I don't know if you know this about me, but I am very into sports.
When I was growing up I was a competitive gymnast and I was on a competitive soccer team and I was pretty intense about it.
I was really driven, which sometimes worked for me and in other stages actually worked a little bit against me, or at least my own mental health in the moments.
My family today is also super into sports.
My kids play sports and we just watch a lot of sports and we get really into it.
And sometimes I step back and I think, what is this phenomenon?
I have such an emotional reaction. people.
I don't even know what is going on.
I love learning more about competitive athletes what their early years were like, what shaped them, what motivates them, how they think about performance differently than other people.
Anyway, my interest, my curiosity about sports is actually what led to this series.
This is The Playbook, a limited series by Good Inside in partnership with Nike.
I'm going to be talking to some of the most successful athletes of our time, leaders who have had real impact in their sport.
And I'm going to be talking with them about their highs, about their lows, about their mindset, about team dynamics, about what really motivates them, about the way they talk to themselves and recover from difficult situations stages.
And I also have some of my favorite moments with these athletes, where we talk about their life off the field, their early years, their family life, the things that keep them grounded, their rituals and superstitions that keep them going.
We cover so much in every conversation.
I'm Dr. Becky, and this is Good Inside.
We'll be back right after this.
Today, I'm sitting down with someone whose story I cannot wait to explore.
Sonia Richards-Ross.
You know her.
She's a four-time Olympic gold medalist.
She's also won a bronze medal.
She has five Olympic medals.
She's one of the greatest 400-meter runners of our time.
From the outside, people see Sonia Richards-Ross, the ferocious competitor, laser-focused in control of her craft.
Such a winner.
They see her power, her confidence.
They see a champion who rose again and again.
That's all true.
And today I want to look on the inside the mental strength and the inner work that shaped Sonia long before the medals and long after the medals.
Hi, Sonia.
Hi, Dr. Becky.
I often like to start by actually rewinding.
So maybe we can jump in.
Just when you think about your early years growing up in Jamaica, getting into competitive racing probably lots of things in your early years.
Besides that, just tell me a little bit more about that.
What comes to mind?
Man, you know, that's a really good question.
It's so funny because sometimes I feel so far removed from that life.
It feels like I've had two lives.
And so it's nice to sometimes reflect on that.
But when I think about my early years, I just think, I mean, they were just wonderful.
They were wonderful.
I had amazing and still have amazing parents.
We grew up like middle upper class in Jamaica.
We used to go to the beach every weekend.
Everything was just so good.
And I remember you know just kind of that pureness of finding sports and loving track and field so much and wanting to be great.
And my parents just doing everything that they could to help me live my dreams.
So in Jamaica, track and field is the most popular sport.
So I remember, as early as I can remember four three four, five the country literally shutting down to watch the Olympics and watching Marlene Addy and some of those great athletes you know have the kind of success and the admiration from the country.
And I was like, I want to do that.
I want to be an Olympic champion.
And so when I was seven years old, I we had a fun day at school where you race and you do all these things.
And I beat all the boys.
And the head coach for the track team was like, OK, you're joining the track team.
And, you know, just started from there.
And I remember Dr Becky, my dad, as early as probably nine 10 11 12, telling me you're going to be the best in the world.
You're gonna be the best in the world one day.
And when I was nine, I wrote for my class assignment when they asked what do you wanna be when you grow up?
I said, I'd be an Olympic champion when I was nine years old.
So it started really early.
You know, of course it was very fun for me.
I wouldn't say that it became, you know, this huge goal for my life until I was really 16.
I started to really like lock in and do all the right things.
But as early as nine, I had dreams of being an Olympic champion.
When you were in that nine-year-old-ish range, I'm just always curious.
Was it one of your parents who's like Sonia, come on, we're going to.
We're going to do some running now.
Was were you more like mom or dad?
I'm going out to run like the motivation.
Was it always intrinsic?
Did it start from someone else and then it transferred to you?
How did it work when you were young?
That's a great question.
It was intrinsic.
I remember my parents telling me I would get up, like if we had a track meet that weekend.
I would be up at five, six o'clock already, dressed by the bedside.
Like it's time.
I'm all be like, Sam, it's too early.
The track meets not until four or five.
