when you start settling for anything thats not the best
thats when its over
thats when you can tie your shoe laces together
and throw them over the telephone wires
make them as far out of reach
because thats where your dreams and goal will always be

in this sport, its not about enjoying life
its about being the best
its about eating oatmeal for breakfast even though you don't like the taste
its about running an extra rep even though you have nothing left
its about staying at home recovering even though you haven't seen your friends in months

its about sacrifices
its about discipline
its about hard work

its about crawling and fighting your way through every set back

its about being the best

most battles are won not in the limelight of the game
they're not won when the crowd starts cheering
when the clock starts ticking
not even when you cross that line

most battles are won somewhere between the hours of self-inflicted pain and agony and the hardest sacrifices.
they are won when I'm training my guts out rather then going out drinking with mates.
they are won while i'm doing extra reps rather then complaining about the pain
they are won when i refuse to be defeated
rather then rolling over and giving up
victory is not achieved on one day
victory is achieved at every single session
victory is working harder then your competitors
victory is believing harder then your competitors

victory is only given to those who work harder then others believe is possible.

"Champions do not become champions when they win the event, but in the hours, weeks, months and years they spend preparing for it. The victorious performance itself is merely the demonstration of their championship character."

the question isn't "how much more can you take?"

But "how much more you can give?"

Just when you're ready to quit.

Your mind says "push harder".

You listen, sensing an inner strength that wasn't there before.

&& suddenly you discover -- you no longer feel pain.

only a burning desire to do what others cant or wont.

only a burning desire to win.

I have no idols. I admire hard work, dedication and competence.

it doesnt matter if you want to be

club champion,

state champion,

national champion,

world champion,

olympic champion,

whichever of the above,

a champion is someone who gets up,

even when they can't.

you dont win races, at any level,

without some form of hard work

In order to excel, you must be completely dedicated to your chosen sport.
You must also be prepared to work hard and be willing to accept destructive criticism.

Without 100% dedication, you won't be able to do this.

is that all it takes to stop you?

while your inside enjoying the sound of the rain.

i'm out training in it.

18 months ago.

18 months ago,

no one really even knew my name.

no one ever spoke my name,

no one noticed me on the track

or noticed me at all

no one wanted to talk about me, 

to me or 

behind my back.

18 months ago,

no one believed in me

i barely believed in myself

18 months ago,

i made the choice to change.

i had two options.

be nobody. 

or be somebody.

i chose to change 
almost every aspect of my life;

to train harder

eat healthier

aspire

inspire

today, i cant honestly tell you 

im everything i wanted to be 

18 months ago

im much more then that

im much more then  

i ever thought i could be

why?

because i dared to dream.

you should too.

Great effort comes from great attitude

my method for success is simple. i don't believe in trying to be better than anybody else i just believe in trying to be better than what i thought i could be.

And it may not happen over night, but persistence is the twin sister of excellence. One is a matter of quality; the other, a matter of time.

Each man is the architect of his own fate, you cannot sit back and expect things to happen, you cant even show up for a race stressing about winning. we are responsible for the effort, not the outcome. Put the work in and you will win. you have to stand on that line and truly believe you have worked harder then the other 7 people.

and yeah, its hard.

and people will rubbish you every step of the way. but victory tastes sweet when taken from the mouths of wankers. because honest hearts produce honest actions. and i dont wanna hear 'try'.

Do or do not there is no try. either you do the hard work. or you do not.

Find your passion, whatever it may be. Become it, and let it become you and you will find great things happen FOR you, TO you and BECAUSE of you.

All that we are is the result of what we have thought. The mind is everything. What we think we become

The thing i want most in life, cannot be bought nor sold. But earned.

think, really hard.

&& ask yourself.

are you doing enough?

are you working hard enough,

are you looking after yourself good enough,

are you doing everything you can?

if the answer is yes, then your a lying fraud and you should stop reading this blog and go be mediocre else where, coz the truth is, you could always be doing more.

more reps.

more speed.

more strength.

more technique.

more smiles.

more laughs.

more hugs.

more sleep.

more, more, more.

but when can you sit back and say, i have done enough.

well, you cant really.

There are only a few people in this world that can say they have done enough.

Usain Bolt: 100m World Champion, Olympic Champion, World Record Holder, Olympic Record Holder.

Lance Armstrong: 7 time Tour De France winner and cancer survivor.

