I feel fortunate that there was a place like the CFL where I could hone my skill and become a consistent football player and have a nice career.
We knew the people in Natick and knew the teachers that would be teaching our children. It was important for us to be involved in the Natick community because we think so highly of it.
I adapted an antiquated style and modernized it to something that was efficient. I didn't know anyone else in the world would be able to use it and I never imagined it would revolutionize the event.
I didn't train to make the Olympic team until 1968. I simply trained for the moment. I never even imagined I would be an Olympic athlete. It always seemed to evolve.
I was just ice skating. I had no concept of that. In those days you couldn't see the judges. I was this little person on the ice and they were just people that would stand around the boards.
Everybody has to deal with tough times. A gold medal doesn't make you immune to that. A skater is used to falling down and getting up again.
It took me two years to get an appointment with Mr. Suga who cut my hair for the Olympics. Who knew? I had no idea that it would be popular.
I didn't try to cry my way out of Orlando. That was never my intention, or not what I did at all. And I understand everybody thought it was that way because of what was being put out there.
I never saw a wild thing sorry for itself. A small bird will drop frozen dead from a bough without ever having felt sorry for itself.
Standing on the podium at the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta and receiving a gold medal was the crowning jewel in a successful gymnastics career and, most certainly, the confirmation that my parents' sacrifices were not in vain.
I got injured at the Olympic Trials in 2000. I could not jump. I could not walk on my leg properly. I couldn't bend my knee. I couldn't straighten it.
Training with Bela and Marta Karolyi took the joy out of the Olympics for me. I look back and feel there was a lot of verbal and physical abuse. For years, I felt it was my problem.
I can barely recall a single holiday when my father didn't make a scene or create some kind of chaos. We were always walking on eggshells.
I want to race as long as I'm having fun, it's competitive and healthy, and who knows when that, you know, date comes when that's not happening anymore.
When you've got the Daytona 500 out there at stake and everything riding on the line, guys go for it, and the guys that go for it are the ones that are either going to win or they're going to wreck.
Both the cockroach and the bird would get along very well without us, although the cockroach would miss us most.
The thing about getting older is the injuries. You just get injured more often. You take time off, you come back, you get injured again and you never get in shape.
I really like the retro look. My regular clothing, I like to always keep it classy and I like to kind of be more dressed up more of the time. I'm not really someone you see in sweatpants a lot.
In all the time that people have known me, has anyone ever heard me talk about the importance of rushing records or finishing with the most touchdowns? So if that's never been important to me, then why would that be a motivation to keep playing?
I had the most incredible time on 'Dancing With the Stars.' It never occurred to me when I took it on that I would physically not be able to do it because that's not in an Olympic competitor's vocabulary! It was the most wonderful environment, such a...
In my very first interview, at nine years old, I said I wanted to be an Olympic gold medalist. That was the first time I said it out loud in front of somebody other than my parents.
