Second Place is the first loser?

"Winning isn't everything...it's the only thing." -Vince Lombardi

Last night NBC showed the women's pole vault and it turned into a duel between Jennifer Stuczynski of the US and Elena Isinbaeva, the current world record holder, from Russia. The two were going vault for vault until Stuczynski missed tying her own American record. Isinbaeva went on to break her own olympic and world records, but what was shocking was the reaction of Stuczynski's coach. Instead of the "ok we got silver, let's get back to the training grounds in a couple of weeks and we'll prep for the world championships." It was a litnany of the faults that she had done in that and the previous two attempts at her record followed by the snide remark " I guess silver isn't bad for someone who's been doing this for four years." For one thing Stuczynski's medal after doing the sport for four years is a massive accomplishment, the only person who beat her is the world champion, who by the way has been doing it longer. For someone who's been doing a sport for only four years she schooled several competitiors that have been doing this for almost a decade, she has nothing to be ashamed of....except she wasn't good enough gold. She showed more class than her coach, she talked to reporters despite the fact she probably wanted to hang herself by her shoe laces after the tounge lashing..and tried to hold her head high .

This incident leads me to ponder, Is Second place really the first loser? The reaction of Stuczynski's coach was in stark contrast to the men's gymnastics team which pulled a shocking upset for Bronze. The way those guys were celebrating you would have thought they won gold and set 8 world records in the process. Dara Torres earning the silver in the Women's 50m Free and silver on the 4x100 medley relay. There were no snide comments of "good for a middle-aged mother of 1." "Or you really should have exploded more off the blocks, and you turnover, well what happended, you swim faster in practice." They were athletes doing the best they could on a given day and on that given day there was somebody who was just a bit better. So does that mean they're losers? Tell you what when you can do a routine on Pommel Horse and score a 15, Pole Vault over 16 feet or you're 41 and swimming close to world record pace give me a call. Then you can call these athletes losers, leave the snide comments, and boast on how they are no talent bums, but for the rest of us struggling along in the sports world, being able to qualify for the olympics let alone win a medal would be a honor. But at the same time when you go into any competition the main goal is to win. So to stop beating around the bush is second place the first loser, I guess you'd have the person who came in second.