Black Champions; Interview with Benita Fitzgerald-Brown

fb the champions mouth full productions ninety five when the divisional round several thirty three carol sixty eight songs one zero three and you also won her fifties when you were three now wasn't around that mourners came out after i've won the medal i guess i you know all the information and everything was right hand to the media so they picked up on that right away and i'm really only the second woman to win it because they gave you since the first american women and then lastly for me what was a credible

deterrent so glamorous detention facilities didn't put any particular pressure the pressure wasn't making the list he dated the olympic trials were very intense are they actually swapped around like zombies are like a day's final eight days and then the trials because you know it mr willey you can think about the games are you want the film and getting i can be there and so you really have to concentrate on all your efforts into making the team even people never moses cop i am carl lewis and people like that even had to really just focus in on the olympic trials in chile really try not to look too far ahead and after making a team that seemed almost as if your piece of cake began a laptop and do this i can get through anything you can have a more relaxed attitude too ward's again thinking really enjoyed other the hype in the flying nun along with of course has a changing when you were to detroit's

portrait i am i was confident that i can make the team i was on innovating nineteen eighty as a freshman in college as a team and i'm we needed to go to moscow but i didn't feel like thousand a position to really do well at the games in a nineteen eighty anyway about one to go there for the experience and just enough to have been here that start placing a wedding announcement that i thought that was kind of for years long way and so on italian cinema tells me before i can say is just in very intense because i've done it before and it was expected at me to do it again and i was number one the country the year before and i and that top ten the world so you just that perches on you and you're saying well identity for many many times and never plays lower than second in the national chairmanship so that's now all those things were point to the fact that while you should make the team that anything can happen so soon her the way she could have overheard or unknowingly

thing fall anything can happen between the start in the finish of the race so any data off for this cross the finish line the exact same time in the olympic trials some within the hundredth of a second each other the winner i ran thirteen point one two in the next three of this cost him thirteen point one three so to a photo finish in about twenty minutes worth of examination you know anything about who made in the eighty nine it up second race so it's pretty exciting i'm kirstin canady at east germany at the teen and me i'm from east germany and learn and their home from well poland and as he does it i was writing them or nine in the country i won the gold medal but they used embark on just weren't there for me to compete against them and they ended up with faster times ugly and this season even ida never get to really our race against

them he's doing great yes it would have been definitely that it had to look on the bright side a very nagging rain and death that that they were going to work and the deafening roar of income i just realized that while it has opened more doors to me and to see a better chance to win a gold medal so i just have to focus in on that and worry about everything else actor or you know what might have been but i don't i just felt like there was more pressure on me because i thought that there's no reason for me not to win now because my major competition head had gone out with the eastern bloc countries onion router you for a good yes but that was in that our chairmanships the year before now is a thin net and watching the ships and i'm ninety three in

helsinki on the tv and one at the cursing mommy were second and i am i don't run a very key races and this season in august and as i was still a new collegiate lead then and in the united states to write a really heavy season in april may and june because of the two agencies especially collegians because getting re friends in la is a new collegiate coaches have you running to me it's an invitation was and things like that and you really get burnt out and by august he really does out there more this point to the motions and doing what you can but you really pasture peak and that's the point i was in i was at at the world championships in eighty three simon of like those are my guest i thought that if i had been tough i would've been five for the fifth and that race was it like to race in the country what's the reception lot of people to listen to the west for example the defense has said that the reception is

not always good for america is it this was a delight most the time for other track athletes and go to al anon in mostly european countries they really like check until the whole like they don't have a professional sports that we have as far as football baseball and everything has taken away from them just words some will say it soccer and track in the early exit so they really know the american track and field athletes are really see you walk in the streets or you're in your hotel room and to announce a hotel lobby get fifty or sixty people there have a new freer autographs were in the us you don't get that kind of reception because there's so many good athletes and so many different sports is you really can't get to know them all and so i feel like we get it better reception were overseas myself it has affected how they appreciate until the more reception centers

blackett says that america's response to them after the supposed abuse was not always as enthusiastic as many other athletes were paid much more attention to any of those get endorsements and reports there are to do it in which the black track the track whole new levels and trekking through regional like i do did you all talk about what kind of wow i was sad very disappointed at first because that you know they gave me that is to believe so much i guess all the athletes that if we did when gomez and did do well that these can be some of still waiting for is down the road and there was it wasn't there and so you got a can and it

