I wanted no part of politics. And I wasn't in Berlin to compete against any one athlete. The purpose of the Olympics, anyway, was to do your best. As I'd learned long ago from Charles Riley, the only victory that counts is the one over yourself.

People who worked with me or knew me still called me the 'world's fastest human' because I almost never stopped. I'd found that I could get more done with no regular job or regular hours at all, but by being on my own, flying to speak here, help with a public relations campaign for some client there, tape my regular jazz radio show one morning at 5:00 a.m. before leaving on a plane for another city or another continent three hours later to preside over a major sporting event.

I fought, I fought harder . . . but one cell at a time, panic crept into my body, taking me over.

The only victory that counts is the one over yourself.

If you don't try to win you might as well hold the Olympics in somebody's back yard.

I always loved running.... It was something you could do by yourself and under your own power.

Although I wasn't invited to shake hands with Hitler, I wasn't invited to the White House to shake hands with the President either.