Winners are made...not born

"Losers live in the past. Winners learn from the past and enjoy working in the present toward the future." - Denis Waitley.

It was so inspiring to watch 24-year-old Sally Pearson's gold medal-winning performance for the 100m hurdles at the World Championships yesterday in South Korea!

Many of you have probably already read about or seen Sally's victory replayed on TV or YouTube. After breaking her own Australian record in the semi-finals 90 minutes earlier, Sally did it again and kept her unbeaten run this year going by taking victory in 12.28sec, the fourth fastest time in history. Being the world's number one is what most elite athletes aspire to but can only dream about. But it's like anything you want in life, it's something you have to really want, and work hard to achieve.


Yes, Sally's really made it, but acknowledges that nothing would have been possible without her Mum, Anne - a single-Mum who, at times, worked several jobs so Sally could have a shot at making her dream come true. That's pretty awesome. (Unlike golf or football, there's very little money to be made in athletics unless you're at the top of your game - a place only a handful of Aussie athletes ever get to).

As Mums, we're often making sacrifices for our children. But that's not to say we don't have our own fitness and health goals. It might be to run around the block the whole way, to swim 200 metres, bike your way around Italy, or increase fitness and lose weight to keep up with active children.

Whatever, your goals are, there's no better time to start now and aim high - like Sally did. She started athletics seriously as a teenager and it's taken her 10 years to reach the stars. And she's had no end of setbacks, injuries, and disappointments. But she kept her eye on the target nonetheless.

As Denis Waitley, American motivation speaker once said:

"The reason most people never reach their goals is that they don't define them, learn about them, or even seriously consider them as believable or achievable. Winners can tell you where they are going,  and what they plan to do along the way."