A phrase that’s been much bandied about here in Massachusetts of late is: “Victory has a thousand fathers, but defeat is an orphan.” This pithy adage has been deployed in reaction to —or as cover-up of —the recent special election held to fill Ted Kennedy’s US Senate seat. As you all surely know, it was a heavily-watched and hotly-contested election with both state and national implications. But why do I invoke Massachusetts politics here? Because —to continue with the kinship analogy —a close cousin to the aforementioned phrase is: “Good news travels fast.” And here at ITA we have more good news to share (on top of the news about Scott Blackmun’s appointment to the position of USOC CEO, Emily Azevedo’s secured spot on the US Olympic Bobsled Team, and the ITA podium sweep at the Methow Valley SuperTour).



To wit: two more members of the Arena Roster have just been named to the US Olympic Team: Torin Koos (pictured above) and Caitlin Compton (pictured below) will be donning Team USA uniforms in Vancouver next month as members of the US Nordic Ski Team. This is Torin’s third Olympic team berth (wow!) and Caitlin’s first. Congratulations to them both, as well as to all of the other skiers on the roster who laid down their best efforts over the course of the rigorous Olympic selection process. Each one of you can also claim a measure of victory knowing that you helped push your competitors —and colleagues —to their best performances.

Toot! Toot!

Yes, that's the sound of me tooting ITA's horn, which is not something I do all that often, but the circumstances so merited today. Two days ago I was impressed when I learned that not one but two ITA Athletes —Torin Koos and Laura Valaas —won their respective sprint races at the recent SuperTour event in the Methow Valley, virtual hometown competitions for both Koos (pictured below) and Valaas.


But before I could bask in the reflected glow of that news for even one revolution of the earth, a second set of races happened at that same Methow Valley SuperTour. In those races —a 15k classic for the men and a 10k classic for the women —ITA Athletes not only went 1-2 in the men’s race, but they swept the podium in the women’s race. To wit: Torin Koos edged out Brian Gregg by nine-tenths of a second on the men’s side; and Caitlin Compton led an ITA 1-2-3 on the women’s side, with Laura Valaas and Nicole De Yong taking second and third, respectively. Pretty impressive results, yes?

And as it so happened, the logging of the above superlative athletic performances coincided with the publication of a fascinating editorial in yesterday’s New York Times titled “On Basic Human Pleasures: Food, Sex and Giving”. (FYI: there’s really very little sex in the piece; I think that’s just a hook to get you to read the column.)

It was penned by Nicholas Kristof (one half of the duo expected to speak at Middlebury College's commencement ceremony this spring; the other —and better? —half is his wife Sheryl Wu Dunn, with whom he co-authored the bestseller “Half the Sky”), who uses his 750 word allotment to link “doing good” to “feeling good.” To the extent that happiness drives athletic performance —and I would argue it does —one might be able to make the case that all of the Arena Athletes who do good on a regular basis are putting money in their emotional banks, as well as in the vault of their athletic potential. Just my two cents.

Texas Tech Teachable Moments

Anyone who has spent a modicum of time in a classroom --on the teacher's side of the desk, that is --is familiar with the term "teachable moment." It is precisely as it sounds: a spot in time when the teacher spies a ripe opportunity to reach out to the student and to offer that mentee a pearl of wisdom, a diamond in life's educational rough, a gem of a lesson. Any adult tagged with the responsibility of educating writ large must be in the business of searching for, identifying and leveraging these teachable moments for the betterment of the kids under his or her purview.

And it is precisely the failure of the now jobless Mike Leach to recognize and capitalize upon a series of teachable moments that underscores his unsuitability for his former position as head football coach at Texas Tech University, a position that asked of him not to teach his charges how to win, but rather to teach the young men under his supervision how to be better men.

