Wooden and Success

John Wooden was a UCLA basketball coach. I don't follow BB, but I understand he was very successful as a coach (he must of been since even I've heard of him).

At one point he quotes Cervantes as saying "The Journey is Better than the End". I don't know if this is from Don Quixote, but it would fit.

I've been reminded of this in cycling a few times over the years. The first time was years ago when I hired a coach for a few months, rode a lot of aggressive intervals, and quickly found myself completely fried. I didn't fare well in St. George where the weather was bad, flatted at Five Mile, and then proceeded to get whooped on at Soldier Hollow. After the Hollow I was pretty upset, feeling like I'd wasted months of effort and money. I vowed that day if I wasn't enjoying both the training and the racing, it wasn't worth it and I'd change my ways or quit. So I changed my attitude.

The second time was after I'd won my first expert race, which was at Joyride. When it was over, it was just over. It was kind of like in "Downhill Racer" when David wins the gold medal and someone asks him, "What will you do now?" and his response is, "I don't know". At Joyride I had won and I realized no one else cared much, and I was surprised to find I didn't care that much either.

Which brings me to my second quote from Wooden, which is "Success is peace of mind which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you made the effort to become the best that you are capable of becoming."

During a ski trip in February in the Sawtooths (that I never got around to blogging about), one of the guys and I had a conversation that I have thought about many times since. He described how he and his wife were growing apart from each other, both busy chasing their individual dreams. He and his wife finally decided to slow their lives down, he quit bike racing and "re-learned that his personal value didn't depend on how quickly he could ride up Little Cottonwood", and they spent more time together. It was clear that they had rediscovered life in the summer that followed.

I've learned over the years is that nothing is worth sacrificing your family for, especially not bike racing. To have a family of 4 kids (in my case) and race, and take my career seriously, I've had to learn to balance the competing demands, and find ways to include my family in all areas of my life. Bp is, in my view, especially good at this. For me, our tandem bike was a small example of this, but the reality is that every day in the minutes between work, training, and church is when I do or don't make 'things' work, and so far I've been fortunate to find it all working most of the time, largely owing to the largess of others.

The last lesson I've learned is that when things are bad at work, things are bad on the bike. There are days when I resent every minute on the bike because I have things I need to get done at work. It isn't fair to my company or my employees when I'm not giving a full effort, which for me means full-engagement when I'm working.

I could write more about exactly how I've personally balanced these things in my life, but perhaps it is unique to every person and circumstance. My real point is, coming back to Wooden's definition of success, becoming the best you can become means bringing all the areas of life along together and integrating them so that sport, family, spirituality, personal development and business all complement each other day by day, or at least week by week, in a synergistic way.

As an End, this balance is ever elusive: as soon as I find it, it slips away. As a Journey, it's been a great and rewarding one.