Best Athletes Quotes & Sayings

Like most athletes, I like to go home and relax. I try not to bring the game home with me. I might play some video games that are, let's just say, for mature audiences only. And I might get some flak for this, but I like to watch 'Seinfeld.' Sometimes, laughter is the best medicine. — Nick Ferguson

It may sound like a bold statement for one to claim that he is the world's best at something but it's not an impossibility. I've done it many times, and so did Olympic athletes. It requires more boldness to distrust what I just said, as those who do won't read my books and access the reasons to why they're bestsellers. — Robin Sacredfire

You'd like more people to recognise what you do is special. But I take the attitude that the best thing I can do for my sport is to be the best at it. The best way people will come to recognise that track and field is a great sport is to see athletes excelling at it. — Maurice Greene

We feel very honored to have been offered the responsibility to host this great event, Berlin is a wonderful city that is developing at a tremendous rate, and this decision means that we can now prepare to welcome the world's best athletes to a fascinating place. — Otto Schily

Definitely, injuries are tough, and they happen to every athlete in every sport. The best athletes put it behind them and keep pushing forward. I haven't really had a choice; I've had so many injuries. And the love of BMX, I haven't wanted to stop no matter what. — Tory Nyhaug

A lot of things are out of my control, and that's all the other athletes. I can be the best I can ever be, and if there's someone better, they'll win the race. I'm aware of that. — Mark De Jonge

MMA fighters are said to be some of the best athletes in the world. My plan at the age of 47 is to show the world I am still one of the best athletes as well. — Herschel Walker

The best athletes in any sport take stretching very seriously before and after matches. Stretching is instrumental in any athlete's physical success. — Jozy Altidore

The London Games will be designed for the athletes and we will provide them with the very best venues and the very best conditions to pursue their sporting dreams in London. — Sebastian Coe

When you're a professional athlete, you get paid millions of dollars for doing something that's not only fun, but also physical and badass. You have fans: pathetic people without their own lives or hopes or dreams that measure their happiness on your weekly performance (this still boggles my mind, but in the best way possible - however, my role as a fan now is quite detached). You get to travel around to different cities and fuck their most beautiful women. You are given license to do pretty much whatever you want all the time, and are forgiven easily and often instantly when caught doing anything illegal. Professional athletes can literally get away with murder. — A.D. Aliwat

It is to create the best Games the world has ever seen by unlocking the UK's unrivalled passion for sport, by delivering the best Games for athletes to compete in, by showcasing London's unmatched cultural wealth and diversity and by creating a real and lasting legacy. — Sebastian Coe

It's odd," Amory said to Tom one night when they had grown more amicable on the subject, "that the people who violently disapprove of Burne's radicalism are distinctly the Pharisee class - I mean they're the best-educated men in college - the editors of the papers, like yourself and Ferrenby, the younger professors.... The illiterate athletes like Langueduc think he's getting eccentric, but they just say, 'Good old Burne has got some queer ideas in his head,' and pass on - the Pharisee class - Gee! they ridicule him unmercifully. — F Scott Fitzgerald

David Epstein, the author of the best book on athletics in recent memory - "The Sports Gene" - wrote to me to say that he thinks I'm being overly generous. He points out that, for years, there used to be an "all-star challenge" on television, in which the best professional athletes from a variety of sports competed in a kind of makeshift decathlon. — Malcolm Gladwell

I think today's athletes generally are spoiled by what's happened to salaries, but I also think that golfers have maintained the best demeanor of any sport. — Arnold Palmer

People always ask me, "What kind of people make it through Hell Week?" I don't really have an answer to that. I do know
generally
who won't make it through Hell Week. The weightlifting meatheads who think the size of their biceps indicates their strength: they usually fail. The kids covered in tattoos announcing to the world how tough they are: they usually fail. The preening leaders who don't want to be dirty: they usually fail. The "me first, look at me, I'm the best" former athletes who've always been told they're stars: they usually fail. The blowhards who have a thousand stories about what they're going to do but a thin record of what they've actually done: they usually fail. The whiners, the "this is not fair" guys: they usually fail. — Eric Greitens