And so I remember as early as I can remember wanting to run, wanting to win, wanting to be the best.
And then I think my parents nurtured that.
And that's something that I feel like is something that we don't talk about a lot and how that balance of when you have an individual who desires to be great, how do you foster that?
And I think my parents did a really good job.
My mom and dad always let me lead, right?
So they followed my lead.
Like when I was like when it was just fun for me.
They didn't make me ever feel like there was a ton of pressure on me.
It was always just like, and then at 16, when I was like, okay, dad, I really want to be great.
My dad was ready to go equipped with all the things that we needed to do that.
So I would say it was intrinsic.
And I just always had this burning desire to be great.
And my parents just always met me where I was. it's such a powerful model.
I don't know if you see it around you now, but But sometimes it's hard to differentiate.
How much does the kid want this?
Yeah.
How much does the parent want this for the kid?
Who's living whose dreams?
I don't know if you notice that just in families around you now, but it sounds like it was pretty clear for you.
This is my dream.
This is my motivation.
I'm the one getting up.
I want to do this.
And then the other.
The other thing you said that I think is really important too is your parents supported that.
Like they nurtured that.
But it but it came from you.
100%, 100%.
My parents did everything that I asked them to do, supported me in every way, but it certainly was my dream.
This wasn't something that my dad had hoped for me before I wanted it for myself.
And that's something that is really important to me now as a mom.
With our children, we have three boys and I want them to lead.
Whatever they're excited about, whatever they love, we're going to support them, but we're certainly not going to plant any unrealized dreams of ours into them.
Yeah.
I mean, you have a lot of realized dreams.
The rest of us have a lot of unrealized dreams.
I just want to point out.
I think I read, but this is right because you said 16, but age 12, you move.
Yes.
Is that right?
Okay.
Tell me about that.
So you were 12 and you left Jamaica.
So my entire family, most of my family was still living in Jamaica at the time.
So my mom is one of six.
And so she.
There are two boys and four girls, and the majority of her family and my dad comes from a small family.
His mom Jamaican, his older sister everyone was still in Jamaica.
And so around 12 or maybe around 10, My mom's eldest sister migrated to the States.
Her mom migrated to the States.
And so they kept saying to her look, if you're going to make the move, you want to do it now, while the kids are still young.
So they'll have a chance to get into a good university and just kind of that.
You know, living that dream.
Like you want your kids to have a better life, more opportunities.
And so my parents for two years kind of thought about, okay, What would this move look like?
Where would we move to?
And so when we were 12, when I was 12, my sister was 11.
My mom and dad decided to move to South Florida.
One of her sisters were there.
We traveled there a lot and she felt like it was kind of the easiest transition from Jamaica to Miami, Fort Lauderdale area, kind of.
You know, the same kind of weather, the same kind of vibe.
And so, yeah, my parents basically moved for us to be able to have greater opportunities.
And so I went to middle school for one year and then I went to high school for four years in South Florida and then got a scholarship to the University of Texas.
And before we move past those early years, what was racing like?
What was winning like performance like?
How did you handle that?
And how did that all play out for you when you were younger?
I certainly learned my drive and desire to be successful early, because I used to love to win so much.
And my dad.
Whenever I did lose, you know, my dad, I would cry and my dad would be like that's okay.
That's okay.
It should matter to you that things didn't turn out the way you wanted them to.
And I would have that moment to be able to be in my feelings, to cry.
And then he said, okay, what are we going to do better tomorrow?
How are you going to improve on this so that you don't have to have this feeling again?
And so it definitely helped me to be able to deal with disappointments, but also to get back up on the horse and to try again.
And do you remember at those ages you'd lose something?
Okay, you'd feel your feelings.
Like, what would you say to yourself?
Did you spiral?
Was it kind of like short window, be upset, back at it tomorrow?
Like, what was your process even when you were younger?
I feel like the people around you can really help to shape, you know, because you are young.
You don't know how to deal with those emotions.
And so I was never that kid that... spiraled out because things weren't going my way.
I was like, okay, it didn't work out.
I feel I'm sad about it now, but tomorrow I get a chance to try it again.
Where was the feeling greater, like the joy of winning or the hatred of losing for you?
The hatred of losing?
For sure.
I enjoyed winning a lot, but I think I hated losing more.
