Saturday, January 29, 2011

The Consequence of Cheating

He, who has cheated, is defeated.

Cheaters never prosper. Track stars Ben Johnson and Marion Jones both disgraced themselves and their sports; they lost financially and in reputation. Recently, Alberto Contador, 3-time, Tour de France winner has been issued a one-year ban for failing a drug test. He is adamant that he has been unfairly accused, although he may not contest the ban because of severe repercussions emanating if he fails in his appeal.

What goes through their minds when professional athletes are busted? Are they sorry? Or, are they sorry that they got caught? Time will tell, as more revelations un-fold. Scorned ex-team mates may emerge as whistle-blowers, creating awkward public relations moments. I may be keeping my yellow wristbands into a box soon…
This is a photograph of the mini-burgers we ate at our gathering last night. The consensus was that these meat sandwiches were tasty. Now, do you know what Chrissy Wellington eats after an Ironman race? She devours two hamburgers, six plates of fries, onion rings, four slices of pizza, and15 doughnuts – and she is skinny like a stick! 
****
This morning, about 15 swimmers turned up for our fortnightly open-water swim. Today, most of us completed about six laps of then swim and run. It was assuring to note that with our two co-facilitators, Sin Guan and Danny the swim proceeded safely and surely. Both leaders are highly competent endurance runners, who made the transition into swimmers comfortably. We met new swimmers through Andy, and these include Matt and Ralph who both completed the 6-day, 254K, endurance race across the Sahara - Marathon Des Sables - in 1997 and 2010, respectively. Another swimmer, Stein I met in 2006 when I did my second Ironman race in Jeju, Korea. What a delightfully small world!

No comments: