Parents, kids and amazement

I have a had some good practices lately and am heading down the home stretch in the training but I want to talk about something I saw yesterday. I volunteered to represent team in training at the Iron Kids triathlon at Lake Hefner yesterday. MY job was to pass out medals to every child who crossed the finish line and there were 3 things that really stood out to me. The first was that there was a large family of siblings, 7 to be exact, that all dominated the field and finished 1st in their respective categories, the girls were the first girls and the boys were the first boys sometimes being 1st and second. It was pretty cool.

Secondly was a boy with no legs who was about 7 or 8, I had no idea that he was in the race because I was only around the finish and wasn't close to the swim, bike or transition areas. All I saw was this kid come around the corner in a 3 wheeled racing wheel chair with a huge smile on his face. Everyone was cheering really loudly for him and he was so happy and excited, it looked like he had done them before and was just an inspiring thing to see and it nearly brought a tear to my eye.

Finally was a parent that needs to learn a lesson in competition and how to treat a child. Her son who was no older than 10 just completed a triathlon and when he crosses the finish line and comes to a stop I walk over to give him his medal and his mother quickly comes over and says while pointing her finger at him, "you didn't get first. Why did you let him pass you." I was shocked, mad and upset. That is not what you tell a 10 year old in any thing they do. That kid laid it all out on the line and gave it his best and that is how his mother treats him. I wanted to punch her in the stomach. Instead I walked over to him and gave him his medal and told him that he did a great job. Parents like that make me sick and need to learn a lesson in how to handle winning and losing for kids. At that age it's all about having fun and nothing else.