Rio Olympics (2) / Prayer
South Korea’s goal for medal count this year’s Olympics was 10. After receiving 9, and being 5th best in overall rankings, Korea was satisfied with the results.
During the Olympics, one of the sessions was the Olympic Woman’s Golf. It was one of the sports that was removed then returned after 118 years later. In the Man’s Golf, a mid-50s aged British player won Gold. Many people who were interested in golf were especially interested in Woman’s Golf. The reason was, many of the players were extremely well-to-do and Lydia Ko, who represented for New Zealand was a Korean.
It was only natural that it started all from England, but Asian contestants, especially the woman were predicted to earn Gold. But who would be the honorary recipient? Many people predicted InBee Park, but after her injuries to her hand and seeing her conditions were not getting any better, no chance. The head coach for the Korean Woman’s Golf was the famous player Se-Ri Pak who made a name for herself when she won the 1998 LPGA tour.
Inbee Park who had practiced with extreme focus had to get 3 weeks of painful treatment afterwards – which she was able to succeed in getting Gold Medal in Golf. Player Park said, the match was dedicated to Korea, and when the Korean National Anthem was played on award podium, she said it was the most awe-inspiring time.
Another unforgettable thing was the Archery that multiples of players had earned Gold in – both genders despite the difficulty of predicting the angle, direction and the speed of the wind. Korea made its name as the suzerain in Archery – which each of the players had shown in their training, cooperation and such. Also despite being eliminated early on 16th round, Korea tied against Germany and defeated Mexico in which both of the countries were very strong opponents.
But the one unforgettable event was of the Handball. Despite being smaller in stature of being westerners, the record set by the Woman’s Handball team was amazing! 2 Gold medals, 3 Silver, and 1 Bronze earned in total during Olympics. There were 2 people who had helped achieve that victory in Rio – they both earned silver in 2004 Athens Olympics in which their victory was based into a movie “Our Life’s Best Moment”. The members were the Goal Keeper Younghwan Oh and offense SunHee Wu. Athletes Oh would be 44 this year and Wu would be 39 years old. Also athlete Wu recently had a baby only 4 months ago and had a tough training to join with the younger athletes after only that short time. It was unbelievable to see those 2 older players joining such a fast and furious sports like that. But that was the truth and I was not interested in the winning and losing but something else.
Both the athletes said that when the nation needed their skills, they put their individual agendas behind and followed, and the family happily obliged to follow suit. I was very thankful at both of the athletes to put their age behind and to join the field in that match up. Beautiful! I am thankful there are so many nameless heroes that exist within Korea. Whenever I see them shed tear whenever Korea fails to earn a medal, I was also shedding tears as well. When God calls me back someday whatever my age, I have to succeed in whatever I do, pass or fail with all my efforts and all my focus on it.
While I watched several Olympics games from time to time, there were so many heartwarming things being shown during the games. One of them was the athlete Allyson Felix who, for the fourth time she was running for Track and Field. During the 200m individual, 100m X 4 and 400m X 4 relay, she was something else. During the 200m Individual, Athlete Felix was 2nd place despite coming in 1st place. The span of time was only 1/100, 2/100th of second’s difference that made it silver. Quite frankly, she was robbed of her Gold to be blunt.
The reason was, the athlete representing Bahamas (who was 2nds away from Felix – quite literally) had decided to dive into the goal line by a hand span. I think and if I can recall correctly, most athletes push their head forward to get into the goal line faster, but seeing someone dive was new. I was surprised. I didn’t know and was curious if diving like a swimmer was allowed in track and field? So many people who had guessed Felix to be 1st ended up 2nd place through picture. Despite being 2nd place, and still out of breathe from running, she still went back to pick up the 1st place runner who couldn’t get up. It was a beautiful scene. It shows the true spirit of the Olympic whether she won or not.
During the 4X100m Relay, Felix was the captain and gave the team Gold Medal. But during the 4X400m Relay, there was a problem during the semi-finals. Felix ran on 2nd lineup when one of the hosting Brazilian athletes got in the way and was not able to pass the baton successfully. Many of the Americans were in despair from that mistake, but as she was the most experienced in track and field, she told her other teammates to continue and run till the end. The reason was if the athletes gave up in the middle, there is no re-review chance. Rest of her team followed her instruction and the American Track and Field team was given the chance of a review. The next day, only the Americans were the ones running. For them to successfully win, they have to beat the other 8 teams in total speed time. Their record ran during that day was far superior than the rest of the 8 teams put together.
After the final run on the 4X400m relay the Woman’s team received Gold. I was inspired and touched by the athletes running in their full might, strength and passion till the end. But furthermore, after the American team won both the 100m and 400m relay, even before they celebrated around the field with the American Flag, they huddled in group. The oldest, Felix said, “Let us pray” and they all put their head down and prayed! One of the camera crew wanted to take the picture of them praying (as the panning camera view was from floor up) and the whole world saw it. It was amazing that as it is becoming increasingly difficult to show our faith out loud, but what they did was a ray of light in their faith to be shown!
(August 29th 2016)
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The Strange Acorn Tree 
Rio Olympics (2) / Prayer