The Love of the Game

Sheila would never tell you, but she was once the oldest entry in the World Indoor Rowing Championships (www.crash-b.org).  

Yes, amazingly, they do exist.

She came in 5th in the world in her age group.  She was 73.  

She also came in third in her age group in the Danskin Women's Triathlon.  I think she was about 65 then, and would probably have won her age group if she hadn't decided to run down into a basement stairwell near the transition area to change out of her bathing suit before the bike and run.  

She was an amazing tennis player, and she loved both competing and teaching her grandchildren well into her 70s.   I also recall how it would bug my dad that she would trounce him when they played.  As kids, we thought it was so cool!

She even let me talk her into CrossFit workouts.  Somehow the company that runs Crossfit got a hold of this photo and put it on their Instragram feed, bragging about the 75 year old woman doing overhead squats.  She got 15,000 "likes"!

Sheila dismissed it and said, "Jeese, I'm not doing anything.  Just holding a bar over my head.  Why all the fuss?"

Sheila was a competitor.  She loved the thrill of competition and was always up for a challenge.

But the best thing was that she loved competition for its own sake.  Winning wasn't particularly important.  

Trying to win was very important.  Doing your best was assumed.  Pushing yourself to do your best was a mantra for Sheila.  But in the end, winning or losing was pretty irrelevant. She just loved the thrill of being in the game.

I learned that thrill from Sheila, and we shared it for years. I will always be grateful that she pushed me from a young age to "get in the game", do my best, but not really care how it turned out.  The process was important, not the result.