That Leach lost sight of the mission and got caught up in the marching orders is unfortunate. That he seems to have developed what some might call a "God Complex" and what I would call a "Warden's Complex" is also regrettable. But that the well being --both physical and mental --and most importantly the character of one of the young men he recruited and was hired to educate became collateral damage in Leach's mad scientist approach to his coaching craft and subsequent rush to his own defense...well, that's where the axe falls for me. Cut him loose. He's not fit to be coaching. He's not fit to be mentoring. And he sure ain't fit to be teaching.

If he were, he would have come up with a more creative, less Alcatraz-like solution to the Adam James problem. Have a player who you think needs motivating? Want to teach him --and his teammates --a valuable lesson? Bust out any of John Wooden's books on mentoring and have yourself a read. Call up the Tebow family and talk leadership development. Take notes on some Pat Summit game tape. Or, hey, here's a new one: sit down with your coaching staff and brainstorm the most innovative and uplifting way to spin hay into gold. Because this is the teacher's mandate: to perform alchemy.

But put a concussed kid in a dark shed? Twice? Really? Is that the best you can do, Mike Leach? Was it a bad day? Get up on the wrong side of the bed? Forget your coffee? Because that's the least impressive, most banal solution to a teachable moment I can recall. Leave aside the isolation of a single player in a team sport; forget for a moment the cruel and unusual punishment foisted on James; and temporarily suspend your disbelief at the subsequent character assassination unleashed upon said 20-year old, a 20-year old Leach was supposed to be educating. (All failures in my book.) And focus instead on the missed moment to work with a player and a whole team in a meaningful manner. If one of Leach's players had committed a similar offense on the football field, had failed to capitalize on a wide open opportunity to score a point or three or six by, say, dropping a pass or botching a hold, he'd be benched. Which is precisely what has happened to Mike Leach.

Have a seat, Mike. Preferably off the field and outside the stadium. Take a time out, kindergarten-style. And think about what you should have done differently. Just be glad you're not sitting in a shed.

Italy, Qatar and...Berlin!

Although the work we do here at In the Arena is domestic (ie: our programs run in the 50 United States and address the under-served children therein), our athletes travel more frequently than Lewis and Clark. To wit: this past week saw two Arena Athletes journey overseas for competitions in Italy and Qatar.

Matt Chisam (pictured below at the 2008 US Olympic Trials in Eugene, OR) traveled to Milan to compete in a Multistars event. Although Matt had to bring all of his charm to bear on the airline personnel to get his poles to and from Italy in an affordable manner (barely), the trip was a great success and you can read about it on his blog.


Mike Hazle also ventured quite a ways from home for the thrill of a top-notch athletic competition. He traveled to Doha, Qatar for the second time in as many years to contest an IAAF Grand Prix meet --and one chocked full of talent at that. Mike threw his best season opener ever in the javelin and finished sixth in a field he says was worthy of an Olympic final. He, too, has blogged about his experience in typical Mike fashion: full of candor, humor and interesting nativist tidbits. As you can see from the photo below, Mike is all about getting a feel for the culture of the loci he visits.


And finally, it's with great pleasure that I can announce the appointment of Arena Athlete Zoila Gomez to the US World Championships Team in the marathon. She and a few of her compatriots, including Kara Goucher, will travel to Berlin in the fall to test their mettle against the world's best at that grueling distance. This will be the second time Zoila --the alternate for the 2008 US Olympic Marathon Team --dons the USA uniform. To read an interview with Zoila and her US teammates, click here.


Meanwhile, as the above athletes and their colleagues on the Arena Roster continue to pursue excellence in the civic and athletic arenas, the little one below is working out daily in the hopes of some day being able to join their ranks. While she's not yet running --or even walking --she's really good at leg lifts and arm circles. Onwards and upwards, folks.

Who is in the arena? Where? And to what end?

While I've occasionally used this space to offer a Keith Olbermann-esque "Special Comment" --albeit minus the caustic wit and inevitable toppling of some political giant --I'm becoming increasingly enamored of using it as a locus to update readers on the competitive goings-on of the Arena Athletes. While it's entirely possible to surf around to each and every Arena Athlete blog, that can be a cumbersome task; so I'll endeavor to post a one-stop shopping update every week so that those who prefer can keep tabs on the athletes' performances (in addition to their mentoring work, which is superlatively important and also detailed on their blogs and in ITA's collateral).