has re evaluate your goals and say well first priority for me was to a graduation ridge tenn in december and i did that and that agent in anything in the nba things just didn't come in for me so i get to austin texas a well and says i'm actually be doing on endorsement allies will start to my career and that's opened the door for me that work a check or as a desk engineer so i mean like i said i have a tennessee look on the bright side of things i am the major accomplishment major feeling i got out i guess into games was the fact that the people at home my neighbors in dale city virginia and the people at home really appreciate what i do about the olympic games they had a parade for me in a reception anything after that that contains and still now i'm i'm supposed to be the keynote speaker my sister's graduation in july at mile high school and i'm isaac then lastly and softball so they're have a scholarship fund set up in my honor and now that a new street after me in my hometown and things like that so

we really get down to it as nozzles people really appreciate what you tell your family and you're done something for them and dance of anna improve their quality of life and i feel like i feel fulfilled so that's when i have to has a chance you have of what would appear in favor of quotes the very rich rich and the sense of opportunity to position us athlete i see it on the game back then i feel like they're terrific sell it in my appearance on didn't i mean everything nine nine percent right now and they answer it interesting character in all right but they introduce me to all kinds of things and warner's let me choose and find out what i was this stack and even then i'm in high school i had my acceptance of course and then music in church in piano my father wanted me to go into music and i was doing really well cry better and music heineman since freshman

sophomore years of high school and i was in track and field and then after nigeria made that my first us team and shouted russia and western leaning in and i met a whole lot of people about it travel that more at the next winter during the entire track season and found that i guess i could travel morning more people to do more things but it sounds it was your fork a lot of people would be interested in what he actually goes on to get checked or what is you have a particular rituals the thing is if you do the last gold medal but it's funny because i at the olympic games in rio olympic villages can have a totally different atmosphere from one if you've ever been in before advent and mike were university deans and things like there were changes we've had to stay in a village

that i think is so much more excitement the olympic village the guy does america's are so many more athletes now because it's only different sports i stayed out in pasadena with what man has been for a whole weekend and he was out there and then the night before my race i stayed in until it's because i had i want to get sweat it wasn't one to get up and eat breakfast and you are there to not have to worry about having to travel on the freeway from pasadena our way to the village so i stayed a virgin and thereby eight of us i guess and into rooms they really thrive in the air side to that then i i just get ready and dutch are estimates and practice thinking back up and said iran was television hours talking to the girls in them and then in rome and that is going through her mind they were saying it because it's added excitement and full of anticipation i guess is kind of re scientists to get out there wasn't nervous and our

eyes just excited and that was a good thing on because if you to notice a lot times he just he can take on such a legend that comes out which is looking forward to that race a lot and so the sales going on i just couldn't wait to get out there on its own to him it means all three of us made it into the final lp americans ever and into the finding her race so that was jim turner who end up getting a bronze medal and pam page an update and that then also from great britain charlie strong and she had finished fifth in the world championships year before the end of race that i had finished eighth in and so she was the major competition between private more so than my teammates and down a girl and won the gold medal in heptathlon i can't begin a vicious in australia she visited her low end and cuddle from west germany also so the whole field was really full of people that are running

close to the same time to mind was slightly faster than the message that you know a few times and the second only in his defense when you're in that type of competition if you were going to vote for you what actually happens well people are using nicer than an event like that they should be or really quiet when the gun goes before the gun goes off when they're giving commands in the lights i didn't really notice the cat ear crowd on warning that they let you out there you go to the time an undertaker spikes in anything like that in the chicken numbers and now that type of thing and this led the judge to the track to another bench we had to sit there or you can just ride around that you can get into the blocks and one of the hurdles it so you're kind of looking around and they're

doing strides mostly of those during this time to monday's mormon this and down and it really does a crowd that much either the noise is is that i don't know what we in a cafeteria here reading you know there's noise that you don't really pay that much attention to it as your costume something else then you get into the blacks and the race goes off in animal yet accredited and the race but after the semi final racer want my semi final and ran against john greyson that's what my goal is to run a guest on race and going to the final part of their two across the finish line in paris monster somewhere because it made his legacy years at this duo they don't care if it's the semifinal our child hear anything icky when they just go crazy and they're waving flags and yelling my name in this is if i won the gold medal already and spicer possibility this year and try and win this race

so great it was a wonderful feeling so i had to comeback skinny half an hour later and a final of wallace have a nice but our navigator the other time they are safe on race to run and i got back to the area had half an hour so i came back again and won the race just a tremendously sure if you know this is the chance to speak to you yeah i think it's like i said they're the guys are more intensity in the three trials and they were at the olympic games as far as between athletes were concerned because you know you know you here to be this person out of a spot on the team and none of that as just like a sentence that is a major thing and just getting here because after that i feel like it's all downhill ms reimer is keep yourself together

