The reason sport is attractive to many of the general public is that it's filled with reversals. What you think may happen doesn't happen. A champion is beaten, an unknown becomes a champion.

My family actually lived in the same village for about 400 years. They had great stability until the last century. People lived and intermarried in small villages.

Whether we athletes liked it or not, the 4-minute mile had become rather like an Everest: a challenge to the human spirit, it was a barrier that seemed to defy all attempts to break it, an irksome reminder that men's striving might be in vain.

I've always been very impatient. At age 10 I frankly found life boring, and I can remember age 9 having the awful thought, as it seems now looking back on it, A war! That should liven things up a bit!

If I faltered, there would be no arms to hold me and the world would be a cold and forbidding place.

If a man coaches himself, then he has only himself to blame when he is beaten.

The man who can drive himself further once the effort gets painful is the man who will win.