But wait! Before I provide an update on the Arena Athletes who have competed since my last post, I have a quick introduction to make. ITA is pleased to welcome a new member to the fold. Nope: not a new athlete. More of a peanut, actually. But she is a budding sports fan as she has already spectated the Boston Marathon (although she didn't much like the helicopter and police escorts accompanying the lead female and male packs) and has shown great interest in the Red Sox-Yankees rivalry. (Yes, she was up at 1:40am this morning to see Jonathan Papelbon strike out Robinson Cano with a bases-loaded fastball to elevate the Sox to 4-0 against the Evil Empire this season, but I digress.)

Who is she? Thea Rowe Salem (as in TR), born March 27th and weighing in at a whopping 7lbs and 2oz. She's now nearly 9lbs and, we've been told, has gained more weight in three weeks than most babies gain in two months. Folks, we may have a shot-putter on our hands. Wouldn't that be great?


Without further ado: an update on those members of the roster who have been "in the arena" of late.

Gabriel Jennings (at left) ran 14:38 for 5000m at the ASU Invitational on March 28th and, having returned to Eugene with the Oregon Track Club, has turned his sights on the inaugural USA Road Mile Championships to be contested in Minneapolis, MN on May 7th. With a rich prize purse and a stacked field (one usually follows the other), perennial "big race competitor" Jennings is sure to bring his best stuff.

Karl Erickson has put in a serious winter of training and his first competition of the year showed it. At a small meet in Mesa, AZ, Karl threw the discus farther than he ever had in a season opener --and farther than he ever has period: a PR of 62.77m. Not bad for the first meet of the year. We all look forward to seeing what else is in store for Karl in 2009.

Matt Chisam has also had a banner start to his year, highlighted by a 110m hurdles win at the Penn Relays. Matt leaves for Italy later this week for an international multi-sport competition called the Multistars, upon which I'll be sure to report in my next post.

Mike Hazle is currently in Doha, Qatar for a track and field meet. This is where he had a monster throw last year, so hold good thoughts for him as he prepares for his competition later this week. If you want to read an amusing tale of an athlete abroad (and see some great pics of Doha), check out Mike's most recent blog post.

Sara Hall has had a phenomenal start to her '09 season, culimating in a PR in the 1500m this past weekend at her alma mater's Payton Jordan Invitational. Sara ran 4:09.69 for third place. Prior to that she ran for second place in the 5000m (15:34.68) at the Brutus Hamilton Invitational. On a more personal (ie: less competition-oriented) note, Active.com posted a wonderful profile on Sara a few weeks ago; and even more impressive: Sara's husband, Ryan, threw out the first pitch at Fenway Park on April 18th (oh yeah, he finished third in the Boston Marathon a couple of days later, too).

Sarah Groff (at right) has had a sterling --as in silver --start to her season. To wit, she's notched two impressive second-place finishes in both of her big races: one at Ironman California, in which the reigning 70.3 World Champ had to set a run course record in order to best SG; and one at the hotly-contested Olympic distance St. Anthony's Triathlon. These are both non-drafting events and admittedly outside of the comfort zone of our proven ITU star. Given these early successes, just think what the World Cup circuit has in store for Sarah this season!

In a not-too-surprising turn of events, Torin Koos (at left) picked up his umpteenth national title at the US Distance National Championships. He and US Ski Teammate Chris Cook dominated the field, winning the US National Title in the Team Sprint, prompting TK's hometown paper to run the following headline (and accompanying article): Next Goal, the Winter Olympics.

Fellow Native Pacific Northwesterner Laura Valaas finished up her season in style with a dominating set of performances at the Canadian Nationals, earning herself a mention in the same "Next Goal, Winter Olympics" article as Torin. Let's hear it for the Wenatchee World's sports coverage!