And that was my drive to always work really hard.
So speaking of that, actually the person in kind of the next lane I know you've said before that your biggest competition has never really been the woman in the other lane is kind of the expectations you hold for yourself.
And what I'd love to hear from you about is I have this concept.
I think a lot about with parents, with kids, is how much we gaze out and how much we gaze in, and and both matter.
If you're only gazing in, you got to pay attention to the world, but a lot of, a lot of women are, And I think a lot of young girls are almost trained to, whether in sports or elsewhere gaze out to the point that they don't gaze in.
What matters to me?
What do I care about?
And you seem to have from a young age, like it's never about the other person saying like I am someone who gazes in for my expectations, at least before I gaze out.
So tell me a little bit about that.
Yeah, I think for me I have that really good habit from sports of saying OK I'm.
When I start to feel like I'm getting too distracted by looking at other people, I then zone back in to know like how am I performing against the barometer of success I've placed on myself?
And especially as a mom, I've given myself a whole lot more grace these days.
But yeah, it was something that was very intentional about.
But look, it does kind of remind me.
It's interesting.
I was just in a live event.
I was saying this, but it feels like a parallel, right?
Like as soon as, as a mom, we're judging our good parenting by say whether or not our kid had a tantrum when we held a boundary.
I always say I'm like giving away all my power.
My kid's going to do what they're going to do.
But do I know my job?
Do I feel proud of how I showed up?
And if I, if I do, I'm like OK, I'm going to hold this boundary because, let's say, I don't want my kid to watch another show and maybe they have a tantrum, but That, that's kind of on them.
Do I know how to hold the boundary?
Do I show up in a way I'm proud of?
And can I find a win based on gazing in totally separate from my kids behavior?
It doesn't seem that far from like.
Am I focusing on what I need to do in the lane versus what she's doing in the lane over there?
No, that's an amazing parallel to motherhood.
And I love finding that because I feel like I work so hard in sports.
And so it's like whenever I can draw that into my new life as a mom.
I just think that's such a great way to analyze it.
And I think we do, as moms put a lot of oh, am I doing a good job based on our kids' reactions or actions.
And it's really true.
Like it's really, am I showing up?
Am I doing my best?
And that's really where sometimes the wins are.
So I love that.
There is a world where you are doing your best, let's say on your baseball team, and another kid moves up the batting order above you.
They can both be true.
And how you handle that moment.
First of all, if you're a competitive kid, you're going to be upset.
But
It's very protective to be able to say, OK, like, what did I do over the summer?
I feel proud of my work.
I know I'm working on my swing.
Look, the kid next to me, whatever it is, he she grew at a faster rate.
Like, wow, I'm impressed, too.
And for right now, this is where it's at.
But I did work hard and I am proud of myself, even if that other kid is batting, you know more home runs and everything.
That's that prevents someone instead of something feeling hard like if you don't have that, you're going to spiral based on someone else.
Right.
So to be able to find your win in sports, in parenting, separate from someone else's behavior, to me is such a mental health protector.
Right.
Absolutely.
You have had, right, some kind of heartbreaking moments in sports and racing, right?
Yes.
You know, the races where things didn't go the way you wanted to, injury that changed everything.
And I know you've spoken about in some ways like we learn more from those moments, probably over time, maybe not at that moment.
Yeah.
Well, what have you learned from some of like that?
Can you tell me about one of a hard moment that comes to mind or a hard result, and how it felt in the moment, and then, maybe over time what, what you got from it?
No.
Yeah.
I mean one of my toughest, toughest moments in sports came in 2008, when I was favored to win gold in the Olympics.
I had been from 2020 from from 2006 to 08.
I was undefeated.
I had been running really well.
World number one broke the American record was just on track to just.
It was just like, felt like it was meant to be.
And also too, I mean you know I had worked really hard.
You know, especially in 2008, with the Olympics being that season, it's just natural that you just up everything.
I was eating right, resting, just doing all the things to win this Olympic gold medal.
And so when it didn't happen for me on that night and I finished third, I felt like the world was going to come to an end.
Like literally it was.
It was the most devastating, heartbreaking experience I'd had in my life up until that point.
Because the other thing too, Dr Becky, is the minute you cross that finish line, you know you have to wait four more years.
