to spell the word RESPECT. We must respect the rights and properties of our fellowman. And then learn to play the game of life, as well as the game of athletics, according to the rules of society. If you can take that and put it into practice in the community in which you live, then, to me you have won the greatest championship. — Jesse Owens

I recommend for everyone the study of some type of sports or athletics, particularly martial arts. Always check with your doctor first, naturally. — Frederick Lenz

On the day I was signed, Mr. Finley, the owner of the Athletics at that time came up to me and said, 'When you were six you ran away from home, and when your parents found you at a nearby lake, you had already caught two catfish and were pulling in a third. Now repeat it back to me.' — Catfish Hunter

I love coaching. I would probably be coaching. I would work in athletes and work with the youth. I would maybe do personal development and athletics. I would coach in high school or college. — Donovin Darius

I think when you are the parents of a gifted athlete, the best thing in the world you can do is to encourage them, in my opinion. My dad didn't push me and I didn't push my children in athletics. — Bob Lilly

Hurdling, sprinting, athletics in general, is always in the back of your mind. — Sally Pearson

I was in the doldrums for a while after my athletics career ended in 1992. I spent six to eight hours a day training, for 18 years, and it took a long time to get over the regret that I wasn't competing in major championships any more. All I ever wanted to be was the best. But I find new projects and I keep things in perspective. — Daley Thompson

In my heart of hearts my motivation would always have been to be the best, and I think that athletics is probably what I was built for. — Daley Thompson

All success in sports and athletics, from the Zen point of view, comes from the mind. No matter what kind of shape your body is in, there is disharmony in the being. — Frederick Lenz

It has always been my thought that the most important single ingredient to success in athletics or life is discipline. I have many times felt that this word is the most ill-defined in all of our language. My definition isas follows: 1. Do what has to be done; 2. When it has to be done; 3. As well as it can be done; and 4. Do it it that way all the time. — Bobby Knight

You have to get into the water and learn against what seems to be the law gravity to float and dancing, or athletics takes you years before you develop a skill. But if you work at it, practicing daily, you can enable your body to do things that are utterly impossible to an untrained physic. — Karen Armstrong

There were letters for her at the bureau-one from her brother, full of athletics and biology; one from her mother, delightful as only mother's letters could be. She had read in it of the crocuses which had been bought for yellow and were coming up puce, of the new parlour-maid, who had watered the ferns with essence of lemonade... — E. M. Forster

I love athletics. As an athlete, I like to believe I can still do the things I used to do when I was once young. — Dominique Dawes

I knew I could sing when I was about 7 years old. But since athletics was very much the forefront of my life, and I was kind of doing that a lot, I don't think anybody was caring or looking for me to be singing anything. So, yeah, I just kept it hidden from everyone. — Liv Warfield

I grew up in athletics, where people keep score. — Phil McGraw

Most people who do a lot of exercise, particularly in the form of competitive athletics, have unneurotic, extraverted, optimistic personalities to begin with. (Marathon runners are exceptions to this.) — Robert M. Sapolsky

When I was coaching I always considered myself a teacher. Teachers tend to follow the laws of learning better than coaches who do not have any teaching background. A coach is nothing more than a teacher. I used to encourage anyone who wanted to coach to get a degree in teaching so they could apply those principles to athletics. — John Wooden

Athletics lasts for such a short period of time. It ends for people. But while it lasts, it creates this make-believe world where normal rules don't apply. We build this false atmosphere. When it's over and the harsh reality sets in, that's the real joke we play on people ... Everybody wants to experience that superlative moment, and being an athlete can give you that. It's Camelot for them. But there's even life after it. — H. G. Bissinger

All guys involved in high school athletics are more or less the same - former athletes themselves, big guys, maybe played a little college ball at some shitty school in some shitty program, charismatic for teachers, a little goofy and dim, their lives outside of their sport's season barely worth living, their once kinda hot wives having grown old-looking and probably fat. They were like my seventh-grade coach, except maybe with five or so more I.Q. points. Anyway, I liked them well enough. — A.D. Aliwat

Sports teach us the value of facing yourself and others honestly. You can only grow if you let go of denial and embrace what is real and true. — Corey Irwin

If you are serious about sports and athletics then you need to begin the discipline of mind. With the power of mind, almost anything can be accomplished. — Frederick Lenz

If you look at anybody who's been marketed, it's been somebody who has been drop-dead hot and gorgeous,' Milbrett said. 'For men, you just have to be good. It doesn't matter what the hell you look like. For women, you have to be good and you have to be gorgeous. Maybe you're not even the best one on your team. Just as long as you look good, you're marketed. People's opinions are that this team is gorgeous. That doesn't bother me. What bothers me is the double standard in society and athletics. — Jere Longman