Speaking of Torin's victory in the Team Sprint event at US Distance Nationals, Caitlin Compton also had a great race on the women's side. She and CXC teammate Maria Stuber came in second to a US Ski Team duo, rounding out an impressive season for the Minneapolis native.

Zack Simons has traded his skis for a cycle...a bicycle, that is. He's currently tearing up the macadam in and around his native Park City in his quest to cat up to a 1 or a 2 by the end of the year. Given Zack's ability to suffer and his raw athletic talent we think the likes of Armstrong, Leipheimer and Horner should consider themselves forewarned.

Focusing on the shorter distances this spring (in preparation for another marathon in the fall), Zoila Gomez has posted two strong results this past month: a third-place US female at the Cherry Blossom 10-miler in Washington, D.C.; and a fourth-place finish in the 10,000m --in a time of 33:50 --at the prestigious Payton Jordan Invitational at Stanford University this past weekend.

That is, as they say: all --or most, at least --the news that's fit to print.

From Winter to Spring

It’s mid-March here in New England and what with the early turning forward of the clocks and the particularly vernal weather we experienced this past weekend, folks ‘round here are understandably getting excited about the onset of spring and –more importantly –the fading of what has been a long and persistent winter. Happily, evidence of the imminent change of the seasons is at-hand as the embedded photo –taken on my morning run –attests.

Here at In the Arena this transition brings with it its own peculiar set of rites: it’s when the winter athletes wrap up their ski seasons, usually with a barnburner of a World Cup or a National Championship; and it’s when the summer athletes begin to test the fitness they’ve so dutifully been building since the beginning of the year.

I’ve borne witness to both of these types of events the past few weeks –albeit at a distance –as the full roster of Arena Athletes continues to pursue excellence in their chosen sports fields, as well as, of course, in classrooms, gymnasiums and community centers around the country and for the benefit of today’s youth.

Here’s a brief look at the competition highlights posted by Arena Athletes in the past few weeks as winter fades and spring approaches.

Brian Gregg notched his first SuperTour win of the season –along with CXC teammate Bryan Cook –in the Freestyle Team Sprint at the Madison SuperTour. A few days later, he capitalized on the confidence from that race to win a sprint finish for 4th place at the American Birkebeiner, the country’s largest single-day Nordic ski race.

After traveling over to the Czech Republic for the World Championships, Caitlin Compton returned stateside to do some domestic races, including the hometown City of Lakes Loppet, which she won in front a hugely –and understandably –partisan crowd. Given Caitlin’s propensity to dominate the longer distances, look for her to have a serious impact at the upcoming US Long Distance Nationals in Fairbanks, AK at the end of the month.

Sporting a new affiliation with the esteemed Oregon Track Club, Gabriel Jennings proved his early season fitness with a 3:58 mile at a recent meet at the University of Washington. To his credit, he said he’s taking the result as just one step along the road to running really fast this spring and summer. He has since decamped to Tucson, AZ with the OTC for some warm weather training prior to settling down in Eugene for the race season.

If ever there was a buzz forming around the development of an athlete, that would have to be Karl Erickson who –after relocating from his hometown of Minneapolis, MN to the Olympic Training Center in Chula Vista, CA –has put in a superb winter of training and is very much the talk of the elite athletes gathered there. We all look forward to seeing the caliber of results Karl produces this spring and summer.

Kate Whitcomb admits that she hasn’t had quite the season for which she had hoped and prepared; a back injury left her with no choice but to settle down in ID to pursue various PT treatments. But now she’s on her way back to being healthy –and fit, no doubt. And the good news? All that down time left her with an abundance of energy for “her kids” at Hemingway Elementary, where she is a regular fixture.

As Laura Valaas herself writes in her most recent blog post: “There aren't too many days when you laugh when a teammate tells you your place because you're both happy and unsure that she's telling the truth, or when your first glance at a results list your own name jumps out at you from the very top.” Well, that pretty much sums up Laura’s past few days of competition. After returning from the Continent and a few World Cup races –including an appearance on a sprint relay team with silver medalist Kikkan Randall at the World Championships in Liberec, CZE –Laura turned her attention to some North American races and has been decimating the competition. Currently installed at the Canadian National Championships, she’s won two of the three races she’s entered and is going for her third Canadian title in four tries later today. Go, Laura!