If you get the opportunity to be there again, because most athletes only make one Olympics in their sporting lifetime.
And this was my second Olympics.
So it was really really really, really crushing to have done all that work to get to that point and to only lose that race.
So I ran 20 races that season.
That was the only race I lost was the Olympic final.
Like I felt like I just wanted to go inside of the track and like just go down, like just where you know, cause I just felt like like I felt my body was failing.
Like I was literally like, I felt like I was gonna have a heart attack.
And then as I would like, so I was bawling, crying.
I was really, really disappointed.
And I remember we, at that Olympic night, they gave us our medals that same night.
Sometimes you get them the next day.
And so they, you know, everything's happening so fast.
I'm devastated.
My heart feels like, I feel like I can't breathe.
Like I'm having all these thoughts like, oh my God, did this just happen?
You know.
So it was just a lot of things happening, Dr Becky, all at once.
That made it extremely crushing.
Yeah.
I really thank you for being willing to put words to that.
I think, The interesting thing is like there's no universality to being in the Olympics.
That's like a very select group of people.
But the feeling of like something that I assumed kind of would happen and I worked hard for and I wanted.
All of a sudden, in a moment there's like this disbelief of it not happening and the loss.
Dr Becky, unless the race is less than a minute, in less than a minute, I hope and dream that you had your whole life just gone in a minute.
It's it's it's, it is really.
And I'm getting emotional now thinking about it because it's like so hard to describe that.
Like you know what I mean, like you think you're from, I was nine years old.
I'm like this is my moment, this is my time.
Like I beat all these girls all year.
It's like why didn't it happen?
You know.
So here you are now.
You've survived it, which is sometimes the best we can say about hard things.
And What did?
What did that?
Looking back,
It doesn't take away the pain.
I think sometimes we think like the growth takes away the pain or they just can both be true.
So, yeah, what what what have you taken from that or what did it do to you or do for you?
Yeah.
So you know, so there were there a bunch of lessons, but there was one that was like in the moment, or I call it in the moment because the same Olympics a couple of days later.
And then there's, of course, what happened beyond that.
But I think for me what the best thing that happened to me was obviously my whole family.
Everybody knew how especially how important it was to me.
So they all gave me that night to like, cry and kind of mourn that you know lost opportunity moment.
I remember the next morning my coach he, he.
Of course I saw my coach after, but we didn't exchange a lot of words because he knew him.
So next day I was, we had the relay.
So at the Olympics, you do individual events first.
A couple of days later is the four by four relay.
So I competed in the 400. the 4x4 relay.
So I told my coach, I said, I'm not running.
I can't even picture myself getting back on the track.
There's just no way.
The commentator, Otto Bolden, who is now my colleague, actually said this was the biggest upset of the games.
That's how much people had thought for sure I was going to win it.
And so my coach says to me, he says, no, I'm not going to allow you to do that.
He said, you've worked too hard.
You're going to leave here with a gold medal.
And I remember, thank God I had two days off.
I had the first day of like not getting out of bed.
The second day, of going back to my coach and him saying to me no, I'm not going to allow you to do that.
You're going to get out there and you're going to win an Olympic gold medal.
I run the anchor for Team USA.
And most of the times we get the baton in front.
Like I've always kind of run like a victory lap, almost because our team is so dominant and we just, you know, are crushing it by the time I get the stick.
And so this time in 2008, we actually get the stick behind Russia.
Right.
So I get the stick.
I am behind the Russians.
And, you know, it's going to take everything I've got to pull out this gold medal.
And so already, of course, I'm very emotionally drained from all that I've gone through.
Of course, I'm physically fit because I haven't trained forever for this.
And so I remember, you know, pacing myself behind her, pacing myself behind her.
And with the final 100 meters to go, I think, okay, I'm gonna just, I'm gonna pass her.
I feel like I got it.
So I go out and I don't pass her as quickly as I thought I would.
And so I had to dig even, I mean, I'm talking about from my pinky toe.
I'm like, we gotta muster up, you know, what it's gonna take.
And so in about the last 10 or 15 meters, I overtake her and I win gold for my team.
And you know, I think for me the lesson I learned in that moment that I think has helped me through my entire life is we can overcome massive disappointment and still show up for ourselves and show up for what God has for us, you know, because I could have missed out on that opportunity.
