It is not about luck

I have never been a fan of archery. But Wednesday afternoon found me seated watching the elimination rounds for archery at the Olympics. Pairs of men and women, separately walked to the field, took aim and fired their arrows.

The first set of men took aim at different times and one of them did well. A good number of his arrows hit the gold circle (which is the area that gets the archer most points) compared to the others.
Then the women came on. I found their section more interesting. It seemed they hit the gold area more than the men did. For some of the pairs, the competition was tight.

The rounds were going fine. And then Tan Ya-Ting, the world number two seed in archery came on stage. Things changed.
Tan is a 22-year-old from Chinese Taipei (which I found out is another name for Taiwan. Long story for another day). She is small, unassuming and a picture of calm. But when she raises her bow and arrow, fire comes out of this woman. When she shot her arrows, Tan hit only the gold section. Twice, she actually got the crosshairs of the target board. It was impressive.

Tan’s action on the sambadrome (the area in which they play) was nice to watch. Unlike most of the competitors,
Tan looked confident. Most of the time, after she raised her bow, Tan did not take more than four seconds before firing her arrows. The others tended to take at least six to eight seconds. There was no hesitation or doing a mini exercise with her neck or hands. She just picked the bow, and shot away.

What is for sure, is that it was not luck. Tan had practiced for this over and over again. She knew her weaknesses and how to deal with them. In an interview with Reuters, she said she was sure of her game. What she had to do was build on her mental confidence. She was gunning for gold.

Tan did not make it past the quarter finals. She met stronger competitors. These competitors had obviously done more work than her. These sports people at the Olympics teach us one thing.
It is not about what luck you have. It is about how much you are willing to put in that will get you gold. If you settle for the least, that’s what you will get. But if you push yourself every day, if you practice hard all the time, if you look at the prize, you will get it.

cbeyanga@ug.nationmedia.com