Excerpt from Reminiscences of an Athlete: Twenty Years on Track and Field I cannot remember the time when I was not interested in sport. There was no form of exercise which did not appeal to me, and this Whether I took part myself, or, as a mere spectator, applauded the performance of others. TO run fast or enduringly, to leap high or far, these had, for me, the savor of great deeds; and upon those who did them Worthily, I gazed with awe, as upon beings of a superior world. I am sure of the facts, yet when I look back and seek to find the reasons for them, I can scarcely seem to hit upon the cause. I was not reared in an athletic atmosphere; there were no family traditions to be maintained. It was, I think, simply a natural bent; the germ Of the athletic fever was in my blood. Stevenson has told us how he learned to write, not so much because he wished to be anauthor, although he wished that too, but principally, as it were, in a wager with him self. And thus my own ambition, though a far less noble one, was in kind the same. I wished to be an athlete, yet it was not for the sake of the medals or the glory, although, to borrow Stevenson's phrase, perhaps I wished that too. But my main incentive, like his, was a wager with myself. There was much that I aimed to acquire, yet it was not to excel others that I practised and trained; A certain standard of accomplishment, was always before me; and to know, in my own heart, that I had attained it that was my desire. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.