I saw this article on Joe Vigil. It certainly warmed my heart. I am privileged to have Joe as a mentor and and a friend. He is an amazing individual, a role model for all teachers and coaches.
‘Dean of distance’ discusses Olympics
By Mike Touzeau, Special to the Green Valley News
Though he was impressed – as the rest of the world was – with the pageantry, what legendary distance coach Joe Vigil recalls most from his 40th year of service to his country in the Olympic games is the Chinese people and the changing face of the sport he has loved all his life.
“I’ve been to a lot of Olympics,” said Colorado’s Coach of the Millennium and member of 11 halls of fame, “but nothing compares to what they did in China.”
Speaking from his Green Valley home between training seminars in San Diego and Las Vegas, Vigil, who has coached and mentored coaches at every Olympics since 1968, was disappointed that his men’s distance runners were shut out on medals and didn’t come close to their best times, but still found something positive, as he characteristically does.
“We probably did better than we ever have, actually, because of the number of men who made the finals.”
The U.S. track and field team took 23 medals.
Read the full article HERE.
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