Baron Pierre de Coubertin spent his life trying to understand the essence of sport. He was engaged in a constant search for insights that would illuminate the driving motivations and characteristics that were necessary to sustain an individual’s participation in exercise and competition. He was as interested in the habits of the occasional athlete as he was the world champion.  He sought to define the interior specifics that gave one athlete the ability to rise above and surpass all others. When he discovered something, he sought to verify it—and when he was confident in his observations, he typically categorized them to pass along to others. Today’s quote is one example of this.  It is taken from “Olympia,” a long lecture he gave in Paris in 1929.

“So we have five ideas (about athletics): initiative, perseverance, intensity, the search for perfection, and a scorn for potential danger. These five ideas are essential and fundamental.”