There are others who fit this catigory of the most amazing athletes we have ever seen but i have chosen these two for a reason.

The feats both these athletes have accomplished are phenomenal.

Yet both of these athletes have never once said "I've done all i can do"

Bolt is still chasing down his own world record.

Armstrong is training for yet another tour de france win.

so dont sit there and tell yourself you are doing enough

because the truth is you can always be doing more

you'll always have to do more

There is no end to how hard you have to work.

it'll always be harder, harder, harder..

until your day is done.

Who are you to judge?

People often think that I'm not good enough.

Not fast enough.

Not strong enough.

Not talented enough.

Well ive got something to tell you. Who are you to judge me? You dont see how hard I train or how much weight i lift in the gyms. You dont see how much of my entire soul goes into this. You dont see my bad training days that often end in tears and you dont see my good days either. You have no idea about my training regime or how dedicated I am. You dont know me. Or how much I deserve this && who are you to tell me i dont?

You dont know how much i need this. You dont know my story or how ive worked for this every single day of my life. you have no idea what i'm capable of. I know whats within me, even if you cant see it;

yet.

I will show you how great i am.

All or Nothing.

Well it's real simple:You've got one more major comp, and thats it.

For those who've known me for awhile, and for a long time now you've been hearing me talk about being perfect. Well I want you to understand something. To me, being perfect is not about the times that you run out there. It's not about winning. It's about you and your relationship to yourself. Being perfect is about being able to look yourself in the eye and know that you didn't let yourself down, because you told the truth. && that truth is that you did everything that you could.

There wasn't one more thing that you could've done.

I don’t know what to say, really. 12 days til the biggest battle of my professional life. All comes down to one day, the margin for error is so small. I mean, one half a foot too late or too early and you don't quite clear it. One half second too slow, too fast and you don't quite make it out of the blocks.

The years of training and sacrifice is all i can hold onto on that line. Its the only thing i can depend on && i have to trust that i have done more work then the others.

Train hard, win easy

"Let us run with patience the race that is set before us,

looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith"

- Hebrews 12: 1-2

Behind every great athlete is a good coach

"Be not afraid of greatness; some are born great, some achieve greatness, and others have greatness thrust upon them." William Shakespeare

We each strive to achieve some measure of greatness in this life. And why shouldn't we? We have unlimited potential for greatness. But the question that needs to be asked is how do we measure greatness. Some people see greatness as being the smartest, the fastest, completing expert on Guitar Hero or conquering world of warcraft. Other see true greatness is being a loving mother, a good friend.

To me, true greatness is being confronted with a task and giving it all that you have to accomplish it. Often, you will fall short of completing a task, but if you can reflect on the failure and honestly say you gave it everything you possible could. That is true greatness.

Personally, I measure my greatness through sport. I want to be a great athlete and Ive asked myself this question for years now, what makes a truly great athlete?

I think a great athlete is not only just a model of physical ability, but a person people can still look to for inspiration off the track. Someone who gives everything they have to what they love and someone who can honestly say after a hard race "I gave it my all" no matter what place they came in.

A great athlete shouldn't have to ask themselves wether they want to train today. A great athlete has the motivation to train everyday.

A good athlete rises to the occasion, a great athlete rises to EVERY occasion.

A great athlete believes in themselves.

All these are good definitions of a great athlete but what is talent, without direction? What is strength, without cause? And this thought process has lead me to my answer to the question that i have been pondering for years. Behind every great athlete is a good coach. To teach and to guide you. An athlete with talent and no coach makes no sense at all. Success is 60 per cent about the coaching and 40 per cent about the athlete.

A great athlete believes in their coach.

My coach is the backbone of my training. He gives me my game plan and guides me regarding what to and what not to do. He is a very important part of my training, and my life. He gives me my program and gets me to do it. He motivates me to believe in myself and to be the best i can.

All of my greatest success is due to my current coach. I was wondering idly for so long. It took 14 years to win my first national gold, and i did it within 4 months of my new coach. I was the overnight success that took 14 years. To say the 14 year lead up was a waste of time would be a lie. But without purpose and direction from a dedicated and talented coach maybe i would still be counting those years til my breakthrough gold.

True greatness shouldn't be measured by what you can do for yourself. But by what you can do for others. Thats how I came to consider my coach truly great.

Always Smart. Always Forward.

If you want something you've never had,

you have to do something you've never done.

