Greatness isn’t just for the Olympics

I was recently in one of those discussions that makes your heart sing. The Olympics are upon us again and our discussion revolved around the question whether it is easier to be great when younger. It didn’t take long for us to traverse beyond sport. Do people tend to devote more energy and effort to their careers when younger? Does their effort fall away as they gain more experience? Why? Does this apply to everyone?

Over 10,000 athletes are expected to compete at the 2024 Olympics. However, that is a result of the number of events, sports and countries. So, let us say that athletes at this level are typically in the top 50 in their general discipline. (Some sports are more athlete-heavy - swimming, for example, has more events than track).?So, perhaps 50 is a fair representation of the pinnacle in each sport. With a world?population of 8.1 billion people that, very rough estimate, would suggest there are approximately 162 million people who are equally great.

However, would that be sufficient to allow for the greats across all areas; business, technology, science, education, etc? Would it allow for the greats that may never be seen, perhaps as they live in less fortunate circumstances, stymied by bigotry, poverty, lack of opportunity or other reasons? We concluded that we’d just accept it as a rough approximation, not genuinely being able to comment one way or the other.

By observation, we concluded that many people put in a greater effort when younger. However, those efforts may be more evident if only because it’s the building blocks to their career. Perhaps the greater finesse, the restraint in what is done and not done, perhaps that is built increasingly later in a career, and is less evident. The discussion also diverged into the question if, as people age, do they feel they have more to lose? Or if the real crux is that people fear being ‘great’, that they shy away from it?

Well may we argue that some of these greats are freaks. People such as Usain Bolt come to mind. Yes, they do appear to be physical freaks at the least. However, how many tall, lanky people have you seen in your life? They do not all become great. So I am going to argue that any number of them may have predispositions towards greatness in a particular sport (or other endeavour), but others? Consider Jess Fox. What is her (apparent) superpower? A review of her record shows that she has built over time towards greatness. What’s her superpower? Perhaps it is between her ears. Perhaps, then, greatness is within the grasp of many. If so, then it is available if they will put in the work. Consider the parents of Jess Fox, both of them necessarily older. Her mother, Myriam Fox-Jerusalmi, is the coach to Jess and others. She was recognised with an International Olympic Committee Coaches Lifetime Achievement Award in 2023 for her contributions to the sport, having coached athletes to multiple medals on the world stage and having been instrumental in developing sport further. It would seem, then, that age is no barrier to greatness.

To round off our discussion we checked that that ever-ready source of wisdom, the phone, to look anew at the question of greatness and longer careers outside of sport. We ‘asked’ some experts:

Meet the Nobel Prize laureates of 2023. That’s not to argue that it’s an equal opportunity for all. It isn’t. However, as we marvel at the performances, perhaps we should broaden our discussions to what limits each of us?