I could have stayed and my team might have won silver and, you know, that might have happened.
But the fact that the people around me not just my coach, my mom, everybody said no, we're not gonna allow you to give up on yourself.
It allowed me to have that moment that I think was for me, kind of the turning point in my career.
The very next year I won worlds.
And then I went on to win my Olympic gold medal in London in the individual.
So I think that moment there of showing up in the face of all I mean all the things that was happening internally, externally to still show up, go out there and have that level of success, it just proved to me that I can.
I could do anything.
You know, I could show up under any circumstance and be great Proof of struggle isn't dangerous because it feels right.
So so there's two things I want to I want to add on here.
First of all, when I heard your language with what your coach said, right like I'm not going to allow you to miss this.
I'm not right.
It's interesting because to me there's a direct parallel to what our kids need from us all the time.
And I do think it's the thing that modern parenting is missing.
I know a good inside.
It's like a core principle to see your kid is capable.
Right.
And so and to set them up. to see that themselves.
And we have to see our kid as capable so many times before they can access that feeling in themselves.
And we can't collude with their assumption that they can't handle something, because if your coach did, In the moment maybe it's temporary relief, but it's the worst feeling.
And so just the other day I was talking to a friend and it's different but so similar where their kid lost a starting spot in their soccer team.
Very competitive.
And was like, I'm not going to practice today.
I can't.
Like, it's always the starting team.
I'm going to walk out and be like, wait, that's not even me.
I'm going to be one of the kids watching from the sideline.
I've never not started before.
My friend called me.
We talked through it.
And I said, what you're going to say is you're going to that practice.
I'll drive you.
OK, but in my life I won't let you take away an opportunity to see you are capable of dealing with this.
It's going to feel awful.
It's going to feel embarrassing.
It's going to be the worst practice of your soccer career.
I'm in agreement with all of that.
But to watch yourself just survive that.
I will not let you take away that moment, because for the rest of your life, soccer aside, You're going to have people get promoted before you do.
You're going to have someone get married and get a big house and you can whatever it is.
You're going to have people get things or be disappointed.
And I will not let you in this state make this type of decision for yourself.
And and that's what we coached around.
And it was.
It was.
It was from a place of love and belief and capability, which is sound like exactly right what your coach did, and kind of saying you're not in a place Sonia, to make this decision for yourself.
I know you, like you're not in the best place to do that.
And so I am going to set you up.
Yeah.
And I believe in you.
And like, I just had the chills thinking, thinking about that.
Yeah.
When you repeat it, it gave me chills.
And my coach just passed away about a month ago.
And so just, yeah, he was such an honorable and amazing man.
And It also taught me too that the people around me didn't care about the medals.
It was so much deeper and so much more beautiful.
And it was about just me.
It was about my self-development.
It was about me striving for my goals and just always showing up doing my best.
And so, yeah, I'm so grateful that he said those words to me.
I will not allow you to miss this opportunity.
And, like I said, when people look back, more people remember that race than even my individual London gold medal, because it resonates right.
Like we all fall down, like we all fail, you know, to get back up and do something great.
I think that you know that made my story, I think, more relatable than just the win win win win, win.
Like most people don't have that experience.
Like we, you know, it's a win, we fail forward, you know, all those things.
So it was beautiful.
I have to say you're much more likable just from So.
The other thing that came up As you were talking about, I worked so hard and so hard and so long and then it's gone in like a second.
Honestly, the thing that resonated so deeply in my body is something I know, I hear from parents all the time.
As a parallel, which is interesting for me, because I know this is something that's happened to you too is miscarriage.
Yeah.
Yeah, is as soon as we get pregnant.
It's like we have the date, we have the life.
We imagine the thing we're planning for the season.
I'm going to become a parent.
And then it's just, it's so powerful that you use language that I hear from people all the time.
Like in an instant that was gone.
Like in an instant that was gone, like I've kind of also wanted my whole life this and you know, or many months, and then it's gone.
And so And I know that's that's a part of your your parent journey as well.
Yeah.
You know, that was and that was I have a community called Mommy Nation.
And so I'm around like, you know, like we talk about all the things we're in community.
And I have heard so many other moms talk about their experiences of miscarriage.