If you keep doing what you're doing,

you'll keep getting what you're getting.

There are people who put their dreams in a little box and say, 'Yes, I've got dreams, of course I've got dreams.' Then they put the box away and bring it out once in awhile to look in it, and yep, they're still there. These are great dreams, but they never even get out of the box.

Fear is a reason for these dreams to stay in this little box. Nobody like to bare the souls and come up empty. No one likes losing, but the trick is; You start as a loser. If you do nothing about it, you stay a loser. The only way to become a winner is to shut the fuck up and train. Millions are training to win. Millions are doing more work then you. Millions are suffering and sacrificing more then you are. They are faster, smarter and more hard working then you are.

But at the end of the day,

YOU CANT CONTROL what everyone else does. You cant control their speed, their power, their belief. You cant control their race, the only thing you CAN control is YOU.

You control your training. Your Belief. Your race.

You cant control the time's they run.

You can only control YOUR TIMES.

It takes an uncommon amount of guts to put your dreams on the line, to hold them up and say, 'How good am I' That's where courage comes in.

Someone in the world is training when you're not. When you race them, they'll win. Unless your the one training.

Imagine what you could do if you knew you wouldnt fail.

Dont give up on you.

Belief is the psychological state in which an individual holds a proposition or premise to be true.

The biggest challenge we will ever face in life is ourselves. What we believe about ourselves and how we perceive ourselves both stem from what we think about ourselves. The mind is a powerful tool. Like a computer, it is easily programmable, adapting and performing according to the specifications of the information received. For that reason, it is important to realize that if you don't control your mind somebody else will.

How many people have never achieved a goal, or a dream, or even stepped out to try because someone told them, "You can never do that! You're not smart enough! You're not talented enough!" That information was processed, then programmed into the "computer," and the thought patterns and actions adapted to coincide with what was accepted as fact or reality. One of the great paradoxes of life is that many of us believe things about ourselves that are not even true. It is important to realize that a lie is as powerful as the truth, if you can get someone to believe it.

Many people have held back in certain areas because of the things that they believe about themselves. They think thoughts like: "Well, I don’t know…." "I'd be embarrassed." "My mother may not like it." "My father may not like it." "They may not like what I have to say." "What if I fail?" Many dreams remain only dreams, never becoming reality, and die unborn because of the belief in the negative words of others or because of poor thinking that produces low self-esteem.

Take some time to examine the stories that you believe about yourself. Are there areas in which you have held back, or are there dreams and goals that you are not pursuing because of what others think or have said about you? Don't let others control your mind. Look at where you have come from, what you have attained, and what you have accomplished so far. Take those achievements and begin to reprogram your thinking. Take control of your mind and begin believing in yourself and seeing yourself as successful.

Where art thou o' confidence.

Like a burst of flames i am now full of doubt.

Doubt is a funny thing, one minute your unstoppable, the next there is a seed of doubt planted in your mind. A weed. If you let it continue to live in the corner of you mind and it will soon spread to grow into something much bigger. It will take your confidence, your believe and your goals. Even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.

In this life you need to be proactive. Nothing in life comes easy. Nothing is free or without great cost. Sacrifice. Hardship. The only place where success comes before work is in the dictionary! Our doubts are traitors and make us lose the good we often might win by fearing to attempt. Now, i never though this would ever describe me but after years of people planting the seed of doubt in my head i guess i never addressed it and it grew. Its hard when very few truly believe in you. But it ends now. A mind troubled by doubt cannot focus on the course to victory.

Why does it matter what people say? But if you call a cat a dog, treat a cat like a dog for long enough, that cat will start believing its a dog. horrible metaphor i know but when people keep telling me over and over and over again that i can not do something, you start believing them. and thats a very slippery slope to be on. but as they say, if you’re going through hell, keep going.

People may doubt what you say

but they will believe what you do.

They have to. So let them doubt you.

Discourage you. Disrespect you.

Let them tell you that you cant do it.

Prove them wrong.

And when you get to the end of the rope, tie a knot and hang on. Because it is your attitude, not your aptitude, that determines your altitude. Hard work spotlights the character of people.

Some turn up their sleeves.

Some turn up their noses,

and some don’t turn up at all.

