Famous Athlete Quotes

Great teams are not made up of well-rounded players. Great teams are made up of a variety of players, each having their own strengths.

Marcus Buckingham

Sports do not build character. They reveal it.

Heywood Broun

You miss 100% of the shots you never take.

Wayne Gretzky

You can't win unless you learn how to lose.

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

It took me seventeen years to get three thousand hits in baseball. I did it in one afternoon on the golf course.
Hank Aaron

It's like wrestling a gorilla- you don't quit when you're tired, you quit when the gorilla is tired

Robert Strauss

I can accept failure, but I can't accept not trying.

Michael Jordan

Luck? Sure. But only after long practice and only with the ability to think under pressure.
Babe Didrikson Zaharias

I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.

Michael Jordan

My mother taught me very early to believe I could achieve any accomplishment I wanted to. The first was to walk without braces.
Wilma Rudolph

There are not traffic jams along the extra mile.
Roger Staubach

 Every kid around the world who plays soccer wants to be Pele. I have a great responsibility to show them not just how to be like a soccer player, but how to be like a man.
 Pele

If you're trying to achieve, there will be roadblocks. I've had them; everybody has had them. But obstacles don't have to stop you. If you run into a wall, don't turn around and give up. Figure out how to climb it, go through it, or work around it.

Michael Jordan

Champions keep playing until they get it right.

Billie Jean King

Perhaps the single most important element in mastering the techniques and tactics of racing is experience. But once you have the fundamentals, acquiring the experience is a matter of time.

Greg LeMond

Winners never quit and quitters never win.

Vince Lombardi

Success is where preparation and opportunity meet.

Bobby Unser

Adversity causes some men to break; others to break records.

William A. Ward

My dad has always taught me these words: care and share. That's why we put on clinics. The only thing I can do is try to give back. If it works, it works.

Tiger Woods

The only way to prove that you're a good sport is to lose.

Ernie Banks

Nobody's a natural. You work hard to get good and then work to get better. It's hard to stay on top.

Paul Coffey

Approach the game with no preset agendas and you'll probably come away surprised at your overall efforts.

Phil Jackson

We didn't lose the game; we just ran out of time.

Vince Lombardi

Play is the only way the highest intelligence of humankind can unfold.

Joseph Chilton Pearce

The integrity of the game is everything.

Peter Ueberroth

My motto was always to keep swinging. Whether I was in a slump or feeling badly or having trouble off the field, the only thing to do was keep swinging.

Hank Aaron

If you can react the same way to winning and losing, that's a big accomplishment... quality is important because it stays with you the rest of your life, and there's going to be a life after tennis that's a lot longer than your tennis life.

Chris Evert Lloyd

Do you know what my favorite part of the game is? The opportunity to play.

Mike Singletary

The only way to discover the limits of the possible is to go beyond them into the impossible

            -Arthur C. Clark

Health is the first of all liberties

            -Henri Amiel

A strong body makes the mind strong

            -Thomas Jefferson

Academics, athletics, attitude, achievement

            -Murray Armstrong

The soul is characterized by these capacities; self-nutrition, sensation, thinking, and movement

            -Aristotle

Be who you are and say how you feel; Because those who mind don’t matter, and those who matter don’t mind

            -Dr. Seuss

I want to be remembered as the guy who gave his all whenever he was on the field.
 -Walter Payton

I've always felt it was not up to anyone else to make me give my best.
Hakeem Olajuwon

It is not the size of a man but the size of his heart that matters.
Evander Holyfield

Coaching is nothing more than eliminating mistakes before you get fired.
Lou Holtz

When I go our on the ice, I just think about my skating. I forget it is a competition.
Katarina Witt

To give yourself the best possible chance of playing to your potential, you must prepare for every eventuality. That means practice.
Seve Ballesteros

You find that you have peace of mind and can enjoy yourself, get more sleep, rest when you know that it was a one hundred percent effort that you gave - win or lose.
Gordie Howe

I've always made a total effort, even when the odds seemed entirely against me. I never quit trying; I never felt that I didn't have a chance to win
Arnold Palmer


The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a person's determination.
Tommy Lasorda

Football doesn't build character. It eliminates weak ones.
Darrell Royal

Just do what you do best.
Red Auerbach

Never let your head hang down. Never give up and sit down and grieve. Find another way. And don't pray when it rains if you don't pray when the sun shines.
Leroy "Satchel" Paige

The principle is competing against yourself. It's about self-improvement, about being better than you were the day before.
Steve Young

One man can be a crucial ingredient on a team, but one man cannot make a team.
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

Positive thinking is the key to success in business, education, pro football, anything that you can mention. I go out there thinking that I'm going to complete every pass.
Ron Jaworski

You can't live a perfect day without doing something for someone who will never be able to repay you
John Wooden

Arthur Ashe

I've always believed that you can think positive just as well as you can think negative.
Sugar Ray Robinson

One man practicing sportsmanship is far better than 50 preaching it.
Knute Rockne

They say football is America's greatest game, but it's not. The greatest game in America is called opportunity. Football is merely a great expression of it.
Joe Kapp

Golf is a game whose aim is to hit a very small ball into an even smaller hole, with weapons singularly ill-designed for the purpose.
Winston Churchill

Doctors and scientists said that breaking the four-minute mile was impossible, that one would die in the attempt. Thus, when I got up from the track after collapsing at the finish line, I figured I was dead.
Roger Bannister