i could put a book starts analysis is ahead once go to a data they'll keeping yourself in containing do the things that you've been doing in more known on tumblr at ten i'll come out well for you so i ended up talking to the athletes cry more at the game say my specialty meats and it at the trials of those discounts even you know i'm really getting from ages each other to dive down into led to the races over the actors in advance and i brown well i talked to liked the people or my racing me the file is saying how well i come from a family you gone off about a business and india were american after the race it was a surefire one right away you know you it's like oh i know an awful mindset than i did jared and an eclectic as elena silva to say is you know seems to overwhelming that you couldn't actually one of oman the olympics and the girls came up and turning on the head and how it means dancing and one cell and given him a safety of wire

and going to believe it sounds happy and it doesn't really great race thank you and moscow and of high school it really creamy a lot of schools and marriage and to sail again penn state university tennessee's seemed an awareness program over all that was up and coming and it really care about the athletes and the head coach pierre at the time terry crawford browne tall now the time as she talk more about more things than just track and field she was interested in my academic life in a way how engineering schools can work into the fact that i was in a full scholarship and things like that and she seemed really interesting to me as an individual and i appreciated that she didn't have a spurt hurdle coach before i got there she had one especially so that i would get the train i mean and so when she was saying that she was looking for a sprint records that i would get the best

training so she didn't know that much about that hurts bensonhurst i felt wow she's really been led effort into this in as violet there was always a restless tremendously difficult because you have to be even more so to know is that this feeling that kind of training and you have to have some special song natural you have to have a very natural rhythm inside you said tom this kind of instinctive once you've done it enough times that no the three steps in another hurdle is going to be there that i started writing i was in junior high school nearly four rows over fifty yards in them naturally came out of the blocks in and won over the hurdle in had three steps in between internet and three steps without an intimate anything like that and that was a great technique for the event and so i just can imagine fell into a lot of girls would topple the hurdle intended

to give you the steps and happy again how wasn't doing and never have and i used to complain that i had never fallen a narration that i did last year in a columbus ohio that man that was one nice thing is because imagine him because of that financial fell into the event i had any problems with trying to get to the hurdle in them it takes a lot of practice as far as refining the technique of hurling and a very long legged and i have a lot of speed unless the music complements traveling so a couple years ago my coach and i had it disney get together and decide how to shorten my stride in an increase as driving with c so that i would have to take such big steps in between her toes it was getting too close to the hurdles so i was hitting him towards the end of the race so i chopped them as driving out on sprint as fast as far as open raises concerns that it has helped my her now janssen the director say is that spreads out to the hundred meters

into a genius for like three or four years as rankin top ten in the country nothing else the land aside that tolly passage in her nose and eighty three that's when everything turned around that's a lot from the rejuvenation of wine and that felt really good so i just i just passed in her innocence is an i have to imagine what people know certainly there's a great deal of pressure pressure in the process it would seem to me also that question once you've won our system will fight go into a big city and desist affliction young life because it's hardly get that debt for the raise a voice rang the cans on it is it so therefore carol sony

song one zero five which is a reporter for time high and i didn't challenge in a corps relies on and my college team and now i'm i really enjoyed spreading and i just kind of fell into writing the hurdles and concentrating on that event because i thought they're the most potential and their eyes are on top ten in the country for like three or four years in poker hundred and the two hundred am her assault the same time and i ended up dropping her nose and sprints and eighty three and the county no one the country because i concentrate on my efforts into one place is a jack watch a semester now and that's more or less what i was until i very encouraging ah my father graduated from the dreamy verse people can stand there and you go to work anyway and the

father get his master's at virginia tech to my mother gary sick columbia university i'm logan them i didn't start their careers before they got married i think they started and teaching and as a mother about twenty twenty and my father after he got out the air force so they had it right five or six years and around saying that marriage about twenty nine at a they're more mature more reagan handle you know a lot of things and roundly been there and i are now it and twenty three timeline say really knew what they wanted to teach their children to analyze everything else another one to go about doing and so i'm on my life that introduced a lot of things to me that a lot of parents don't understand that the child find out for themselves that mr follett always taking sightseeing him by crane and now i'm going to disney classical music in i play the violin i was in ballet that tap dancing gymnastics awful you name it cited explore a whole lot of different things and then find out when alice best and