I like extreme athletics, extreme meditation and extremely beautiful women. Perhaps I'm an extreme person, or it's simply my Karma. But I must tell you, as if you hadn't read about me in a newspaper or seen me on a magazine format television show, there are extreme risks involved with all three. — Frederick Lenz

Our politics, religion, news, athletics, education and commerce have been transformed into congenial adjuncts of show business, largely without protest or even much popular notice. The result is that we are a people on the verge of amusing ourselves to death. — Neil Postman

I didn't get an athletics scholarship at a major school. — Edwin Moses

Greatness, whether athletic or otherwise, doesn't come from those content on just being but from those who seek being the difference. — Kirk Mango

Athletics is a great sport with many different events and athletes come in all shapes and sizes. I'm one of the smallest athletes on the track. They call me the 'pocket rocket'. — Jenny Meadows

The mastery of the true self, and the refusal to permit others to dominate us, is the ultimate in living and self-expression in athletics. — Percy Cerutty

During my early days as a sportsman and early career as a policeman, things were tight. In athletics I competed as an amateur and, although I might have received some expenses, very little came my way in earnings. — Geoff Capes

You have to be positive, and I'm not just talking about athletics, this also applies to life. — Sheryl Swoopes

It's clear that women athletics are pretty far behind in every way. In terms of facilities, how much we make, everything. — Hope Solo

When I talk to youngsters today, especially those involved in athletics, I tell them to get their education first. — Ken Norton

I've always been really comfortable around athletics, I've just never been comfortable playing anything. — Amy Adams

Michigan State is always welcome at Ann Arbor. Your teams in all the various branches of athletics are more frequent visitors here than those of any other institution. This is as it should be, for not two universities are closer together in every way than Michigan State and Michigan. — Fielding H. Yost

That's what I'd like to do on the President's Council. Make sports and athletics available to every youth in America, not just one day a week like it was for me, but every day. — Florence Griffith Joyner

This league is getting big. We have way more 300-pound guys than ever before. That's not to say all the people in athletics who have died are 300-pound guys. There are so many different reasons. — Steve Mariucci

If you have the sense of participation in sports or athletics, of being a player, then you are not really into the Zen mind. In Zen mind there is no sense of self in the play. — Frederick Lenz

You are still young enough to think that torment of the spirit is a splendid thing, a sign of a superior nature. But you are no longer a young man; you are a youngish middle aged man, and it is time you found out that these spiritual athletics do not lead to wisdom. — Robertson Davies

It is in experiencing and accepting the pain of defeat, that we may truly acknowledge the joy of victory. — Andre Bramble

We've separated from mogul and aerial skiing and we've built our own sport and our own tricks. And now we're going back to the roots. But the Olympics is a world stage for athletics and it's going to be pretty sweet to represent our sport and represent our culture and show everyone what we're all about. — Nick Goepper

Few would deny that blacks have become very dominant in athletics: football, basketball, track, now dominant in tennis and dominant in golf. — Jesse Jackson

Confusion over how a person's extraordinary skill is developed runs deep. The heated debate over writer Malcolm Gladwell's "10,000 hour rule," as put forth i his popular book Outliers: The Story of Success, indicates that it is not just refeerees who get tongue-tied trying to pinpoint the fundaments of their expertise. Proficiency in activities from musicianship to athletics, Gladwell contends, can be achieved only through vast amount of practice (10,000 hours was the ballpark figure he cited, applying it to the triumphs of Bill Gates and the Beatles, among others.) — Bob Katz

In a budget, how important is art versus music versus athletics versus computer programming? At the end of the day, some of those trade-offs will be made politically. — Bill Gates

You always gotta continue to hunger. If you're gonna continue in any kind of industry whether music or the film industry or athletics, that drive to become better is what will eventually make you into that superstar everybody else will see. — Ryan Guzman

We want to make sure our athletes have a future once their athletics careers are over. — Alberto Juantorena

Bear in mind, people with eating disorders tend to be both competitive and intelligent. We are incredibly perfectionistic. We often excel in school,athletics,artistic pursuits. We also tend to quit without warning. Refuse to go to school,drop out,quit jobs,leave lovers,move,lose all our money. We get sick of being impressive. Rather,we tire of having to seem impressive. As a rule,most of us never really believed we were any good in the first place. — Marya Hornbacher

Athletics carries its own set of truths, and those truths are diminished when manipulated by people with agendas. — Chris Crutcher

Baseball outfits went through their gaudy period during the disco '70's, when the White Sox looked like softball players and the Athletics looked like 'Saturday Night Fever' personified. — George Vecsey