But until you experience it for yourself, you don't realize just really how gut-wrenching heartbreaking it is.
Because it's true.
I think the minute you start to accept that you're, you know, you're a mom and you're like it's happening and you're like excited about it and you, you know, start to think of the name and the room, and then it's just gone.
There's this like, you know, strange dichotomy of like, Did I do something wrong?
Is something wrong with my body too?
Was it meant to be?
Like all of these thoughts of like, why did this happen?
Yeah, miscarriage, you know, it's certainly different, right?
Than losing an Olympic gold medal.
I think it cuts a little bit deeper because it's family.
It's, you know, those things.
And so-
Yeah, it was really, really, really hard.
It was a really hard life experience.
But a couple of months later, we got pregnant again and I became a mom of two.
I mean, my second son is just they're all amazing.
So, you know, it's like once again, that four by four Olympic final, right?
I had the bad and then I get the good again.
So thank God for that balance in life.
But yeah, it was it was really tough to experience that.
What are you, you speak about your kids with such joy.
Yes.
Like what?
Yeah, what are you proudest of in your family and your parenting when you think about your kids?
Oh man, you know I first of all I got to say, you know, for you know all the mommies listening that I thought I was one and done, like really, Dr Becky, I was like I am one and done.
And I wasn't like, it was like the door in my mind was closed.
I, I
I felt like I just there were so many things in my life that I still wanted to do.
And I didn't want to cheat my family.
Like I wanted to be.
And I knew after having my son like this is a full time, you know, commitment.
And I just don't want to like compound it, you know.
And so for a long time, I wasn't in this the headspace. to have more kids.
And so I'm really grateful that my husband is the kind of man that allowed me to grow through my own growth and decide when it was right.
And so when we finally decided to go for our second baby And we had the miscarriage and then we actually had Asani
I don't know.
I just feel like you're.
You feel like sometimes your heart, you don't have room, or you're, you know, and it's like your heart just grows.
You just end up with all this capacity to just love these little humans.
And so that makes me happy.
And my third son is like my third son understood the assignment.
Dr. Becky, like he showed up and he's like, I ain't gonna fuss, I ain't gonna cry.
I'm gonna be here.
Happy to be here, guys.
Thanks for including me.
He's like, I ain't gonna cause no fuss.
I'm gonna just sit here and chill.
And he's the calmest baby.
My other two are like crazy off the wall.
And so, you know, he's just been a very easy addition.
He hasn't caused us any additional strife.
He's healthy, loving.
So, yeah, and I'm just really proud of where we've come as a family.
You know, like I thought we were going to be a family of three.
Now we're an awesome, loving family of five.
And I just, yeah, I just love it.
I love that.
So speaking of kids, I'm sure you notice the athletic world around you.
Kids these days, you know, doing sports, competitive sports.
A couple of questions around, kind of I'm curious about you know if you had like some toolkit for the next generation, some of the things that that might include.
So, yeah, let's start with for young girls in sports.
When you think about young girls in sports trying to figure out where they fit, feeling like enough, you know the drive to do well and maintain your mental health.
Like what's a message you have for them?
Yeah.
And you know I kind of alluded to that in the beginning of our conversation is that they're definitely navigating a whole new environment and space when it comes to being a great athlete, being in sports, as a woman in sports, because I think that comes with a whole nother level of mental toughness that is required.
Because you know when you're a woman in sports, and I don't know if this may be in life, Dr Becky, you can tell me, but it requires more right.
For you to kind of get the same stuff, you know, like you can't just be great.
You also got to speak well.
You got to look a certain way.
There's so many other buts, buts, buts, or and, and, ands.
But what I'll tell you is and I've really love to see this is that there has been a shift and a change in sports that I think young girls can lean into.
I would say to the young girl out there to just be authentic, show up 100 percent who you are.
I would say to work hard like that.
There's no shortcut to success.
I think people now think there's like a microwavable success.
There's no shortcuts to success.
You have to put in the work, believe in yourself, surround yourself with good people, positive people, and the sky's the limit.
What trait or quality not physical, more emotional, mental do you feel like is really important for young athletes to be building?
Yeah, I would say, I would say we talked about it too.
Is that kind of like being able to turn back into yourself?
Like I think you have to.