Coming off of a New England winter in which he wasn’t once able to get outside for a training session, Matt Chisam posted his best-ever finish in a post-collegiate National Championship when he placed 4th at the recent USATF Indoor Multis National Championship in Durham, NC. He’s now en route to his sunny home state of California for some warm weather training and a few more early season competitions.

Mike Hazle gets the award for number of miles traveled this season (although he might have to arm-wrestle Torin Koos for the honor). He’s just returned from a banner six-week training trip to Scandinavia where he ate, slept and trained with some of the world’s best javelin throwers. Some might say it’s counter-intuitive to leave sunny San Diego to go to cold and dark Norway for a bout of training; but Mike has a keen sense of precisely what he needs to do to succeed and there’s no doubt he’ll be raring to go come this outdoor season.

After earning a much-coveted World Cup start earlier this winter, Nicole De Yong settled down to contest a series of North American races. Hampered by a cold of late, she’s only raced one of the three events at the Canadian Nationals. But when she kicks her cold to the curb, watch for her to have a stellar performance at the US Distance Nationals in her home state of Alaska.

Sara Hall rebounded from a nagging winter injury to score back-to-back top-three finishes at the USATF Indoor National Championships in Boston last month. She earned a 2nd and a 3rd place in the 3000m and 1500m, respectively. Those strong finishes, especially among that caliber of competition, bode well for the season to come. Hopefully we’ll see her in Boston again soon when husband Ryan Hall competes in his first Boston Marathon on April 20th.

Like Mike Hazle and Torin Koos, Sarah Groff has been racking up some frequent flier miles. She kicked off her season in Hawai’i before returning to Colorado Springs, CO for some more altitude training and is now bedded down at the Olympic Training Center in Chula Vista, CA. Happily, she’s been able to catch up with two ITA colleagues while there: the aforementioned Karl Erickson and Mike Hazle. It’s good to know that our virtual community occasionally becomes real…and enjoyable.

Of all the news that is happiest to report, this particular tidbit tops my list: Tim Broe is running. He may not be running very fast, and he may not be running great distances; but he is indeed running again. Having a keen sense of Tim’s talent and determination, I’ve no doubts that he’ll be a force with which to be reckoned in the coming months and years.

Truth be told, I can’t recall the last time Torin Koos was on US soil. Christmas, perhaps? Such is life on the road with the US Ski Team, which Torin represented for the fifth time in this winter’s World Championships in Liberec, CZE. In addition to racing well at that venue –and doing a superb job of chronicling the experience for fans near and far, including his rapt fifth-grade youth charges back in Wenatchee, WA –Torin has also competed in a full slate of World Cups, posting an impressive 12th-place finish last weekend in Lahti, FIN and an 8th-place in Valdidentro, ITA (his best-ever freestyle World Cup finish) in mid-February. With just a few more races ahead of him, including a race around the King’s Castle in Stockholm, SWE and the US Long Distance Nationals, Torin has surely earned a trip home and ample R&R.

After battling giardia in the early part of the season, Zack Simons rebounded to post some impressive results, including a win at the Boulder Mountain Tour, some strong sprint finishes and a well-fought race at the Engadin in Switzerland last weekend. Although I know Zack was planning for a more robust season, he did a great job of working with what he was given and will surely be aiming to have an impact on the ski scene next season.

Zoila Gomez and her longtime coach Damon Martin have decided to spend the spring and early summer going after a new 10k PR before focusing on a fall marathon (possibly the World Championships in Berlin). To that end, Zoila has assembled a slate of shorter races, including a recent appearance at the US Cross Country Nationals in Maryland and some upcoming events on the track. Something tells me that 32:47 is going to fall by the wayside as Zoila rolls her way through the 2009 season.

