When tragedy strikes and health is affected some people lie down and wait to die. Such was not the case for Wilma Rudolph and Chantal Petitclerc, two women who not only dealt with pain, but went on to make a name for themselves in the field of athletics!
On Your Marks...Get Set...and Win the Game of Life!
“They’re naturally gifted. They were just born
to do that.” When we see high performing athletes on television, like
those who compete in the Olympics, it’s easy for us to say that some people are
just blessed with better genes than others. “They’re naturals,” we offer…and in
doing so, we rob many hard working, dedicated athletes of the glory they are
due for the sacrifices they have made. . . Athletes like Wilma Rudolph and
Chantal Petitclerc.
On your marks...
Wilma Rudolph and Chantal Petitclerc were not born to race. In fact, the
obstacles each had to overcome were severe. Only the most dedicated would push
on through the challenges they faced:
Wilma Rudolph battled life from the very beginning. She was born prematurely
on June 23, 1940, in St.
Bethlehem, Tennessee. She
weighed a mere four and a half pounds (about two kilograms!). Now with the
technology available today, this situation might not be so scary. But being
born in the southern U.S.
in 1940 meant that because of racism, finding proper care was difficult.
African-American babies did not have access to the best doctors and
hospitals. There was only one black doctor in Clarksville,
and because the Rudolph’s were quite poor, her mother became her nurse. She
suffered through one illness after another, including measles, mumps, chicken
pox, double pneumonia, and scarlet fever. And then she had her greatest
challenge of all—polio. It was a crippling disease that had no cure. Her left
leg and foot were weakened, and doctors said she would never walk again.
Despite having a large family to manage (twenty-two children!), Wilma’s mother
never gave up. As Wilma herself said,
“My doctor told me I would never walk again. My mother told me I would. I believed
my mother.”
Chantal Petitclerc also had her life altered drastically as a child. In
1982, at the curious age of thirteen, Chantal and a friend were building a
bicycle ramp. Unfortunately, the heavy barn door they were planning to use for
the task fell directly on Chantal, breaking her spine, and costing her the use
of both legs. Though she did not have to face any racial discrimination like
Wilma Rudolph did, she’d have to learn to live with the challenge of facing
life in a wheelchair…
Get set...
Fortunately, both women had a caring support network at home and outside of
home. With her mother’s care and her brothers and sisters taking turns
massaging her leg every day, Wilma showed rapid improvement. By age nine, she
was out of her leg braces—braces that doctors thought she would need for the
rest of her life. That alone showed she was a fighter, but two other people
would enter her life and help the world take notice of her forever.
One was her high school basketball coach. With a hoop set up in the
backyard, Wilma began to train rigorously, strengthening her legs and improving
her stamina. It was enough to impress the school’s basketball coach, C.C. Gray.
He gave her a chance on the school’s team, and she more than made use of it.
She became an all-state player, and set a state record of 49 points in a single
game.
A university track coach saw her play in one of those games, and he knew he
wanted to train her for another career—as a sprinter. Rudolph began training
with the university team while she was still in high school. Her dedication,
together with that of three other girls, would result in them winning the 1956
Olympic gold medal in the 4x400 relay. She was only sixteen years old by then,
and this was only the beginning…
Chantal had mentors who made a difference as well. Gaston Jacques, a high
school physical education teacher, turned Chantal’s life around when he
convinced her to build her strength and stamina through swimming. This first
contact with sports and training gave her the drive to succeed that would later
impress someone else.
Pierre Pomerlau was a trainer at Laval
University in Quebec
City. When he met Chantal, he suggested she try
wheelchair sports. Using a borrowed wheelchair for her first race, her
beginnings were somewhat less impressive than those of Wilma Rudolph. She came
in dead last! But the idea of wheelchair racing grew on Chantal, and the idea
of becoming a professional athlete, something she had not previously
considered, inspired her. In Barcelona
in 1992, she competed in the Paralympic Games for the first time, and took home
two bronze medals for Canada.
And just like Wilma Rudolph’s situation, this was only a taste of what was to
come…
Win!
It’s September 7th, 1960,
and the Olympics are in Rome. Wilma
becomes the first American woman to get three gold medals in the Olympics,
winning the 100-meter dash, the 200-meter dash, and anchoring the winning
400-meter relay team. The newspapers loved her. She became “The Black Pearl”
and “The Black Gazelle”—an inspiration for women all over the world. But it was
a victory back home that had nothing to do with sport that she is proudest of—a
moment when she helped bring two cultures closer together.
When she returned to Clarksville, Tennessee,
she insisted that her homecoming parade be open to everyone, and that it would
not be a segregated event. There, the parade became the first racially
integrated even ever held in that town, and that night the celebration banquet
became the second. Her impact and greatness as an athlete affected her nation
and the world…and her charity work went on to continue to open new
opportunities to those facing challenges.
Chantal Petitclerc, too, came a long way from finishing a disappointing last
place in her first wheelchair race. Through dedicated training and the
willpower to push through pain, she arrived at the 2004 Olympics in Athens
determined to make a statement. By the end of the games, she had collected five
gold medals and set three world records. To this day, she is the Canadian
record holder in the 100m, 200m, 400m, 800m, and 1500m events, and has a total
of sixteen Paralympic medals.
She too has used her status as an athlete to help many charities, including
Defi Sportif, an event for athletes with a disability that draws over 2500
athletes to Montreal from over ten
different countries. She has also become involved with England’s
Mobility Programme, which promotes accessibility for vehicles of individuals
with a disability and Relais Synergie, part of the Quebec Lung Association’s
annual fundraising campaign.
Were these two women born for greatness? Hardly. But their dedication and
their drive, past and present, is an inspiration to women worldwide. Wilma
Rudolph said it best:
“The triumph cannot be had without the struggle. And I know what struggle
is. I have spent a lifetime trying to share what it has meant to be a woman
first in the world of sports so that other young women have a chance to reach
their dreams.”