People say that it doesn’t matter if you win or lose. But when you lose it matters and it hurts! One day after studying the Olympics in class our sixth-grade teacher said, “It’s possible that one of you might one day win an Olympic Gold Medal. Who do you think has the best chance of winning a medal in this class?” A boy sitting next to me stood up and said, “I don’t know who has the best chance but I do know who has the WORST chance; Lanny!” That’s when losing hurts and I was losing a lot. I made up my mind that some day I would show that kid. I had to find a sport that would take a short, slow athlete to the Olympics.
One day a friend of mine invited me to a rifle club meeting. “What do you do at a rifle club meeting?” I asked.
“We shoot rifles. It’s fun and it’s an Olympic sport,” he said. I was interested. “How strong do you have to be to be a rifle shooter?”
“You don’t have to be strong. The rifles aren’t that heavy!” He said.
“How tall do you have to be to be a rifle shooter?” “You don’t have to be tall.”
“OK, how fast do you have to be to be a rifle shooter?”
“You don’t understand,” he replied. “You don’t have to be tall or strong or fast. All you have to do to be the best rifle shooter in the world is stand still.”
“Great!” I exclaimed. “There’s an Olympic sport where all you have to do is be still. I can do that! I’ve had lots of practice in the dugout and on the bench.”
That was the beginning of my shooting career. My father took me to that rifle club meeting and they let me shoot. I wasn’t good at it but I wasn’t bad at it. I was average. I had never been average at anything in my life and I was average at this sport from the very first night. Wow! Shooting was all I talked about the next week. My dad took me to the next meeting but when we arrived the man running the club gathered us around and explained that he had some bad news.
“I’m afraid we are not going to be able to shoot tonight. In fact, we are not going to be shooting at all. We have some trouble with using this range and tonight is our last night. Walking out of the range with my father I remember looking up at him.
“You know Dad. I think this is the most disappointed I have ever been in my life!”
Then my father said, “I don’t want you to worry about this son. I’ll take care of it. I’m your dad. I’ll pick you up from school tomorrow.” The next afternoon my father was waiting for me after school. In the back seat of our car was all the equipment needed to shoot. He’d arranged the use of an indoor shooting hall and for the next year he taught me to shoot. He encouraged me, became my coach and took up the sport as well. We practiced together and became a team. You see my father never played baseball or basketball either. He and I became best friends on that rifle range. Fifteen months after beginning shooting I won my first national championship.
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