Here at ITA we wish all the Arena Athletes –and the kids who work with them –the best in their pursuit of excellence.

In Defense of Authenticity

In this day and age of plastic surgery and PhotoShop, we’ve grown accustomed to being confronted by scenes of apparent perfection: the too-tight pull of septuagenarian skin over cheekbones; the flawless pose of Paltrow in her Tod's raiments; the oddly full heads of hair adorning pates of grandfathers everywhere. We look upon these scenes with the studied eyes of skeptics and know to take them with grains –dumptrucks –of salt.

“It’s not real,” we say to ourselves. “Not really real.” And we feel better. But what is “real” these days? Aren’t those cheekbones and mops of hair real, even if they don’t look it? Do we actually mean to say they’re not natural? But again, what is “natural”? Perhaps what we mean to say is that they’re not genuine (origin: Latin for birth, race, stock). Gosh darnit, those people were not born into this world with those features. They’re not authentic.

And it is this fundamental question of the slippage of authenticity that keeps me awake at night. Most of us can recognize a surgically-enhanced visage when we see it. But what about the better disguised cases of inauthenticity? What about the folks who received envelope after envelope of consistently sparkling quarterly returns from Bernie Madoff? What about the baseball fans who watched home run after home run soar off the bat of Alex Rodriguez? Or what about the millions of Americans tuning in to the inauguration of our current President who found themselves awed by the virtuosity of Yo Yo Ma & Co. performing so beautifully in such frigid temperatures? Did these people know they were viewing something that was neither real, nor genuine, nor authentic? Did they care?

I would wager that the folks invested in Madoff’s vehicles cared. And if the judgment that’s been passed on Mark McGwire’s candidacy for the Hall of Fame is any indicator of the public’s distaste for the use of performance-enhancing drugs in sport, I would posit that fans care about seeing a clean ballgame, too. While we could impugn the media for making a mountain out of a molehill of soaped-up cello strings and gutted pianos, learning that the musicians (but not Aretha!) at the inauguration were “fakin’ it” did diminish my previously unfettered appreciation for that event.

The crime perpetrated by these people –if that’s not too strong a charge –does not lie in their instincts to please, to thrill and to entertain. Those are admirable aims. Rather, the transgression lies in their intent to deceive their audiences, to pass off the inauthentic as real. Just as the airbrushed images of willowy models plastered on glossy magazine covers have saddled a generation of women with skewed perceptions of beauty, so do doctored returns, doctored athletes and doctored instruments do a terrible disservice to a public’s standards of achievement and our ongoing attempts to get our bearings in a rapidly changing world.

So it was with great surprise that I catalogued the following experience weekend before last. My husband and I were seated in the stands of the Reggie Lewis Center in West Roxbury, MA, soaking up the track and field action of Reebok’s annual Boston Indoor Games. In addition to the cohort of recent Olympians performing, the crowd was also being treated to three record-breaking attempts: one by 10k Olympic bronze medalist and MA native Shalane Flanagan who was gunning for the US Indoor 5k mark; and two by pole vaulters: Jenn Stuczynski, the Olympic silver medalist who was aiming for the US Indoor mark held by compatriot Stacy Dragila; and Aussie Steve Hooker, the Olympic gold medalist who was chasing Sergey Bubka’s long-standing World Indoor mark. Hooker fell just short, but thrilled the capacity crowd in his attempts. Flanagan, however, got hers; as did Stuczynski, who then went on to take a shot at the Indoor World Record height.

What was most startling, however, was a nearly inconspicuous moment that transpired in the interstice between Stuczynski’s successful American record jump and her first attempt at a World Record height. Nearly all other track action had come to a halt as the bar was verified and reset for her first World Record attempt. As Stuczynski shouldered her pole and squared her shoulders to the bar, drew a deep breath and relaxed in the final seconds before initiating her approach down the runway, a sudden cacophony erupted just to our right.