In boxing, where most of the guys are from lower-class backgrounds and have darker skin than most of the fans, one might fear that the athletes are being exploited. But that narrative doesn't hold up very well in the world of MMA, where 99 percent of fighters are amateurs who will never earn a dime. They aren't seeking fame and fortune. For the most part, these guys are fighting because they want to and because it gives them an opportunity to strive for something big in their lives. It gives them a chance to become their best selves. — Jonathan Gottschall

Representing Canada as a hockey player is always a tremendous honor, which also comes with a lot of responsibility. Being able to compete and win a gold medal on our home soil made it a once in a lifetime experience. Capping off the best ever performance by not only the Canadian athletes, but also Vancouver and all Canadians, made for an amazing Olympic experience. — Scott Niedermayer

The team with the best athletes doesn't usually win. It's the team with the athletes who play best together. — Lisa Fernandez

At the end of the week, when we sat down to dinner, all eyes went to the trays on the table, where browned-to-perfection mini corn dogs cuddled up against a variety of dipping sauces.
"This is the best thing that's ever happened to me." A lineman wiped a tear from his eye.
"It's like Christmas," I said, all choked up.
"I love you, Coach." The quarterback's bottom lip quivered.
We dove into the pile of savory sausages, watched NFL football, and forgot our aches, pains, and camp struggles. — Jake Byrne

Mediocre athletes that tried like hell to get good are the best coaches. — Mark Rippetoe

Top athletes understand that to play at their best, they must alternate periods of intense performance with periods of strategic renewal. — Robin S. Sharma

People want athletes to cater to their image of what an athlete should be, but they also want them to fail so they can feel like their screwups are all right. If I make a priority shift, I'll make it because it's best for me. — Bode Miller

Some of the world's best athletes didn't start out being that hot. If you have a passion for a sport, put in the effort and see. — Carol S. Dweck

Your best athletes might give basketball a try just when they think, geez, this might be something that pays off for me in the end. — Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

When you look at guys who get recruited, most of the best athletes, they come from poor families. I don't forget. I was a junior looking through my mother's stuff and looked at her bank statement, and we had $30 in the bank. — Eric Dickerson

I've got some athletes who do best on 70% carbs, 20% protein, 10% fat.
But they deserve their carbohydrates. They've got a great pancreas, they're in-
sulin-sensitive, blah, blah, blah, they've got a lot of muscle mass. But some
athletes, they're allowed 10 licks of a dried prune every 6 months. That's all
they deserve and that's all they'll get. And after 6 months, they're actually al-
lowed to look at calendar pictures of cakes once a week. — Timothy Ferriss

My heritage is something that I have always been aware of, however, some would say that there is a disproportionately low number of Asians as professional athletes. I take pride in trying my best to be a role model to show young Asian American boys and girls that they are only limited by the size of their dreams. — Nathan Adrian

Awake! arise! the hour is late!
Angels are knocking at thy door!
They are in haste and cannot wait,
And once departed come no more.
Awake! arise! the athlete's arm
Loses its strength by too much rest;
The fallow land, the untilled farm
Produces only weeds at best. — Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The best way to show respect to your fellow athletes is to give the best performance you can. — Cheng Fei

The main challenge is technology and that's something I really push and work closely with Adidas on. They're real leaders in sports performance; always trying to push that further and further and get the best technology they can. That takes time and has rigorous testing, it's very laborious, but it's also very rewarding. You get to work with fantastic athletes, and that's a fantastic thing that has nothing to do with my day job in ready-to-wear. — Stella McCartney

This automatic feedback is another reason extreme athletes have found flow so frequently, but what if we're interested in pulling this trigger without help from the laws of physics? No mystery here. Tighten feedback loops. Put mechanisms in place so attention doesn't have to wander. Ask for more input. How much input? Well, forget quarterly reviews. Think daily reviews. Studies have found that in professions with less direct feedback loops - stock analysis, psychiatry, and medicine - even the best get worse over time. — Steven Kotler

Food fighters in Japan think of themselves as athletes. They have a higher recognition of the game and are constantly thinking about records. I probably won't continue for long because it puts pressure on the body. But I am at the age where I can perform my best. — Takeru Kobayashi

About strip clubs and athletes. The best way I can explain why a lot of players end up there is because it's one of the safest places a high-profile person can spend time in a boring city. — Shaquille O'Neal

