You can't control what the other athlete is going to do; you can't control anything except for your competition and how you execute the race or how you execute the task.

Along with trustworthiness, consistency is the thing to look for when you surround yourself with people who can help you on your quest.

Rivalries don't necessarily mean races being close at major championships. I had a rivalry with Butch Reynolds for many years. I won all the races, but Butch was the world record holder before I came into the sport, he was extremely talented and he was the only other man running 43 seconds.

You owe it to yourself to find your own unorthodox way of succeeding, or sometimes, just surviving.

That first peak is the best place to pause and look back, to see if you took the easiest route, to learn the lessons from the first climb. And it is the best place to examine the terrain ahead, to change your plans and goals, to take a deep breath and begin climbing again.

The basis of self-discipline: Don't allow the edges to blur.

The only way to deal with loss - as a horribly unwelcome guest that you know will show up eventually. And so you deny it and reject it and ignore it and laugh in its face. You toss it out into the street and push it away and fight it off, and only it has landed square in your lap, only then do you deal with it.