So many of our dreams at first seems impossible,

then they seem improbable,

and then, when we summon the will,

they soon become inevitable

Death before dishonor

Its not difficult to realize the impact of attitude in our day to day life. Sometimes, attitude is more important than facts. Personally, I never expect to lose. Even when I'm the underdog, I still prepare for victory. The most important thing to realise is that we have a choice regarding the attitude we will wear for a particular day. Attitude changes everything. The last of the human freedoms is to choose ones attitude in any given set of circumstances and its amazing how much it can change things.

Attitude is a choice.

A decision you make when you choose to be better.

My attitude toward my sport has been so caught up with times, technique, perfectionism. I have forgotten the most import thing of all. My love and passion for what i do. My attitude shifted from loving what i do to watching that clock. 2010 has brought with it the wrong set of values and attitude and i will not be able to go far this year unless i make the informed choice to change it.

You cannot tailor make your situation in life, but you can tailor make your attitudes to fit those situations.

Why worry about times? If you train hard you'll not only be hard, you'll be hard to beat. So put you fucking head down, get to work and hit that starting line knowing you did absolutely everything you possibly could to prepare yourself for victory.

today is the first day of the rest of your life

Here i sit. With high hopes and big dreams. But i am no different to most. "I wanna do this, I'm going to do that" but am i really willing to do what others don't to achieve what others wont? I'd like to think i would do everything to be the best i can but some days that is a lie. The capacity to learn is a gift; The ability to learn is a skill; The WILLINGNESS to learn is a choice and some days its just easier to choose to be mediocre. Why must this pursuit for perfection rule my life? To myself I seem to be like a girl playing idly on the seashore, now and then finding a prettier shell than ordinary, while the great ocean of success lay undiscovered before me. I have had my solutions for a long time, but I do not yet know how I am to arrive at them. I work hard, believe, suffer and sacrifice. The idea that so much suffering can be in vain is intolerable to me, i know persistence is the key but which door does it open? My mum told me when i was very young that God will never give you more then you can handle. and i try to keep this in mind on days like this. Day so dark you wouldn't know them to exist.

But I must get up, dust myself off and pursue these dreams. Maybe I made you believe that it was easy. But I've worked on this these dreams, every single day of my life.

Which is exactly why I must push on, and persist. To chase my dreams through the struggle and hardship because if I don't, the last 16 years of my life had been a build up to nothing. A giant drum roll.

The graveyards are full of irreplaceable people, but only winners are remembered.

My Story.

When your born you start from the bottom. Your parents hold your hand through all of your greatest learning points. They teach you to talk. eat. crawl. walk.

Then they hand you off to your coach at five years of age. Your coaches holds your hand through all your greatest achievements. He taught you to run. believe. dare. dream.

You work your way up the ladder of success. When your at the bottom, no one cares about you. As you climb they start to notice you. As you pass them and they start to hate you. When your on top, it doesn't matter what they say. Other coaches now try to help you, confuse you with a million different things you should be doing, trying to have there claim that they somehow helped you along the way. To take a slice of the glory.

You achieve greatness and your current coach gets all the credit.

But somehow it doesn't sit right with me.

What about that man who taught me to run. To love what i do. That man, what now seems like a million years ago, who spend hours and hours setting me up for success. Setting the foundation of the Athlete i am today. Without him, i am no body.

In the limelight and glory you should never forget where you came from. Your past which defined your future.

The first ten years of training are the hardest. Then it just gets harder.

she lies awake.

you pass thousands of people everyday.

in cars, on the train, down the street.

people with their own insignificant problems and fears.

we walk down the street without a care in the world about the people we are passing.

their names. their problems.

their stories.

people who could be molded and changed to become better

if only they believed they could.

in this life we are pigeonholed to become mediocre.

by our parents, teaches, friends. ourselves

but really, who are you?

have you ever truly asked yourself that question.

are you happy?

"all that we are is the result of what we have thought" - budda

now im not a huge believer in that which i cant see.

and even half the stuff i see i still dont believe.

but how dare the world tell you what you can and cant do.

who are you not to be beautiful, talented, adventurous.

Successful.

Its time this world celebrated accomplishments,

not alienated those who strived for better.

without dreamers we wouldnt have anything in our lives.

space travel, telephones, computers, internet, cars, planes.

achievements.

success is not given.

it doesn't just fall into your lap.

you have to chase your dreams, hold on to them with two hands

and never let go.

you can to anything you set your mind too.

whether its education, sports, love.

the world is yours to discover. to enjoy.

to conquer.

so plan for today.

to be better then you were yesterday.