You have to set goals for yourself and constantly be checking in with those personal goals so that you don't get so caught up with what's going on around you that you lose your way.
And so you know I didn't mention this earlier.
But one of the other shifts in my career that I think helped me so much after 2008 was I started working with a sports psychologist.
And I wish I had started doing it sooner.
If someone had told me, I would have done it sooner.
But it really helped me because I was honing all my skills physically with my strength coach, my track coach, but I really wasn't fine tuning my mental toughness.
And so when I got with Dr Corley and we started to work on the skills that it took to really be present in the moment to quiet that monkey chatter, that noise in our minds that sometimes distract us from being great, it really changed the game for me.
And so I would also encourage young people, especially ones that want to perform at the highest level, to work with a sports psychologist or a psychologist to really help to give you the tools that you need to be present and fully mentally prepared to execute at your highest level when you become an elite athlete.
After the loss, whether it's a race or the game, a bad game.
But what do you think about telling young athletes like how should they handle that?
What should they say to themselves?
What thoughts should they watch out for?
I think after a really tough loss, you gotta remember the sun is gonna come up tomorrow.
The world is not coming to an end.
And that challenges come to refine us.
They don't come to keep us down.
And so I always tell people that failure is a recipe in the ingredients for success.
And so you're not gonna get to that final point of success without experiencing some failure.
So you gotta figure out how to embrace it lean into it.
I always say you fail forward.
So you know, failing feels like you're falling down, but if you're failing forward, when you get up you're in a better, you're in a better place.
And so I think it is not to be afraid of failing, but to embrace it in the best way that you can learn from it and then get back to work.
I love that idea of like thinking about it like an ingredient in that recipe, because I I think about that too.
Like I'll be watching a team I like and you know I'm a big fan of Duke basketball, or you know big Boston sports fans here.
And, you know, they'll lose in the regular season.
And you know it's always.
You know, first of all, I'm not on the team, but still, as a fan, you're like, oh man.
But if you think about the ultimate goal and the championship and the playoffs like it's, You need that hard loss.
You need because you need to know nothing.
Someone tells you is going to give you the experience of that feeling, that feeling you can't.
And that feeling when you're in the championship game, like that's going to drive you again.
If you hate losing, you're like, I do not want that to happen.
But if you don't know the feeling and you can't use it, I have to imagine you're not going to get to that next level.
Absolutely.
It's fuel.
It is certainly fuel.
OK, thinking about your kids.
Question when your kids are older and someone innocently ask them oh, your mom like what?
What was she like?
What is she like?
And they kind of answer and they say, oh, my mom, she.
How do you hope they finish that sentence?
Oh, I love that question.
I hope that they'll say that their mom was always very loving, very supportive, very thoughtful.
And that you know I was someone that always did my best to try to help to set them up, to have, you know, the best future that they could have.
And so in every way, like I'm constantly thinking about you know, like what do they need now to be able to be successful in the future, whether that's in school or sports or financially, like how can I kind of help them to?
You know, face some of those pitfalls that are going to come.
And everything that happens now.
My husband and I both try to see it as a lesson you know for the future.
So I hope that they'll say that I was loving thoughtful, kind and always preparing them to be the best versions of themselves in the future.
So beautiful.
Again, I think a lot about how at Good Inside, we talk about to parents being long-term greedy.
We want to stay connected to our kid now.
Of course, we want these wins, but...
You're parenting today because you know the impact of parenting on your kids when they're 18 and 38 and 58, when inevitably the stakes are going to be higher than when they're eight right.
And so that I know, I don't know if you think about it this way, being long-term greedy, besides the opportunities my kids have, it's why I think I really think about that in the moment they're, let's say they're left out of a birthday party or they're struggling with math.
That I don't tell them, oh, this is great for you.
But internally, one of the reasons I think I can stay grounded is I realized wait, my kid's going to be left out of things for the rest of their life.
Or my kid will learn how to read and do math, but they're going to do things the rest of their life that don't come to them immediately, or don't come maybe as fast as they do to the person next to them.
And if I can stay in this moment and not just fix it and rescue, if I...
If I can help them get support in the struggle without stealing their competence, that to me is the ultimate long-term greedy perspective.
And so I agree.
I think your kids don't necessarily say thank you in the moment for it, but I think it's the thing.
