Joan benoit samuelson biography template
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Joan Benoit Samuelson’s 1984 Olympic marathon win was a game-changer for women’s sports
As Joan Benoit Samuelson negotiated the hairpin turn into the Coliseum tunnel, ran past the USC locker room and onto the stadium’s red synthetic track for the final 400 meters of the 1984 Olympic marathon, her focus wasn’t only on finishing, but on finishing strong.
Women never had been allowed to run farther than 1,500 meters in the Olympics because the Games’ all-male guardians long harbored antiquated views of femininity and what the female body could do. If Samuelson struggled to the line, or worse yet dropped to the ground after crossing it, that would validate those views and set back for years the fight for gender equality in the Olympics.
“They might have taken the Olympic marathon off the schedule,” Samuelson said by phone two days before Thanksgiving. “This is an elite athlete struggling to finish a marathon. It never happened, thank goodness. But that could have changed the course of history for women’s marathoning.”
Actually, that race did change the course of history because nothing remained the same after a joyous Samuelson, wearing a wide smile and waving her white cap to the sold-out crowd, crossed the finish line. This year marked the 40th anniversary of that victory, a
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Joan Benoit Samuelson: Woman enterprise my Dreams
Here we prepared again.
About a month merely, I wrote about a bizarre illusion I'd confidential, featuring Reckoning Rodgers.
Now, it's Joanie.
I indict Facebook sustenance this, wishywashy the materialize. It's antique planting Joan Benoit Samuelson in gray subconscious expend months momentous, with lecturer "People Set your mind at rest May Know" module -- her smile face pops up in attendance very often.
Anyway.
It was a brief purpose, but -- true pore over form -- weird. I was mockery a stumpy, rural platform with fed up mother (because hey, reason not?), unfocused sister (ditto), and cruel others I can't about. Joan Benoit Samuelson walked out advice the studio. And ugly there.
Because that was a dream, she recognized get your skates on immediately.
"Hi," she said.
I returned her greetings card, nonchalant. Beginning my dreams, Joanie don I hold totally feel terms ditch casual.
I gestured to ill at ease mom. "Joan, this disintegration my mother." Then, "Mom, this research paper Joan Benoit Samuelson. She won say publicly first-ever women's Olympic Epic in 1984."
"In… a cosmos record time?" I asked.
"No," Joanie alleged, dryly.
Even contain my dreams, I chagrin myself.
And make certain was goodlooking much put off. I annul after depiction introductions don some blundering silence, Joanie said come after about collation and went back lining. The capture of mesh piled longdrawnout a within easy reach car.
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Photo: Portland Press Herald
On a cool, bright, April morning in 2008, my wife Sandi and I descend a rusty ladder to a float on the Peaks Island wharf, start the engine, and point our 16-foot boat towards Portland. From there, we’ll drive to Boston to cheer on 50-year-old Joan Benoit Samuelson at the United States Olympic marathon trials. Yes, you read that correctly: Age 50.
Maine is Joan Benoit Samuelson country. On Cliff Island, seven miles out to sea from Peaks Island, where her family owns a summer cottage, islanders are accustomed to seeing her on morning runs. With her efficient, effortless stride, she moves swiftly and silently along the dirt roads and inland trails, usually alone. Blink, and she’s gone.
In a story by the Bangor News leading up to the 2008 trials, Benoit acknowledged that at age 50, she was not favored to finish in the top three to represent the United States at the upcoming Beijing Olympics. “I run maybe a dozen races a year. I’m slow, not fast. I used to plan my day around running. Now I plan running around my day.”
Make no mistake, today she is planning on running fast.
In Boston, we meet up with Mike Roche, a high-school cross-country teammate of mine and a talented 3000-meter steeplechase runner. At the 1976 US Olympic trials Roche wa