MY GREATEST OLYMPIC PRIZE - JESSE OWENS - BASIC ENGLISH NOTES - SEMESTER II - SUMMARY

 

MY GREATEST OLYMPIC PRIZE 

JESSE OWENS

SUMMARY

 

This story is an outline of true sportsman spirit and friendship. Competitions are tied in with winning as well as about taking part with a positive spirit. An excursion of a competitor begins before the competition, and it was something very similar for Jesse Owens as well. He had started his preparation for these games six years before they occurred.

 

"My Greatest Olympic Prize" is a true story of the author's life a personal record of Jesse Owens' experience of true friendship in the Berlin Olympics 1936 where he won four gold medals. The Chancellor of Germany, Adolf Hitler, was getting ready with his performers to prove the predominance of the Aryan race by winning the most gold medals in the events.

 

However, Jesse Owens, an American Negro, had different plans in his brain. He was determined to prove Hitler's theory wrong by winning a couple of those gold medals. What's more, in view of that objective, he had prepared hard and trained himself for a very long time. Also, a year prior to the great occasion, Jesse set a world record of 26 feet 8-1/4 inches in running board jump his college. Thus, everybody anticipated that he should win that Olympic without any problem.

 

When Jesse arrived at Berlin and attended the board jump trials, he was amazed to see that a German athlete named Luz Long was hitting very nearly 26 feet at the practice leaps. He additionally came to realize that Hitler had stayed quiet about him, expecting to win the leap with him. Knowing Hitler's cunning ways, Jesse blew up and more resolved to win the board jump and to prove who was the best and who was not.

 

Yet, an angry athlete consistently commits errors. Jesse fouled in the initial two preliminary jumps by taking off from a few crawls past the line. Then, at that point he thought harshly "Did I come 3000 miles for this? To foul out of the preliminaries and make a fool of myself?"

 

Jesse was unmistakably baffled and kicked the ground in disdain. Unexpectedly he felt a hand on his shoulder. The man was in all honesty his German rival in the board jump Luz Long who had equipped for the finals on his first attempt. The friendly blue-peered toward man offered Jesse a strong handshake. Then, at that point Luz urged him and proposed to jump from a couple of creeps back of the board. His tip assisted Jesse with qualifying the finals.

 

In that evening Jesse met Luz to say thanks to him and discussed themselves, sport events and the world situation in addition to other things. Jesse came to realize that Luz didn't trust in the Aryan-supremacy theory. They turned out to be old buddies after that discussion and Luz truly needed Jesse to give a valiant effort – regardless of whether that implied Jesse's winning.

 

The following day Luz broke his own previous record and that inspired Jesse for a peak performance. When at long last he arrived from his last leap, Luz was the main man there to salute him. He warmly greeted Jesse, despite that Hitler was watching them from the stands. This was an incredible presentation of true sportsman and friendship.

 

Jesse Owens proceeded to win four gold awards that year. Yet, he feels that Luz Long's friendship was the best Olympic prize which he won in Berlin. Indeed, their companionship finished just when Long died in World War II.

 

Owens adds a note after his story that Luz was the perfect example of the sportsman spirit that Pierre de Coubertin, founder of modern Olympic Games, had as a top priority when he said that participating and battling great is a higher priority than winning or overcoming.