Simon Whitfield plans on using an unassuming, dog-eared notebook as a prop this morning when he addresses the eighth annual Vikes Championship Breakfast as the keynote speaker.
The affair is sold out, with 650 people expected to attend and is being held for the first time at the high-performance gym in the new CARSA Building, which opened in May. The breakfast, in its eight years, has raised more than $3 million for University of Victoria student athletic scholarships.
The weathered notebook Whitfield brings with him today is his training log from 1997, the year he moved to Victoria to live and train as an unknown triathlete. Three years later, he would be known to everybody who follows sports in sa国际传媒. It seemed to happen all in one morning, bursting across the finish line to win gold at the 2000 Sydney Summer Olympics.
鈥淚t鈥檚 about moonshots,鈥� said Whitfield.
鈥淚t鈥檚 about the power of belief. If we believe it, we can accomplish it. Sydney was my first moonshot.鈥�
Yet, there are no such things as overnight sensations. Whitfield trained diligently, but in obscurity around Greater Victoria, before providing a minor blip with bronze in the 1999 Pan American Games.
That鈥檚 why his 1997 training logbook is such a personal touchstone.
鈥淚 look at it every day,鈥� said Whitfield.
鈥淚t鈥檚 a reminder that being an athlete is about intense willpower and commitment.鈥�
Whitfield went on to win gold at the 2002 Manchester Commonwealth Games, a dramatic late-career silver medal at the 2008 Beijing Olympics and was chosen as sa国际传媒鈥檚 opening-ceremony flag-bearer for the 2012 London Olympics.
But it all comes back to that training logbook from when nobody had heard of him.
Now 40 and retired from competitive racing, the father of two is involved in several businesses related to cycling and remains active playing pick-up soccer, touch football and paddling the waters around the Island.
Even he looks now at the high-end of his sport, a spot he used to occupy, and marvels: 鈥淟ook at the Brownlees [the superstar British sibling triathletes].
They are awesome and so much faster than we were. It鈥檚 evolution.鈥�
Whitfield admits it has been hard to retire what he labels the 鈥渙ne-day mind鈥� of a high-level competitive athlete.
鈥淚t鈥檚 where every decision you make in your life revolves around one future day 鈥� such as the date of the Olympic final,鈥� he said.
He said every UVic Vikes athlete will have that one day in mind 鈥� their CIS national final. There are no guarantees of getting there. But the road will be logged 鈥� literally 鈥� with miles of effort.
Whitfield joins a list of past keynote speakers that includes former UVic rower and Olympic gold-medallist Adam Kreek, alumni Vikes swimmer and Paralympics multi-medallist Stephanie Dixon, former UVic rower and Olympic silver-medallist Darcy Marquardt and MLS Vancouver Whitecaps president Bob Lenarduzzi. The initial keynote address was delivered in 2008 by former Vikes basketball star Chris Hebb, who was then senior vice-president of broadcasting for Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment. Hebb returns today as MC.
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