To achieve in sports you first have to have a dream, and then you must act on that dream. The best athletes are those who truly enjoy what they are doing and display a tremendous amount of work ethic. They continue to persevere in spite of setbacks and never lose sight of their ultimate goal. — Dianne Holum

You will be competing against athletes from many nations. But, most important, you are competing against yourself. All we expect is for you to do your very best, to push yourself just one second faster, one notch higher, one inch further. — Ronald Reagan

The left's obsession with the high incomes of corporate executives never seems to extend to equally high - or higher - incomes of professional athletes, entertainers, or best-selling authors like Danielle Steel. — Thomas Sowell

Truthfully, this is how I approach my workout: I want to be the best athlete I can possibly be. If I can out-perform some of the better athletes then I'm happy. When I look at the NFL or the NBA, these guys look how I want to look - it's useable, functional muscle. — Channing Tatum

In sport, mental imagery is used primarily to help you get the best out of yourself in training and competition. The developing athletes who make the fastest progress and those who ultimately become their best make extensive use of mental imagery. They use it daily as a means of directing what will happen in training, and as a way of pre-experiencing their best competition performances. — Terry Orlick

From the very start in 1969, I wanted to be a part of helping our Special Olympics athletes succeed. I wanted to be on Eunice Shirver's team as another set of eyes, another set of hands and a heart working to be there for them, finding a way to help them be the best they can be. — Rafer Johnson

The night before I compete, I like to have steak. Meat is especially important for female athletes because it provides them with the nutrients they need to perform at their best. — Sasha Cohen

At the Cardiff World Cup I really would like to make the final. The favorites are still Peter, Daniele or Vavra, but I will try to do my best in order to be closest as possible to these athletes. — Benjamin Boukpeti

Best coaches never tell their athletes that they are wrong.They rather focus on creating awareness. — Abhishek Ratna

Champions are not the ones who always win races - champions are the ones who get out there and try. And try harder the next time. And even harder the next time. 'Champion' is a state of mind. They are devoted. They compete to best themselves as much if not more than they compete to best others. Champions are not just athletes. — Simon Sinek

I have spoken with many former athletes, and they tell me the best time they had was in sports. I listen to them and use their experience in my career. — Sergei Bubka

What motivates Olympic athletes to train for years for one event - in some cases, for just seconds of actual competition? It's the same thing that kept my friend Pete nosing around old bookstores for years. It's the same thing that makes a person venture out of a comfortable job to start a new business. We see it in the artist who spends day after day in a studio chipping away at a block of stone. Look closely and you'll find it in the shopper who passes up the good deal in search of the best deal. It's one of the things that makes us most human. We consciously pursue what we value. It's not simply a matter of being driven by biology or genetics or environmental conditioning to satisfy instinctive cravings. Rather, we perceive something, prize it at a certain value, then pursue it according to that assigned value because we were created that way. This ability to perceive, prize, and pursue is part of our essential humanness, and it's the essence of ambition. — Dave Harvey

The quality of American life is an insult to the possibilities of human growth ... the pollution of American space, with gadgetry and cars and TV and box architecture, brutalizes the senses, making gray neurotics of most of us, and perverse spiritual athletes and strident self-transcenders of the best of us. — Susan Sontag

First of all, in any sport where you can measure distance, height speed and all of that, you see how athletes have changed their sport and made it better. I believe, with every generation, the sport has improved. Certainly, in the men's game, that has been the case. I think that I played Pete [Sampras] at his best, I played Roger [Federer] at his best.. I believe wholeheartedly that Roger and [Rafael] Nadal have pushed the game much further than myself or Pete ever did. Their options on the tennis court are considerably more than ours. — Andre Agassi

Our favorite teams bring people together, keep family members close, bond people from different generations. Some of the happiest moments of my life involve something that happened with one of my teams. Some of the best relationships I ever had were with Boston athletes that I never even met. — Bill Simmons

You know what's sad about this? Not the gambling, but the best way to reach college athletes is the Cartoon Network. — Jay Leno

I'm sick of the media making female sports athletes into supermodels, when they're clearly sixes at best. — Daniel Tosh

Charles Barkley, Clyde Drexler and I used to argue for hours about who the best athletes are. I thought football players were better overall. — Warren Moon