he wanted to also persons athletic ability or quarter turn education recently graduated pursuit of going to college and the way that we feel about the fact that athletics known for bravado a person education is a good thing to hear about the abuses that we've created a virtual nervous breakdowns and there is some abusive what was awaiting a full scholarship because it wasn't instead listeners to achieve because if a bit my coaches were so understanding and responsive to my needs and that's like i said one reason why when she received tennessee in the first place they enlisted that engineering takes a lot of time and i understand also the track infield was the reason our lenders to tennessee in the first place is for us and them paying

for my school so instead of taking that required not required that suggested eighteen seventeen hours a quarter i take twelve to fifteen hours a quarter and took five years to graduate back in that way i was more wrestling and and they'd have to put so much effort into the school where that would take away from the track and vice versa during finals week or during the time to test if i needed if i had stayed up all night studying a funny mixture time protest i'll just tell my track coaches you'd say ok take that they often on pakistani or go back home sleep a new and her learning to do so i had really good understanding with my coaches though it for me it worked out really well it convinces situation like to hear an innately for this past year to continue the school lot of people would've taken staff from school no change with in the debates but i figured i had been running well and going to school for four years and i felt like i could do it one more year and in that didn't finish my degree and so that's what i did i didn't want to take up that one yes in a

trilogy then an unlocked and elitism never really get back to it and since it was framed they're still paying for it i felt like i really should delay announced that they were growing up you know so i'm with athletes with people in sports to look up to protect you it's known that la as far as you know heroes and i was i had heard of course and we always think of things damian us or less not something if you're aspiring to do with his suppliers really admiring them for doing what they've done but not until i was in high school i was a freshman in and out our neighbor of mine and also friend and teammate tyler perry may be in the b team in seventy six when she was a senior at the high school on the same team as i was and she made the team in the high jump and my coach jacques pepin that some are said to me of nina for years and it could be getting out the

potentially at the time and that is it just something to think about and four years later i was in for effective than i was last on and won the gold medal so i think our really yet being graded do with mind realizing that it's not just the one laughing and jesse on some way far away to someone right here at home around the corner with a similar background you know both parents very educated in an unknown question of event that can achieve those things he really don't have to know the way mr eisenstein they say it seems almost as if they are because it's so far away from reality when you're you know twelve thirteen so different views so and she trains and she dreams of the ancient we've come and look at it or take a look at technology and one of the things you've been looking what kind of advice did you first first of all what kind of

things would you look for temperamental it for sometimes years while a lot of people have the talent to be champions in in this for amanda said his track and field in the sport and now there's so many athletes especially guys i know it may have gone to college or had been in high school and has an awesome athletes and i'm a college and you never hear them again whether have the grace to go to college and you really never hear them again after that and it's really disappointing solid howard looked for an average intelligent person you know because you'd have to have that knowledge and know what it means to be a team what you don't have to put into it physically and emotionally in them and also to take advantage of whatever obviously coming away such as a full scholarship and learning your tickets were also a person that isn't doesn't have television i guess as far as one and just do one thing oblivious to everything else in their lives that

they get it really is important to take into account your education or your family and everything else that's going on randy because a lot of people who'd well there isn't one basket and when it doesn't come true for them and they're kind of devastating have unbeknownst to fall back on and are people in this city this summer and eighty four did not make the olympic team they should have you know in my race and the girl that had been reading when the conscience for me seventy hightower to not make a tea and then she was concentrating on their belgian on one goal for five years was jamaican of the team and it didn't happen but she does have a degree says she had something else to fall back on that a lot of people did and i'm and that people there they're older now and the year twenty twenty nine years old they don't have an ad in the piano in them and so if they haven't gone out and tried to do something else outside a giant tent outside of the sport and they're really kind of left in the dust as fires and something answer to the nine seconds and says voice or read i don't

think so i think that it's not too much deficit placed an emphasis placed on sports is not enough place to another areas they just make it seems in sports as the end all i think you're going to need it throw yourself into english do well i have to concentrate on the sport when you're there when you're a practitioner because changing on that and practice within me concentrating on which originally and you know putting all of yourself into that but they don't cut it enough on everything else like this they need to be a little bit more well rounded so that there are other things in it and don't like to school work go by the wayside because you could be the best athlete in the world and if you don't have the great american at a gate into the university or be if you get in won't you stay so this is big as far as how appeals on or wanting to

this is morning edition to be a champion is to have achieved that can cause success in a particular area that's when i knew her