When they're older they'll be like oh, that was really good for me.
And I'm grateful.
I want to do, I know there's no official overtime in track and field, but this is overtime.
So it's the extra race.
And so a little bit of rapid fire to kind of wrap us up.
Best piece of advice you got in your career.
The best piece of advice I got was my aunt once told me, the brave may fall, but never yield.
And I feel like I live that every day.
Like there's failures and stuff, but you just never yield.
Relentless.
Any superstition, especially when you were racing, that you like secretly believed like, actually helped you.
It's really silly.
But my mom, my mom gave me this like little bullet necklace and she gave it to me when I was really young.
And she said it was like for me was you're faster than a speeding bullet.
And so I used to always wear it when I when I raced, like it was like my lucky charm.
And I didn't wear it for one race when I was like in high school or something.
And I lost and I was like, I'm never taking this necklace off again.
Anyway, I did have some losses with it on.
I still always felt like that was kind of my lucky charm.
And I wore it my entire career.
Love that.
The last thing your kid did one of your kids did that kind of like knocked you off your rocker, like really kept you humble.
Oh, that's a good one.
Oh man.
So my son, my eight year old, is like obsessed with like he one day getting married and having like a fam.
Like you know, like you're eight, you're eight, like slow down.
So he comes home and he's like, mom, we have a dance on, um, you know, coming up.
Can I, can I ask Kelsey to go with me?
I'm like, you're eight.
Like, He's a planner.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So he's already.
And then my husband, I love it.
Right.
Because he sees a loving relationship.
So he really wants it already.
So I'm like, OK, it's a positive thing.
But it still kind of has me like, I don't know how to feel about this.
You're just asking to go on a date already.
I don't know.
Love it.
These kids, they're advanced.
A moment from your career that maybe the cameras didn't catch but, like you hold with a lot of pride.
I think it was around 2007 was when I was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease called Bechette's.
So I had really bad like mouth ulcers.
I would get skin lesions that looked like someone burnt me overnight.
It was like really bizarre.
And so I remember, you know, some of my training days where I would have such bad ulcers in my mouth I'd have to like literally run with like a cup in my mouth so that my teeth wouldn't scrape against my jaw.
And I remember my coach always saying you know, like he's like son, like no one's seeing this right now, but this is the work that you're doing.
And that's going to one day, you know, pay off for that Olympic gold medal.
So I would say that those would be the moments or that's like one that always comes to my mind.
It's like the stuff that I used to do, that nobody knew that I was like really suffering through, to still fight towards this dream.
I would say that was one of them.
Relentless.
And one thing that you would tell parents who have kids in competitive sports today?
I would tell them to...
Follow their kid's lead.
I would say to just ensure that that drive, that desire, is really coming from their kid, and and then just do everything that they can to support them.
So, whether that's doing the research to understand like, what that kid might need, what kind of coaching and support, whether it is exposing them to a game, like going to professional games, they can kind of see and set that big goal really early.
You know, experiencing the Olympics together, experiencing it together, where they feel like wow, this is special.
And I want to aspire towards doing that.
I think as parents, we can be really creative in how we, open up that dream for our kids.
And so I would say just being present and understanding, like where they are, and just kind of meeting them there and supporting them in every way so that, if they desire it, they can be great in that sport.
I could talk to you forever.
I want to thank you.
This has been I've learned so much.
I feel so connected to your so many parts of your story.
And I'm just so grateful for this time together.
So thank you.
Thank you so much.
This is really great.
I really appreciate it.
I got so much out of this conversation, but I can tell you the thing that's loudest in my head.
It is the moment her coach said to her after she got the bronze in 2008 I won't allow you to miss this next race.
I won't allow you.
This is the essence in my mind of leadership, of seeing goodness, of seeing capability.
I think in our hardest moments, we're desperate for people to see our pain.
But we're also desperate for them to see our competence, to see our ability to cope, to have hope, for something that inevitably allows us to eventually access that hope as well.
That was such a powerful moment in her story.
And I know that's something that I try to use to inspire my parenting with my own kids as well.
Let's end the way we always do.
Place your feet on the ground.
Place a hand on your heart.
Let's remind ourselves, even as we struggle on the outside, we remain good inside.
I'll see you soon.