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 constructive criticism. Without a total 100 percent dedication, you won't be able to do this.
Willie Mays

Treat a person as he is, and he will remain as he is. Treat him as he could be, and he will become what he should be
Jimmy Johnson

I've always believed not matter how many shots I miss, I'm going to make the next one.
Isiah Thomas

Belief in oneself is one of the most important bricks in building any successful venture.
Frank Gifford

Never let the fear of striking out get in your way.
Babe Ruth

Experience tells you what to do; confidence allows you to do it.
Stan Smith

Just go out there and do what you've got to do
Martina Navratilova

The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a man's determination.
Tommy Lasorda

Don't measure yourself by what you have accomplished, but by what you should accomplish with your ability.
John Wooden

You can't get much done in life if you only work on the days when you feel good.
Jerry West

I didn't just jump back on the bike and win. There were a lot of ups and downs, good results and bad results, but this time I didn't let the lows get to me.
Lance Armstrong

The man who has no imagination has no wings
Muhammad Ali

The most important thing about motivation is goal setting. You should always have a goal.
Francie Larrieu Smith

If you have confidence you have patience. Confidence, that is everything.
Ilie Nastase

Discipline and concentration are a matter of being interested.
Tom Kite

Tactics, fitness, stroke ability, adaptability, experience, and sportmanship are all necessary for winning.
Fred Perry

I think it's the mark of a great player to be confident in tough situations.
John McEnroe

The secret to managing is to keep the guys who hate you away from the guys who are undecided.
Casey Stengel

The hitter asks the owner to give him a big raise so he can go somewhere he's never been, and the owner says "You mean third base?"
Henny Youngman

It's what you learn after you know it all that counts.
John Wooden

Success is never permanent, and failure is never final.
Mike Ditka

Smile well and often, it makes people wonder what you've been up to.
Satchel Paige

You win some, you lose some, you wreck some.
Dale Earnhardt

If I were to say, "God, why me?" about the bad things, then I should have said, "God, why me?" about the good things that happened in my life.
Arthur Ashe

Show me someone who has done something worthwhile, and I'll show you someone who has overcome adversity.
Lou Holtz

Nobody's a natural. You work hard to get good and then work hard to get better.
Paul Coffey

You learn you can do your best when it's hard, even when you're tired and maybe hurting a little bit. It feels good to show some courage.
Joe Namath

The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a man's determination
Tommy Lasorda

You get out in front - you stay out in front.
A. J. Foyt

Sports are 90% inspiration and 10% perspiration.
Johnny Miller

Champions aren't made in the gyms. Champions are made from something they have deep inside them: A desire, a dream, a vision.
Muhammed Ali

If you wait, all that happens is that you get older
Mario Andretti

Set your goals high and don't stop 'till you get there.
Bo Jackson

Sweat plus sacrifice equals success.
Charles O. Finley

The will to win is important, but the will to prepare is vital.
Joe Paterno

Never give up, never give in, and when the upper hand is ours, may we have the ability to handle the win with the dignity that we absorbed the loss.
Doug Williams

Quitting is only a short cut to losing.
Unknown author

If winning isn't everything, why do they keep score?
Vincent Lombardi

A trophy carries dust. Memories last forever.
Mary Lou Retton

Do not let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do.
John Wooden

When I go out on the ice, I just think about my skating. I forget it is a competition.
    Katarina Witt


If you cannot win, make the one ahead of you break the record.
    Jan McKeithen


Baseball has the great advantage over cricket of being sooner ended.
    George Bernard Shaw


When I joined the Tour I studied the best players to see what they did that I didn't do. I came to the conclusion that the successful players had the Three Cs: Confidence, Composure, Concentration.
    Bob Toski

In sports, mental imagery is used primarily to help you get the best out of yourself in training and competition. The developing athletes who make the fastest progress and those who ultimately become their best make extensive use of mental imagery. They use it daily as a means of directing what will happen in training, and as a way of pre-experiencing their best competition performances.
    Terry Orlick

All kids are gifted; some just open their packages earlier than others.
     Michael Carr

He who doesn't take risks, doesn't drink champagne

    Alexander Lebed

So you wish to conquer in the Olympic games, my friend? And I too, by the Gods, and a fine thing it would be. But first mark the conditions and the consequences, and then set to work. You will have to put yourself under discipline; to eat by rule, to avoid cakes and sweetmeats; to take exercise at the appointed hour whether you like it or no, in cold and heat; to abstain from cold drinks and from wine at your will; in a word, to give yourself over to the trainer as to a physician. Then in the conflict itself you are likely enough to dislocate your wrist or twist your ankle, to swallow a great deal of dust, or to be severely thrashed, and, after all these things, to be defeated.
    Epictetus, Greek Stoic Philosopher


The Olympic Games are not just ordinary world championships but a quadrennial festival of universal youth, the springtime of mankind, a festival of supreme efforts, multiple ambitions and all forms of youthful activity celebrated by each succeeding generation as it arrives on the threshold of adulthood.
    Pierre de Coubertin

Aspire to inspire, before you expire

    Dr. Mary Downs

Physical Education, Health, and Wellness
Denver Public Schools
Steele Elementary School
320 S. Marion Pkwy.
Denver, CO. 80209 720-424-3740

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