I didn't know it yet, but he would become one of our high school's super-athletes. There were hints of athletic (and, presumably, sexual) prowess there. For one, boys as ridiculously Abercrombie- esque good-looking as he was are always sports stars throughout high school. It is a rule, a self- fulfilling prophecy. It seems as if, sometime during elementary school, coaches make note of the little boys with the most classic bone structure and the best height projections and kidnap them, training them under cover of night. Not all of them will make it in college ball (that's what people call it, right?) because by the time they're all seniors, many of them will have been riding more on the sportsman-like nature of their faces than their actual abilities. But until that day, coaches will keep putting them on the field in the most prominent and visually appealing positions because they just kind of look like that's where they should be. At least I'm pretty sure that is what's going on. — Katie Heaney

To me the Olympic spirit embodies the magic of competition, hard work and coming to a point in your career when you're around the best athletes in the world, and having the whole world watching. — Julia Mancuso

I have the mentality of a winner. I first went to the Olympic Games when I was 17, three weeks after my O-levels, and I remember sitting in a dining-hall filled with the world's best athletes. — Daley Thompson

You are worth so much more than points on a scoreboard or wins vs. losses. The best athletes I know are also some of the best people I've ever met. — Jimmy Moody

Ideally I would start by racing my athletes once every two weeks. But, such a program has to be flexible because some runners improve better with weekly races or even bi-weekly races. A coach has to adjust to what is best for the runner. — Gerry Lindgren

Ken always says that his job is to create the best team possible, not to shepherd the careers of individual athletes. — Patrick Lencioni

The weird thing about rap is that you don't get compared in the same way that athletes do, even though it's probably the most competitive sport in music. In basketball, they look at a player and say: 'This guy was the best in his prime at this sport.' But in rap it's not until you're dead or retired that people think about it like that. — Chance The Rapper

We've got teams and other countries have teams. Right now, we are going to their countries; we're finding the best athletes; we're bringing them to our team. We're training them, we're making them awesome, and sending them back to beat us. We've got to stop that. — Timothy Griffin

Meeting sports athletes that are the best in the world is a thrill to this day. — Phil Knight

I had to add Oguchi into the list. After all, he's a soccer player - fittest athletes ever. At 6'4 210 pounds, he's one of the most feared men in the world's game.
I've played against a lot of massive defenders. And no one has Oguchi's strength. His shoulders and chest are so big that people confuse him with an NFL player. He can move anyone in the game with one arm, including the best strikers in the world. Guys absolutely fear him. — Charlie Davies

Guess what, the cheerleaders in college are the best athletes in college. You think, I'm joking, they're almost all gymnasts, the stuff they do on hard wood, it blows my mind. — Joe Biden

The beauty of running is its simplicity; the beauty of runners is that we all have a similar drive to improve. We are either trying to run a personal best, or toeing the line for the first time, which will snowball into a future of trying to run personal bests. We road racers are a tight community of mileage-happy, limit-pushing athletes. — Deena Kastor

Looking good is important. We're our own premium brand as professional athletes, so you want to be thoughtful about presentation and represent yourself and your city and sport as best you can. — C. J. Wilson

It takes patience to become the best runner you can be. Top athletes realize that running is a long-term sport. It is set up for people who value delayed gratification and who like hard-earned success. — Anthony Famiglietti

'Suena' is what the essence of the Olympics are about. There are the best athletes in the world up on one stage. The love and admiration and respect for each other is amazing to see. — Jencarlos Canela

One of the most painful parts of teaching mathematics is seeing students damaged by the cult of the genius. The genius cult tells students it's not worth doing mathematics unless you're the best at mathematics, because those special few are the only ones whose contributions matter. We don't treat any other subject that way! I've never heard a student say, "I like Hamlet, but I don't really belong in AP English - that kid who sits in the front row knows all the plays, and he started reading Shakespeare when he was nine!" Athletes don't quit their sport just because one of their teammates outshines them. And yet I see promising young mathematicians quit every year, even though they love mathematics, because someone in their range of vision was "ahead" of them. — Jordan Ellenberg

I've found that my athletes run their best races after about 10 weeks of intense training. — Alberto Salazar

The contracts are structured different than athletes in America, but for me, it was good to move on and go back to playing in the premiere league, which is the best league. It was disappointing, as far as the team goes, but for me, there wasn't much I could do. — Claudio Reyna