May Athena be on Your Side
There are moments in sport that I like to call “Athena moments”—where it seems the gods have adamantly decided on the fate of an individual person or result of an event and no amount of energy expended to oppose that outcome will elicit any change in effect.
One of the best moments to illustrate this phenomenon occurred during the Beijing Olympics when it looked like Michael Phelps was swimming his way to silver in the 100 metre butterfly. With only a few strokes left, Athena sent her lightning flash to stop the other swimmers in their tracks and blew Phelps a kiss to nudge him forward just enough to be the first to press his fingers against the side of the pool. (I am not the only one who tried to figure out, slow-motion replay after slow-motion replay, a rational explanation for how this all happened, as the other swimmers seem not to be moving forward at all!)
Talking to athletes, they know this occult power intimately. I know when the gods intervened for me, and I know when they decided to work against me. I could never figure out why, though, on this day and not another, Ann Peel, world champion race-walker, said to me. These moments have nothing to do with funding, doping, or nepotism. People seem to be able to feel fate unfolding as it has been intended to, and the power of that realization is electric.
Fans know when it is happening too. And I’ve had the pleasure to witness this at live Olympic events over the last three days. First: Women’s Ice Hockey. Athena usually flutters over goalies, and here she gave Szabados a powerful glove hand to stall shot after shot from the strong American team. Yes, Canada’s hockey team has worked tirelessly all year for this moment. Yes, the pressure to win in Canada, and against the U.S., gave them extra motivation and momentum. And yes, the crowd rowdily cheered them on. But from the drop of the very first puck, there didn’t seem to be any doubt in the collective imagination that gold was intended for Canada. We were down two women twice. Our defence sometimes broke down. Weird bounces landed behind, not in, the net. The U.S. didn’t score a single goal.
Second: Men’s Short Track Speed Skating. After the fourth and fifth place finishes of the Hamelin brothers in the 1000 metre event, perhaps some fans were beginning to doubt whether or not the men’s speed skating team would collect the expected handful of medals at all. Especially when short track is such an unpredictable sport—people push, hit, and topple each other, openings to pass can be difficult to find, leading the entire race is no indication of winning, and did-not-finish is a common result. And then add Apollo Ono to the mix. The gods, likely biased towards namesakes, have heaped laurels and laurels on the U.S. speed skater in the past. Would Charles Hamelin zip through that finish line first? Well, not exactly. He spun through it. Backwards. In the last seconds of the race, Apollo Ono bumped two of his opponents. But Hamelin managed to stay upright, if not forward. Ono was disqualified. When he ran to kiss his girlfriend, two-time silver medallist Marianne St. Gelais, I was pretty sure Athena is a romantic at heart, and orchestrated a happy love story ending. (And then another for the team as well as the Hamelin brothers, as they won the relay, utilizing a brand new two lap strategy.)
Third: Today: It was not the Canadian Men’s gold medallist long-track team pursuit skaters who seemed fated by divine intervention to win their medal (although, I’m extremely glad they earned their medal), but the German Women’s team. Defending champions, heading into the last lap of the semi-finals, the third skater falls drastically behind (and in team pursuit the time is calculated by the last skater crossing the line, not the first of the team). Zeus had broken her skate. Like a dueller losing a lance, left defenceless, certainly chances at any medals were lost in that instant. Yet, Athena watching on, miraculously flung the desperate and despondent skater on her belly to swim over the icy finish line. Even she couldn’t believe that she’d managed to cross before the opposing team. The crowd went crazy. I’m sure it will be a highlight reel moment for years to come. In response to the developing destiny, the entire stands were cheering for Germany when they proceeded once again to the start line for the deciding race for silver and gold. The Japanese led for most of the race, the Germans falling further and further behind lap after lap. You could feel the electricity of the arena fall flat. No one could believe it—that wasn’t destiny. What was happening? Then, in the last two laps, rather than slowing down from lactic acid build-up, the Germans gained speed and momentum, finishing a few tenths of a second ahead of the Japanese. The crowd once again went wild. But it was a wildness of applause for things turning out as we knew they would and should due to earlier acknowledged omens, not the wildness of applause for surprise.
And four medals today. Athena keep smiling on Canada! Athena, please feel free to help me with my poems, too.
Photo: Priscila with Lucas Makowsky, Canadian Men’s long-track team pursuit gold medallist