There is certainly an underrepresentation of Asian Pacific Islanders in professional sports/athletics. — Nathan Adrian

It wasn't popular for college athletics to embrace Title IX. — Grant Hill

I'm not interested in athletics, I'm only interested in achievement. Fix your goal and work for it. — Percy Cerutty

It was all here for me, just as it has all been here for you, the best and the worst of Western Civilization, if you cared to pay attention: music, finance, government, architecture, law and sculpture and painting, history and medicine and athletics and every sort of science, and books, books, books, and teachers and role models.
People so smart you can't believe it, and people so dumb you can't believe it. People so nice you can't believe it, and people so mean you can't believe it. — Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

Football, that's just athletics. But in the business world - doing everything - people are competing. So you need good work ethics, and I think it helped me to develop good work ethics, being in a small town. — Herschel Walker

In the Zen of sports and athletics, we seek to bring discipline and control into our physical movements, but at the same time to eliminate the self that gets in the way of perfect play. — Frederick Lenz

I swam very competitively till I was 15, then I swam for fun until I was 18. But athletics remain a very big part of my life. I try to keep that as much in balance with work as I can. — Teddy Sears

I have long been one of those tedious people who rails against the coronation of 'student-athletes.' I have heard the argument that big-time athletics bring in loads of money to universities. I don't believe the money goes anywhere other than back into the sports teams, but that's another story. — Susan Orlean

Drawing on impressive achievements in academics and athletics as well as his own personal disappointments and challenges, Jordan provides students with a unique opportunity to discover the magnitude of their own potential. — Hyrum W. Smith

it doesn't matter what the challenge is -athletics, business, romance, health, academics, the arts- the rule for getting up is the same. you just get up! — Scott Hamilton

The whole sexiness thing-I don't know if I'm comfortable with that. But it has helped the sport grow. I think it changes how people see women's athletics. — Jennie Finch

The three major administrative problems on a campus are sex for the students, athletics for the alumni, and parking for the faculty. — Robert M. Hutchins

Playing athletics, playing a lot of different sports, going to drama school ... I was one of those kids who wanted to do everything, so I ended up being pretty average at everything. — Matt Bomer

Blogging is to writing what extreme sports are to athletics: more free-form, more accident-prone, less formal, more alive. It is, in many ways, writing out loud. — Andrew Sullivan

We can choose to accept the fact that a challenge may be quite impossible, or we can choose to challenge the impossible. — Andre Bramble

Frankly," said the Doctor, "I am at a loss to understand my own emotions. I can think of no entertainment that fills me with greater detestation than a display of competitive athletics, none - except possibly folk dancing. — Evelyn Waugh

I've always thought that my exposure to competitive sports helped me a great deal in the operating room. It teaches you endurance, and it teaches you how to cope with defeat, and with complications of all sort. I think I'm a well-coordinated person, more than average, and I think that came through my interest in sports, and athletics ... Playing basketball You have to make decisions promptly, and that's true in the operating room as well. — Denton Cooley

The glory of sport comes from dedication, determination and desire. Achieving success and personal glory in athletics has less to do with wins and losses than it does with learning how to prepare yourself so that at the end of the day, whether on the track or in the office, you know that there was nothing more you could have done to reach your ultimate goal. — Jackie Joyner-Kersee

I think everybody ought to be allowed to be engaged in athletics at whatever level the audience will accept. — Gerald McRaney

In terms of soccer, it wasn't really a thing that girls did. In England it more kind of Net Ball and Hockey and stuff like that in athletics. It's to each their own, really. — Parminder Nagra

We are fighting the greatest battle of all time with the most untrained army on earth. If strict discipline is necessary in art and athletics, how can we expect to be advanced Christians and stay in kindergarten? — Vance Havner

We want to promote the great qualities of athletics - and maintain its integrity - all over the world. — Alberto Juantorena

after all these programs and scholarships, after all the work done by organized athletics at all levels, the number of boys actually playing baseball or football is far lower than before: no one is outdoors playing. — Anthony M. Esolen

I was cutting and threading pipe in the tunnels to get water into the shower rooms for athletics. I was repairing old metal windows, fixing cement walls where rain was coming through, and drying out the maple gym floors in hopes of removing the warping. — Tom Baker

Junior athletics is but one facet of the real gem: life's endless war against the self you cannot live without. — David Foster Wallace

You can be strong as any boy if you'll work hard and train yourself in athletics, the way boys do. — Jill Lepore

The game of baseball is a clean, straight game, and it summons to its presence everybody who enjoys clean, straight athletics. It furnishes amusement to the thousands and thousands. — William Howard Taft

Athletics had, indeed, arrived! "It was time to cheer, and cheer they did. — Edward Achorn