Now granted my husband and I were seated across the arena from the pole vault pit, and chances are only a small fraction of the assembled crowd was subjected to the aural interruption. But what we heard was this: sportscasters Lewis Johnson and Larry Rawson –nestled atop the adjacent broadcasting tower like fledglings in an aerie –were enthusiastically calling Stuczynski’s jump of five minutes earlier as if it were happening in real-time.

“Here she goes, folks, taking off down the runway…”
Real-time Stuczynski was motionless.

“She’s got great speed. And there’s the plant. Can she do it?”
Real-time Stuczynski palmed her pole a final time.

“And she’s over! She’s clear! Jenn Stuczynski has just set a new American record in the pole vault, ladies and gentlemen!”
Real-time Stuczynski, who had been the American record holder for at least five minutes, rolled her neck left and right and began her sprint to the bar.

Never mind the bizarrely disjointed experience those of us fans had as our eyes and ears delivered radically differing versions of the reality at-hand. But is calling a single pole vault jump too complex a job to be done in real-time? Must the commentators use a tape delay to get it right (and they did sound awfully convincing)? What was so wrong with the first call, the real call?

Ordinarily it seems that the higher the stakes, the greater the probability of dissemblance. A multi-billion dollar Ponzi scheme. Baseball’s highest-paid star. The inauguration of the country’s first African-American President. But a track and field call for ESPN2?

Et tu, Brute? Could track and field, in its hunt for a slice of our sport-crazed public’s attention, really have stooped to this level? And if this is happening in the small fry sport of track and field (don’t get me wrong: I’m as ardent a track fan as you’ll find anywhere), then where isn’t it happening? And what, if anything, can and should we do about it?

Call me naïve. Call me old-fashioned. But I think this trend continues at our collective peril. Yes, I live my professional life at the nexus of sport and youth development, where I’ve come to place the highest of premiums on authenticity (a mentor who tries to “fake it” with the kids not only won’t gain any traction, she’ll be ridiculed and rendered ineffective faster than a suburban kid can say “phat”), but what sort of a message does it send our children when we make it clear that it’s prohibitive to make a mistake, to appear less than flawless, to be decidedly unsuperlative? I’ll tell you: it’s emphatically the wrong message.

Kids need to witness failure –and the graceful management thereof –as much as they need to witness excellence. Not only that: they need to witness imperfection in those they admire most: Moms, Dads, teachers and coaches, and arm’s length idols and role models, too. I’m not advocating for mediocrity; I’m pushing for candor and transparency, for authenticity in word and deed.

If the barrier for entry into any new activity is too high (who hasn’t heard a child opt out by moaning: “I’ll never be good enough”?), ambition will languish. If we set false ceilings of expectations, confidence will fade. Some kids are born with fistfuls of talent and those outliers will undoubtedly rise to the top of their chosen fields. Others look to their environment for clues and cues to determine which path they’re best suited to pursue; they scan the searchable world (an ever-expanding realm in this day and age) and measure themselves against the images they find there.

“Which am I?” they ask themselves in a more mature version of square-peg-square-hole. “The investor? The ballplayer? The cellist?” And when the examples furnished them are not authentic representations but artificially distorted images, flawed only in their flawlessness like a reverse funhouse mirror that polishes and perfects rather than perverts, then we’ve failed our children. We’ve deprived them of the ability to get their proper bearings, to gather information and to make educated decisions based on their findings.

So, because I’m a Red Sox fan, I’ll end on this note: some say the media’s treatment of A-Rod has been too harsh. I disagree. Rodriguez is paid –and paid handsomely –to ply his trade in the baseball arena. Yes, to entertain, but also to represent the sport at its most virtuosic. So when he uses performance-enhancing drugs to inflate artificially his already impressive talent, thus distorting the public’s sense of baseball at its best, well then he deserves whatever name-calling befalls him. The New York Post ran the headline, “A-Roid.” And that was his hometown paper! What will we have waiting for him when he first takes the field at Fenway this season? Something befitting his proper place in sport history: A-Fraud.